The Skinny Confidential Him & Her Podcast - Luke Storey - Human Optimization, The Struggle of an Addict, Recovery, Spirituality, & Personal Transformation

Episode Date: December 11, 2018

#155: On this episode we sit down with lifestyle design expert, transformational coach and fellow podcast host Luke Storey. This episode is a wide spanning conversation covering what it's like to battle addiction, practical tools family and friends can take with their love ones struggling with addiction and how to bounce back from rock bottom. We also dive into the world of human optimization, biohacking and stem cells. Luke is well versed in the school of hard knocks and brings a very raw look into the world of recovery and coming out the other side.  To connect with Luke Storey 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 WOO MORE PLAY is the all natural and organic coconut love oil that is changing the way we have sex. With only 4 all natural ingredients WOO is the perfect personal lubricant to spice up your sex life.  All Him & Her Listeners will receive 20% off your entire order plus free shipping when when visiting www.woomoreplay.com & using promo code HIMANDHER at checkout. This episode is brought to you by OMAX. We love OMAX, As you guys know we are huge Omega 3 fans and OMAX3 has some of the purest Omega 3 supplements on the market. Over 75% of Americans Don’t get enough Omega 3 in their diet. Omega 3’s help improve mental focus, memory and cardiovascular health. Omega 3’s also alleviate joint pain and muscle health. OMAX3 is clinically tested and they do what’s called a freezer test challenge to verify that each supplement is pure. To try OMAX3 and receive a free box go to www.tryomax.com/skinny This episode is brought to you by FOUR SIGMATIC We have been drinking this company's mushroom-infused elixirs and coffees for over a year now. When we need a break from coffee but still need that extra morning jolt and focus the Mushroom Coffee with Lion's Mane and Chaga is the way to go. Lauryn also drinks the Mushroom Matcha which is a green tea designed as a coffee alternative for those of you who want to cut back on caffeine without losing focus and cognitive boosts. This stuff doesn't actually taste like mushrooms, it's delicious. All of these blends have a ton of nutrients and amino acids to give you balanced energy without the jitters. To try FOUR SIGMATIC products go to foursigmatic.com/skinny and use promo code SKINNY for 15% off all products. 

The following podcast is a Dear Media production. superfoods delicious and easy to do with their mushroom coffees, mushroom superfood blends, and mushroom elixirs. If you're looking for a coffee alternative, switch up your caffeine intake. Four Sigmatic has the blends for you. They're all delicious. Just open a pack and add it to hot water. They don't taste like mushrooms. And like always, we have a special offer just for him and her listeners. Go to foursigmatic.com forward slash skinny and enter promo code skinny at checkout for 15% off your entire order. That's foursigmatic.com forward slash skinny and enter promo code skinny at checkout for 15% off your entire order. That's foursigmatic.com forward slash skinny and then promo code skinny at checkout for 15% off. I'm telling you their assortment of products are game changing and I take so many for so many different reasons. So check it out, Four Sigmatic. This episode is brought to you by Omax. So guys, most of us are lacking in omega-3s and it's hard to find the right source to supplement

omega-3s in your diet, which find the right source to supplement omega-3s in your diet, which is why you want to try Omax 3. I love it for improving my mental focus and memory. Omax is offering all TSC, him and her listeners, 60% off a one-month supply of Ultra Pure. You get free shipping and a 60-day money-back guarantee. Just go to tryomax.com slash skinny to take advantage of this incredible savings. That's T-R-Y-O-M-Aomax.com slash skinny to take advantage of this incredible savings. That's T-R-Y-O-M-A-X.com slash skinny for 60% off a one month supply. You hear all the hype around Omega 3s. Well, now it's your chance to try the most trusted Omega 3 on the market today. Go to tryomax.com slash skinny. 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! Yeah, I woke up one morning and, like, rolled over and there was cockroaches crawling around the floor next to me. And I was just, I'm like, I'm done. Like I had, I had just like a sliver of self-worth that said, Luke, your life has to be worth more than this.

I'm not sure what it is, but it was that inner voice that there was just this tiny little voice of hope kind of just whispering from, it was like kind of listening to a transistor radio from the bleachers in a baseball stadium. You know, that's how faint it was, but it was like, maybe there's a chance. Stop this shit, you know? And yeah, and I called and got myself into a treatment center. And that was the beginning of the journey that brought us here today. Welcome back. Welcome back to the Skinny Confidential Him and Her Show. If you are new to the show, thank you for joining that clip with some of our guests of the show today. Lifestyle design expert, transformational coach, and podcast host, Luke Story. On this episode, we discuss battling addiction, how to help your loved ones battling addiction, human optimization, biohacking, and alternative medicine. Sitting across from me is my lovely wife and co-host, Lauren Everts. You need a new adjective other than lovely, I think.

What do you want me to say? Busty? Busty. I don't know. Like charismatic, beautiful. Beautiful, you've used. Amazing, you've done. Like you've used way too much.

What about ravishing? Okay. Pull out the thorus. Taylor, pop up a list of synonyms on the screen. Anyways. I'm Lauren. I'm the creator of the Skinny Confidential. And apparently I am lovely.

Ravishing. And I am Michael Bostic, also ravishing, CEO of Dear Media and podcast host. Welcome back to another show. We're getting up there in shows. We are getting up there. I really, really like this episode because Luke opens up about his addiction. And you guys know that I did a podcast with my little sister who battled with heroin and other drugs for like five years. And so this episode to me, it's really important. I think

that especially if you're out there and you're listening and you are a family member or a friend who has someone that you know that is battling an addiction, I think that it will be helpful. That was an old, I don't want to say old, but it feels old now. I'm just looking at it on my computer. It says May 16th of 2017, episode number 63, when we did that episode with your sister and Johnny. That was really cool how they came on and opened up. If you guys haven't listened to that episode, it was a good one. It was really, really important. And especially if you're out there and you are dealing with addiction, I think that's a good episode to listen to. We have a lot of gems back. I'm like back looking at the old list of episodes, like pre episode 75. Maybe don't go

back to episodes. Don't go back to like one to ten but there's some there's some germs back there we're having fun when we're figuring out this medium our first episode was very interesting remember we did that thing where we taylor was there taylor it's come a long way we were filming in our condo thinking it was going to be like a video show and then we had my sister jordan who was working for us at the time, asking questions. But for whatever reason, we like didn't put her on the camera, we put her off to the side. But that just I think that's important to show that you sometimes have to wrap your head around an idea and just keep doing it over and over week after week, day after day until the idea becomes clear. And you can really see the brand and have clarity with it.

You know, what's also crazy is Taylor, our producer, who many of you have known on this show as the Bare Naked Cucumber, is still working for us. He is now one of the head producers of our podcast network, Dear Media. Taylor, why don't you say hello on the mic? It's been a little while. You were on a band for a long time. A lot of people know that Taylor was banned for a while, but Taylor, why don't you say hello once again? Surprise, surprise, surprise. The mic is hot. The mic is hot. I'm back. Everyone thought I was gone, but I'm not. Back on the mic after your hiatus. You know what, Taylor? I was thinking, I want that mic every time we're recording because I've wanted that thing to be hot the entire time. Because listen, you're an

integral part of this show. You've been here since day one, as many listeners know. And I can't, now you're behind this wall. You do all the editing, all the production of our show. But I want you chiming in once in a while because sometimes I have questions for you. We've got this new screen in here to pull up anything we want. You're back there. And I think the audience misses you chiming in once in a while. Because you decided to tell the story of how you went on a strip pull and peed on yourself. Was that why, Michael?

I wouldn't even consider it a ban. I would say that it more or less went away in, uh, in, in shame of my internal shame. No, no, no.

It was a ban. It was a ban. Um, for sure. It was a ban. Taylor's back. He's hot. He's our producer.

He's now at your media and he also has a new edition. It's a man bun. So, uh, we're dealing with that. Anyways, for any of you guys that are interested in learning more about our producer, Taylor, go back. There's a man bun. So we're dealing with that. Anyways, for any of you guys that are interested in learning more about our producer Taylor, go back. There's a bunch of episodes. What are they

titled, Michael? I'd say a good one to start with is number 42. What's that called? You know, 42 is a good one. Number 31 was a strong introduction to Taylor, but he's been around the whole time. Can you just tell us what one's called? Mr. Piss Pants? Mr. Piss Pants Wild Ride is number 42. That's one that started leading into the band. What about One Minute Man? Isn't there One Minute Man? That one's my favorite. Yeah, there's a lot of them.

So anyways, guys, Taylor will be back on the mic every once in a while. I really want recurring characters on this show, and I want to make sure that the audience doesn't forget the people that have been here with us since day one. With that, let's jump in to one of our more interesting conversations in a while. This one went all over the place with Luke's story. We talked about addiction. We talked about human optimization, biohacking. Luke's kind of been through it all. All right. Before we dive into that, let's talk about Omega-3s. This has been a big theme on the Skinny Confidential, him and her. Our favorite right now, we've talked about this before, is

Omax. So you guys know we're super selective about which products we talk about on this show, and we really do turn down so many sponsors. We vet each one really carefully before we commit. We try it, we do it for at least a month, and Omax has been through that process. So before we get into it, Omax is giving a free box away when you go to tryomax.com slash skinny. So Michael has tons of joint and muscle pain from when he was little. Honey, maybe you can talk. It's gotten better using Omax.

But when I was younger, I used to work out. I looked like a meatball. I was one of those guys in the gym that got a little too big, taking way too many pre-workout supplements. And I pay the price now. My joints are out of whack. And I need an omega-3 as well as many other things to help get those back in line. And for me, I like omega-3s because I like them

for focus. I honestly feel like so much more focused on my task at hand when I take them. I've noticed a really, really big difference and that shouldn't surprise you because omega-3s are great for focus and memory loss. I actually take them when we're going to be podcasting because I feel they're good for cognitive memory and they make my interviews sharper and more on point. So it's also good. I feel a little bit of a fog when I don't take it. And when I do take it, I am on point. So if you guys want to improve your memory, you want to get rid of joint pain, and you

want to improve your focus, you definitely have to check out Omax, okay? I think you'll all love it. All right, now for the fun part. Omax is offering TSC, him and her listeners, 60% off a one-month supply of Ultra Pure. You also get free shipping and a 60-day money-back guarantee. Just go to tryomax.com slash skinny today to take advantage of this insane savings. That's T-R-Y-O-M-A-X.com slash skinny for 60% off a one month supply. You guys hear all the hype around omega-3s. Well, now it's your chance to try the most trusted omega-3 on the market today. Go to tryomax.com slash skinny. And I would also say you don't have to worry about the fish burps like many of the other omega-3s on the market. You can feel confident knowing that if you're

taking these, improving your focus and your memory, also improving your breath and not worrying about smelling like a rotten fish. Yeah, no one likes a fish. Tryomax.com slash skinny. Check it out. Luke Story is the lifestyle design expert, transformational coach, and business mind behind the wildly successful podcast, The Lifestylist Podcast with Luke Story. Luke provides a raw and deep diving curiosity into the world of people living life at the highest level of human potential. Please enjoy this roller coaster of a conversation with Luke Story. This is the Skinny Confidential, him and her. Podcasting's fun, huh? It's amazing. Yeah, it is amazing. It's like so many interesting people.

Yeah. And I just, it's the shit that I would do for free anyway. That's exactly how we feel. When I first, I started mine two years ago and I was like, and I got some pretty big names right away in the health field. And I felt like I was like gaming the system. I'm like, I get to sit down and have conversations with these people for free. I should be like paying them for a consultation or something. Isn't it crazy? Yeah, it's funny.

I will say the same thing. Cause like if I went into some, I don't know, CEO or editor or whoever and said, hey, listen, I need an hour of your time uninterrupted. I want to ask you anything I want to ask you and you have to answer me in an authentic way. They'd be like, yeah, right. Or book my season. Yeah, yeah. But when you say, hey, do you want to come on the podcast and talk about all this?

They're like, yeah, come on in. You never have access to those people you didn't. And now we're talking to you. Yeah. Actually, you know who's been one of my favorites too is John Gray, author of Men Are From Mars, Women Are From Venus. It's kind of like old school relationship guy that, you know, I was like, I was aware of that book, but I didn't know that it had any validity.

And I've had him on twice. And I've learned so much, like things that I've applied in my life a lot. Like what? I would love to hear what you learned from that author, because I know exactly who you're talking about. That book's iconic. Yeah. Well, from John Gray, it's just like, it's not politically correct at all, but he deals with hormones, right? And just, I mean, primarily deals in male-female heterosexual relationships. I don't know how it would apply to relationships out of that, but I'm a heterosexual male, so it applies

to me. And it's about learning how to manage your hormones while in relationship and understanding. He's not so much like metaphysical in terms of like, ooh, masculine and feminine energy, but masculine and feminine hormones and what behaviors and what habits in relationship cultivate the proper hormonal balance, basically, and the way that our brains are different. And so if you have an understanding of the way your brain and hormones operate, and those of your partner, it makes a hell of a lot easier to get along. Give us some like specific examples of what you mean. For example, and these are things that I've, I've noticed about myself, but was never never able to decode scientifically. So I used to be in a

relationship with a woman. And for example, we'd be out all day running around and whatever, we're going and getting stuff for the house, grocery shopping, running errands, having fun, being productive. And we'd come home and I would just have to get away from her. I just had to go be by myself. And when she got home, she wanted to like talk about everything we did and like keep hanging out. Or she would be out all day doing her thing and then come home and want to tell me about her day, like right when I got home from doing my day. And I'm like, dude, like I can't, it would just be annoying. So she would feel like I didn't care about her and that I didn't want to hear about her day. So for example, from John Gray's teachings, the issue there is that when men are out interacting in the world,

we burn out our testosterone. And when we come home, we need what's called cave time. And that's, you just need a little time by yourself, whether that's doing something productive or meditating or just being inward a little bit. He just watches the news, he says. I don't know what that, that would probably ruin my attitude. But you rebuild your testosterone,

then you can come and be able to hold space. Playing video games, reading a book. Yeah, whatever. Just kind of going into your cave, like your man cave. I think I have masculine hormones, though, because I need cave time, too. Well, we all oscillate, I think, between the two. So that's one. And then the other one is, I mean, this one has saved my life.

And in all female relationships, whether platonic or not. And that is when a woman wants to express what she's going through and express her feelings to just really be open and hold space and not try to fix them or solve them or say she's wrong and she should view it another way. But literally just to be like, wow, is there anything else not not like placating i mean earnestly like being compassionate and just shutting the f up and just listening and listening and listening until they're completely empty and they have nothing else to say and then you can like move on from there you know michael are you guys a couple yeah okay oh you are okay so you know the thing is is that i think the natural state of being for a lot of us is like, when I hear the problem, I'm going to jump in and help fix it, right? That's how we are.

Right? And then you just want to like, okay, let's get to the solution. And then that get, you know, the intentions in the right place, right? Like you want to be helpful, and you want to solve the problem, but it doesn't always work. It ends up backfiring, because then you get frustrated, right? I get it. It makes a lot of sense when you say it. Yeah. So that had, you know, and like, I'm speaking for you guys, you just interview John Gray, and you get the real deal. But these things that i've i've taken away from him and so in that situation the the female just needs to be heard and needs to express themselves and men we don't really express ourselves that way most of the time we go off by ourselves and we process

things mentally more so than like needing to talk every detail of the day out in order to decompress. Like when I come home, I don't want to talk to anyone. I just want to veg out, internalize the stuff I'm working on, and then I'm ready to share space with people. So having those, you know, fundamental differences understood, I think is really helpful. And there's, you know, there's always exceptions, but generally speaking, that's kind of how our brains and hormones are wired. And it's, it's useful to have some understanding of that. No, a hundred percent. So let's go back a little bit. hormones are wired. And it's useful to have some understanding of that. No, 100%. So let's go back a little bit.

Yeah. Where are you from? Where'd you grow up? Give a little background. And we just kind of dove into it. I bounced around a lot as a kid. I had kind of a weird upbringing. People always go, where did you grow up?

I say, I don't think I ever did. Maybe like four years ago, I started to really look at growing up. I lived in Northern California most of my childhood. I went to a weird sort of cult boarding school in Idaho for a couple years because I was a rowdy kid. What does rowdy mean? Oh, rowdy is really into drugs and crime. And, you know, as a result of trauma, just really acted out and was just wild and always kicked out of school and in trouble with the police. what was your drug of choice depends on what year the very first one was pot did they still call it that weed yeah yeah i mean i'm from northern california in the 70s so like i grew up two counties south of humboldt county so it was hard to get anyone yeah anyone that

smokes weed knows what that means but you know know, it was just, it was part of the culture. I grew up listening to Cheech and Chong records and Led Zeppelin and Black Sabbath and smoking weed, riding a skateboard. I mean, it was just, that was the culture that we, that's what you did. And it's what I did because it was necessary to survive because I just felt so uncomfortable in my skin. And then what, what do you mean when you say it was necessary to survive? What kind of trauma are you talking? Just broken family, lower income neighborhoods, abuse, neglect, abandonment, those kind of, you know, those things that happen. On the part of your parents? Yeah, yeah. And so, okay, so how old were you when you first started dabbling with drugs and alcohol?

Or was there alcohol involved? Like eight or nine. Oh, wow. Wow. How do you get it at that age well everyone's parents did it yeah you know at the end of the 60s when haydashbury kind of like went you know belly up uh most of the hippies in san francisco moved outward into those sticks you know and so they moved into mendocino humboldt sonoma county napa uh and there were a lot of bikers around and things like that, Hells Angels. And it was just like, you know, if you lived in a lower income area, which I did, there was just

drugs around, you know, you'd, you know, when you're a kid, you rifle through your, your, well, I don't know, maybe all kids don't do this. I hope if I have kids, they don't do this. But it's like, as soon as the parents left, we would all like ransack their stuff. And you'd find like, I mean, literally like kilos of cocaine and big bricks of hash. And I mean, it was just like guns and just all kinds of stuff. I mean, I think this is very unique. Like, I don't know. Listen, not that my parents are squares, but I don't think if I rifled through their stuff that I'd find a kilo of cocaine. If you rifled through your dad's shit, you would find chocolate chip cookies because he hides them from your mom.

Yeah. But what I'm saying is. Everyone has their drug of choice. It's normalized for you, but I don't think that's everybody's experience. So do you remember what that was like the first time you started seeing stuff like that? Merry Christmas and happy holidays. Boy, oh boy, do we have the perfect stocking stuffer for you. Everyone on the planet needs to be stuffing stockings with WooMore Play. If you don't know what WooMore Play is, you're missing out. It is the best coconut lube on the planet. Trust me. Trust us. We have done a lot of testing and I mean a lot.

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So you can put it in someone's stocking and it doesn't look embarrassing at all. It's in this chic white matte bottle that you really do want next to your lip gloss. A lot of people ask, does the packaging come discreetly? And you know it does. We know how to keep a secret if you do too. So to try Woo, go to woomoreplay.com and use promo code himandher at checkout for 20% off. That's woomoreplay.com and use promo code himandher again for 20% off at checkout. W-O-O-M-O-R-E-P-L-A-Y.com and code promo code him and her again for 20% off at checkout w o o m o r e p l a y.com and code him and her at checkout. Enjoy and happy holidays. You know, it's it's funny, Michael, because when I talk to people about it, it's you know, your story is just your story. And it's

normal to me. So I understand that it's a little bit out of the ordinary that I had those experiences so early on. But in hindsight, it was totally normal because that's just what was going on with me and all the other kids around that I hung around. I mean, I'm sure there were kids that had healthy families and weren't having that sort of energy around, but that was just kind of the culture that I was in. So it was normal. And when I say it was like needed for survival, because I didn't know how to process experiences I had when I was a kid, I had to have some sort of medication that wasn't the availability of therapy. And I didn't know how to communicate to my parents what, what had been going on and that I, you know, I was abused when I was like five or six and I didn't

know how to process that. And so abused by another adult yeah babysitter yeah okay yeah just in school at first grade i'm like kicked out of school fighting like just right away um lighting fires reading porno magazines smoking cigarettes just doing crazy stuff that most little kids i guess don't do but that was just my reaction to not knowing just not that young of an age yeah not knowing how to process get into it but eight nine ten usually later, nine, ten, six. Usually later, I guess. Yeah. So by the time I was 14, I got sent away to this boarding school because I was in trouble with the police and they had to, you know, they had to do something with me and my parents couldn't control me anymore. The story does eventually have a happy ending. So that's kind of earlier in life. And then

I moved to Hollywood when I was 19. I've been here ever since. It's been 30 years or something. And when I moved here, oh my God, you know, I started playing in bands and that was 1989. And in the early nineties in Hollywood, it was pretty wild. I mean, I'm sure there is a wild side to it now that I just don't see because I'm all sparkly and sober and spiritual and stuff. And I'm sure there's a lot of weird stuff. Biohacking and studying hormones. I mean, we're looking at the sunset strip. I'm sure all that stuff still goes on, but to me, I'm just unaware of it it but it was like the early 90s it was rock and roll in hollywood and it was gangster rap and it was just a different world like what i want

specifics i mean you know at this time you go to parties with the guys and guns and roses and like everyone's doing tons of drugs and everyone lived with strippers and stuff you know that was the thing like you played in a band and you lived by rock and roll Ralphs and your stripper girlfriend supported you and, you know, bought your drugs. Or if you were like me, you sold drugs. And it was just, it was a really debaucherous kind of Hollywood rock and roll lifestyle. And that was kind of at the end of the Sunset Strip and the whole like hair bands and stuff that had sort of died off and Guns and Roses was really big and Jane's Addiction and then Grunge hit and Nirvana came out and then that kind of all changed but the drug scene still remained you know and so I live behind the Chinese theater and I mean again you know going back to the environment yeah I was just right in the middle

of it and back then that area was controlled by the 18th street and white fence gangs and there was just crack everywhere and i mean you just walk we would play it i played in bands and stuff and you'd get out of the club and you'd be if you were walking with a guitar you would get swamped by crack dealers because they knew if you had a guitar you'd probably buy some crack i always think of those times as like the most fun times but well i never lived at those times well there there was a lot of fun i mean dude when i'm in high school with band posters all over my wall and then i moved to hollywood and those people become my friends it's like yeah it was amazing super fucking fun those are those were like my idols right like if you guns and roses back then there was nothing cooler

than guns and roses very much maybe like if i metica guys, which they're not the same, right? Like Metallica is cool and they had some parties, but like Guns N' Roses, like Axl Rose was like, that was the jam, especially if you're from Southern California. Yeah. Yeah. It was, I mean, it was a dream come true for me because I'm 19 and I don't have to answer to anyone, you know? And I just, I think I got, yeah, I got a job as a waiter, started selling weed so that

I could have enough money to buy weed because waiting didn't do that. And started playing in bands and hanging out with a bunch of musicians that were a lot older than me and many of whom I had been a fan of in high school and stuff like that. And so it was like the dream life. And it was a lot of fun. But because of the addiction and things like that,

that tends to progress if you have a tendency toward that like I did. So when does it come to a screeching halt? Like how do you... Comes to a screeching halt in February 1997 when I was 26 years old and I was strung out on heroin. And what I would do is kind of, if you've ever seen the movie Train Spotting, you'd have a drug buddy, like, I'd have a drug buddy sequester me away and kind of, not lock me up, like there was a locked door, but I would be so sick and withdraw that I couldn't go anywhere. And that was kind of my MO. Every few months, it would get really bad, and I'd be really strung out. And so I'd go have myself locked up somewhere kind of in a, and come down, and then come out. And I would kind of keep it together for

a little while but those periods got shorter and shorter and the fun times of like rock and roll hollywood partying became just super dark you know staying up all night crawling around picking up pieces of plastic off the carpet and trying to smoke it and just just the gnarliest darkest most disgusting self-hatred you know just demoralizing times. And that finally came to a head on one of those, you know, hey, buddy, will you lock me up for a few days so I can kick trips? And I was like out in Canoga Park or somewhere out there. And yeah, I woke up one morning and like rolled over and there was cockroaches crawling around the floor next to me.

And I was just, I'm like, I'm done. Like I had, I had just like a sliver of self-worth that said, Luke, your life has to be worth more than this. I'm not sure what it is, but it was that inner voice that there was just this tiny little voice of hope kind of just whispering from... It was like kind of listening to a transistor radio from the bleachers in a baseball stadium. That's how faint it was, but it was like, maybe there's a chance. Stop this shit. And know? And, um, yeah. And I called and got myself into a treatment center. And that was the beginning of the journey that brought us here today. You know, that, that was really when I had like my first profound spiritual experience. Um, I'm in this treatment center

and they're, I'm asking them like, what do I do? I'm freaking out. I mean, I'm in withdrawals. I'm just complete emotional basket case. And they're like, like well the way this works is you have to um all right i've heard heroin withdrawals are like the worst kind of pain oh well it's it is the worst because it's you're physically sick but you're also just an emotional basket case um it's like if you imagine like the most darkest depths of depression combined with the worst flu you've ever had. Is it like, you know, okay, say we've all had those nights where you go out and you drink too much in the morning, you wake up and you have those really like vivid, dark, scary dreams. Is it like that, but worse? You know what I'm talking about? Or is that just me?

Yeah, no, I would say so. But you know, you have the physical component where you just feel really sick. Like it's like the flu, then you're really really dark and depressed and the weird thing about it is with opiates in particular you know that all you need is just a little bit of this certain molecule in your bloodstream and you'll feel instantly perfect so you're just that's what you're trying yeah that's what's really weird about it you know that's why that's why they call it withdrawals yeah and that's why drugs like that you know have so much crime associated with them because it's like you really do just need that fix and then you'll be okay.

You're like fighting for your life, or so it seems. Yeah, and the fix that they offer you in treatment is like, well, we have one option for you, and that is to pray. So the weird thing about addiction, especially when you're talking about opiates, is that you have this terrible sense of isolation and being cut off in this really dark place that you are emotionally and you feel very alone and you feel super depressed and suicidal and then also that feeling as I said of kind of having the flu you know you feel so physically sick and what's so sort of science fiction about it is that you know as the addict that you

just need a taste and that all goes away in seven seconds, literally. That's how fast you can feel happy. And your flu goes. I mean, I imagine we had the worst flu and the worst suicidal depression. And I can just go here, take a hit of this. And it's gone within seven seconds. It's pretty amazing. That's why so many people get caught in that cycle. But in.

So you can empathize a little more because you know what it feels like. Oh, dude. Someone like me, I look at it and go, OK, what's the big deal? Like, quit it. You know what I mean? Yeah. You're like, dumbass, just stop. I mean, obviously, I'm dumbing it down.

Like, I understand how serious. But we don't we don't know what it feels like to withdraw at that level. And when you're when you explain it like that, it makes a lot more sense. It gives you a certain perspective on suffering for sure. Yeah. But when you're in when you're in treatment, you know what they give you? I was like, do you guys have any Dilaudid or some Klonopin? Like, can you give me something?

Because I'm freaking out. And they told me that I could go pray. I'm like, really? That's the solution? Yeah, that was my prescription was to go pray. And I had really no other options. And I really wanted to be clean. You know, I really did.

I mean, I checked myself in there. I borrowed the money to get in there for my mom. I mean, I was very serious about it. I wasn't just like, oh, I checked myself in there. I borrowed the money to get in there for my mom. I mean, I was very serious about it. It wasn't just like, oh, I hit a rough patch. It had been years of like a downward spiral. And I knew that. I had enough wherewithal to know that I was, you know, coming to the end of the line and that soon things were going to get really, really bad.

Do you remember the second that you made that decision? Yeah, I do. Yeah, I was. Yeah, it was the moment that I was crawling around on the floor in withdrawals with cockroaches, like all around me in some dank apartment and deep in the valley somewhere. But yeah. And then the next moment, which, which kind of really leads us up to today is that I, you know, I, all I had to work with was that prayer. And so I went in my little room and got on my hands and knees like they do in the movies. And I prayed, even though I wasn't religious, I didn't really know what God was or that I believed it,

but I was just desperate enough to try it. And from that very moment, February 15th, 1997, until right now, I've never, ever, ever once had a craving for drugs or alcohol. Wow, never relapsed? Nope, struck. I mean, trust me, I've done a lot of work since then. That's rare, though, right?

It is rare. It is rare. It is rare. But there was that gift of grace. And when that happened, I knew that there was some spiritual dimension to life that I could access. And I knew that more than anything, even though I didn't understand what it was, I knew that I didn't do that for myself. You know what I mean? Because I already tried for 10 years to quit on my own. And I could never make it one day, let alone a few hours, you know.

So to just walk out of that place and be a free man and be free of that bondage was very, very powerful. And that set me on the course to learning about all the things that I've been learning about for the past 22 years that I now share with other people. All right. So if you know me, you know I'm absolutely obsessed with functional mushrooms in every way. I add them to my smoothies. I make a hot tea with them. And I even sometimes sneak them in my oatmeal. They're so good. And honestly, guys, you can't even taste them. You're just

reaping the benefits. So right now, my current favorite is the golden latte. And here's why. We've been moving for the last four weeks and it has been so insane. And this is one thing that has been able to calm me down at night. I also, you know, love the spicy mushroom hot cacao, but right now I'm having a moment with the golden latte. Everyone needs to try it. Do a little bit of almond milk, a little hot water and put it in a mug and enjoy it in bed. It really satisfies your sweet tooth. And of course, all of these products are from one of our favorite sponsors, Four Sigmatic. Lauren loves the products. She just mentioned, I am currently having an affair with the Mushroom Focus Shots. They're their brand new product that just came out. I'm telling you these things.

They are focused in a bottle. They don't have crazy comedowns. You don't feel the jitters. I feel so mentally focused when I take these products, the Four Sigmatic Mushroom Shot. And they also taste a little bit like pineapple. The packaging is great. You see a big orange packaging with the mushroom shot as well as the pineapple. I also really like the Mushroom Coffee Elixir. I have crazy jitters sometimes from regular caffeine. And I have an adrenal gland, as many of you guys know on this show, that gets a little

bit out of whack. So when I'm feeling that way, fatigued by general coffee, I switch to the Four Sigmatic mushroom coffee, add a little hot water, and I'm good to go. All right, but let's go back to the golden latte mushroom mix, okay? Four Sigmatic really nailed it with this one, and I want to specifically explain why, okay? So what this one does is it supports beauty from within. It's dairy free, you guys, no milk in it. This is why I say to add a little almond milk if you want, you could even add a pinch of cinnamon. So this is going to basically beautify you. It's a glow from within because there's turmeric in it and it's going to fight inflammation. So we all know that turmeric is an amazing tool for

fighting inflammation. So to drink it in the golden latte every single night just makes a world of difference. For any of you guys that are skeptical, go back and listen to either one or both of the episodes that we've done with the founder of Four Sigmatic, Taro, on this show talking about the benefits of mushrooms. If you don't believe us, believe him. He's built an amazing company and brand off of just mushrooms alone. So to try it out, go to foursigmatic.com forward slash skinny and enter promo code skinny at checkout for 15% off your entire order. Again, that's foursigmatic.com slash skinny and then promo code skinny for 15% off your entire order. Before we jump into that, so if someone is battling addiction or struggling and they're

listening to this, what piece of advice would you, would you offer them? Well, it's all about surrender, man. I mean, that's the thing is if you, you know, well, at first I'd say it depends on whether you're just someone who's dabbling and someone who might be like a heavy drinker. And then if you really apply your willpower, you find that you can control it or you can stop it altogether. Maybe you're someone, you had a little rough patch or breakup or a death in the family and you went off the rails and started doing some blow with your buddies out at the bar

and then you can kind of pull it back together. That's one thing. But once you reach the point where it's controlling you and you can't control it and you identify within yourself that you're an addict or an alcoholic, then I've known very few people that have been so afflicted that have won over in single-handed combat. You know, it takes recovery groups. It takes 12 steps. It takes going to treatment.

It takes help. It takes community. And it takes the love of other people and a sense of connection with some kind of higher power, you know, some sort of spiritual practices and things like that. Every once in a while I meet someone that's like, yeah, I just stopped. I'm good. And I'm like, what did you do? And they go, I just made a decision and I'm going to stop that stuff. But that's so, so rare. Everyone that I know, I mean, they've had to develop some sort of spiritual practice and definitely having support of other people. And in my case, I think what really helped in the beginning was that initial surrender of just going, okay, I can't fix this myself. I mean, at a core,

core level, I was just out of options. And when you get to that place, that's a great, I mean, it's painful, but it's a great place because then you have somewhere to start. Then it's like, even if you're agnostic or atheist and you realize like you've got nowhere else to turn, you can't rely on your own resources, that kind of opens your mind to the idea that whatever these forces are in the universe that some people call God or spirit or nature or whatever it is, might be able to help you. But most of us have to be pretty desperate to seek out something that's that intangible, you know, and unbelievable. I mean, when they told me the answer to this thing is spirituality, I was like, what? That seems like not very, you know, it's not something you can really hold on to. But when you're desperate enough, you're like, hey, okay. I mean, I always say like, I would have went and joined the Hare

Krishnas and sold, you know, books at the airport if that's what it took. I didn't, you know, I wasn't arguing with the solutions, in other words, because I was so out of answers. When you left rehab, how did you continue to access that spirituality in the real world? Well, I got around other people. I got around other recovering addicts for sure, number one. Really got just involved in recovery and I had to let go of all of my old friends that weren't on this new path that I was on. It was terrifying and all my friends hated me and thought that I had abandoned them. And I just had to kind of go out on my own and I gave up my apartment. I started studying every form of meditation. I went to India on a spiritual pilgrimage. I started listening nonstop

to like cassette tape programs by every spiritual teacher, self-help guru, reading spiritual literature, praying, even though I didn't really believe that it was doing anything. I just kept doing it and doing it and doing it until I started to establish a connection. Who had the most impact on you out of all those gurus and self-help books, coaches? You know, it's tough to say. I mean, I would say generally, this is a difficult one to kind of dance around, but I would say as a general teaching, the teaching of the 12 steps was the thing that really gave me a foundation. principles that have to do with being honest with yourself. They have to do with coming to believe in a higher power, for righting the wrongs that you've done to other people, for learning how to pray and meditate, learn how to be of service, being less selfish, just some of those basic,

being an honest person. You know what I mean? Some of the things that come natural to people that maybe haven't had those kind of dark experiences in their life and had a good upbringing, you're like, yeah, duh, of course, that's just how you live life. You're a good person. But for most people that are addicts or alcoholics, they really lose their morality if they ever had any. You know, you sell yourself out and you sell your soul because you have to. So that was the foundation. But then, you know, Wayne Dyer and Eckhart Tolle and Byron Katie, as I mentioned before. And, oh, God, there was this one guy, Stuart Wild, that I used to listen to a lot, who was this British guy.

And, I mean, reading spiritual texts about all the different gurus in India and all that kind of stuff. Just anything and everything that was about getting in touch with your spiritual self and finding some sort of access to God. You know, for me, it was never really in traditional religion. It wasn't really, you know, I didn't go to church or anything like that. But I also wasn't closed to it either. There was a great writer, Emmett Fox, who was a Christian scientist. Oh yeah, that was one of the first ones, really. He read a number of different books that were sort of interpretations of biblical writings, and one of the most profound is called Sermon on the Mount. And I remember someone gave me that book, and I didn't even know enough about the Bible that that was a Bible. I didn't know Sermon

on the Mount was like a Bible thing or a Christian thing. I just was like, oh cool, a spiritual book. Yeah, I'll start reading it. And then I opened it up and it was like, and Christ says this and that. I was like, whoa, whoa, whoa, hang on. And my friend said, just use the word spirit or whatever. Don't get caught up on like the fact that it says Jesus or Christ. Don't freak out. And I wasn't even against that. It just was a little harder for me than some of, you know. You just didn't have that upbringing. Yeah. And, you know, in the Eastern philosophies and the gurus in India and all that stuff and sort of mysticism of the East for for some reason, was more accessible to me. That seemed much more attainable, I think, because it wasn't tainted by some of the hypocrisy that I saw when

I was a kid and kind of turning against religion in a rebellious way. But I did get a lot from Emmett Fox. He's one of my favorite writers, a brilliant writer, and he was almost anti-religious in a sense. What he would do is kind of discredit all of the dogma in religion. And he would really just take out, extrapolate the teachings of Jesus, this person. Yeah, exactly what the guy said. And like, no, this is what it means. Like all of the parable and all the metaphor, he would just throw that away. I mean, I think that's the real, I mean, I'll get in trouble because I'm also not religious,

but I think that's like the real value in that stuff, right? Like there's a lot of great teachings and lessons in those works, right? Like just, I think sometimes people get thrown off by the other side of it, which they think maybe the spiritual side of it, but the lessons in there are great morality lessons, right? So we've been talking a lot about addiction from an addict's perspective. So let me ask you this for somebody maybe they're they have a loved one or a friend or a family member that's that's going through something like this what do you think some of the biggest mistakes are because we you know we've had family members that have

gone through addiction gone to recovery what do you think some of the biggest mistakes are from family members or friends when they're trying to help a loved one this is such i swear it's like addiction and alcoholism is such a gnarly disorder or disease whatever it is because unlike other diseases that mostly just affect the person who has it so many people are affected yeah i mean remember that show um intervention yeah i used to love that show yeah yeah but it was it was like horrifying to watch because you have like one meth addict in the center of the family and everyone else is not an addict, but their lives all get destroyed. So that's what's really crazy about it from my perspective in terms of answering your question more specifically is that it really is a strange phenomenon in the way that these disorders affect

the family. And it's almost as if at a certain point, when someone in the family or friends, you know, that's outside watching the addict, when your life starts to get ruined, then you have to stop trying to help that person and go help yourself. And in the beginning of Alcoholics Anonymous, that's why they formed this other group called Al-Anon,

which still exists and is thriving all over the world and was essentially built by the wives of the early male alcoholics that made Alcoholics Anonymous. Yeah, because they realized they were all nuts too from trying to rescue their dumb ass alcoholic husbands and are, you know, dumb ass, but they're, they're ill husbands. Right. And so they were like, oh my God, we're crazy too. We need our own 12 step group just to not be nuts and try to control, you know, because that's what happens is if you watch a show like Intervention, you see the whole family like lose their minds and lose their emotional health and even, you know, lose their businesses

and their homes because they keep obsessing on helping that person. And it's because you love that person. But when it turns to the point where you're enabling someone, which that show is such a great example of that, you'll see the doting mom and dad who keep letting the kid back in and giving them money and giving them a credit card and letting them crash after they go out on a spree. And you're watching those parents actually kill the addict, but they don't have the support and the understanding of how the disease works that the best thing you can do when it really gets to a certain point is to just stop helping that person. And that's the best help you can give them.

I think the scare there is like, you know, that you hear people say, Oh, let them hit rock bottom. Yeah. Like rock bottom in some cases could be the end. And so like, it's, I can, I can empathize with parents that aren't able to do that because like they, you know, maybe, maybe kick somebody out and say, this is it. I'm not helping anymore. And the next thing you know, like if they, if they pass away or they, they die or they or something, they're like, shit, I should have been doing something. But so do you subscribe to letting people hit rock bottom? Do you think that that's necessary? Or do you think that that's too harsh? You know, it's a case by case thing. And I would never, I would never want to be, you know, put myself in a position to tell

people what they should do, but what they should not do as someone who's been observing and working with a lot of people in recovery for a lot of years now, there definitely comes a point when that helping that the family member or loved one is doing starts to hurt because it turns into enabling. And that's not something that I could determine obviously, but that's where things like Al-Anon and a qualified therapist that really specializes in addiction comes in handy. But I'm going to tell you what the fact is, man. It's just that some people do die.

And you might save yourself and your own soul as a parent or as a husband or a wife or whatever, because you're also now losing your life. And so you save yourself and you stop trying to rescue and enable the addict. And sometimes they do die. You know, my sister was I would say she was a week away from dying. She was like so bad, so into heroin and meth and speedballing and all that. And I am such a control freak. So I would try to micromanage my dad in the situation.

And my dad was enabling it. And what ended up happening was I was enabling it. And the second that I was able to step back and stop, just stop. I just let it go and said, there's nothing I can do here. I've done everything I can possibly do with an interventionalist. Is that what it's called? An interventionist, yeah. Was the second she got treatment.

Right. I don't know if that's a coincidence. She was a drug addict for five years, but the second that I stopped trying to control and enable the situation was two weeks later she got help. That's so common. I had a very close family member years ago that moved out to California,

and I was already sober at this time, and he moved out here and just started going off the rails and was you know he carried guns and was violent doing all kinds of crazy shit and he lost his place he was living in the valley and he had some altercation with someone and a gun and the police came and it's a whole thing and he's like dude i need to come crash at your house and i was like dude i love you but i'm not you can't even come in my house let alone can you not stay here and it was like f you you don't care about me we're family family first blah blah i was like i know i get it it was really hard to do a few months later hey man uh can i go one of those meetings with you and now he's sober 12 years later wow that's cool and it was it was tough, but it wasn't, I wasn't trying to fix

him or control him. It's not about him. It's about me. It's about, I don't want someone in my house that carries fucking guns and has people chasing them around Hollywood because they owe money for Coke or something like I'm not, I'm not going to play in that world anymore. You know, I've saved myself, extricated myself from that. So it wasn't even, it wasn't even for him. It was for me, but I also had the feeling that, you know, hopefully if anything was going to work, if he hit a bottom, like you were saying that, um, that he might have a chance because that's what it took for me. Like I was out of options. No one was going to help me. I couldn't call my parents and be like, can I borrow

a hundred bucks? I'm dope sick. I mean, they would have been like, they were healthy enough to know like, Hey, they had just let me go. So how does this whole wellness biohacking, you know, lifestyle journey begin now? So you're sobered up. Yeah. Like, how do you start getting into all this stuff? That's the stuff I like talking about. Yeah. The early, I mean, I don't have any regrets. It's just the story is the story. But it's like, God, there's been 22 years of just amazing, beautiful life experience, you know, that's come as a result of that. But then again, I don't think I would have had the motivation to seek out the things that I have with such dedication and quite frankly, obsessiveness in many cases, you know, so everything was just going smoothly. I don't

know if you'd be doing what you're doing. Yeah, most people that really go deep into spirituality and also, you know, and really exploring health in the ways that I do, I think is usually because they've had some kind of chronic disease or some sort of breakdown and they just need answers. And that's what it was for me. But in the beginning, in addition to the spiritual practices and teachers and things that we discussed, what I started to realize was that my body was really toxic. And so that began my health journey. And in the beginning, it was doing a lot of fasting and juicing and infrared saunas and colonics and the things that were sort of in vogue in natural health and wellness practices in the late 90s. That was kind of the early stuff.

And then as I started to get a healthier body and a healthier mind, then it got more into the yoga and the meditation. And then bringing us up to kind of where we are now is just learning everything about herbalism and supplementation and biohacking. And I mean, now it's like, God, in any given day, I probably have 20 different random, you know, things that I have going on just that I'm experimenting with in ways that you can keep your body healthy and vibrant. But it's really just, you know, the physical stuff is kind of fun and novel. And it's just interesting to see how much energy you have and how clear you can be and how healthy you can feel. But really, the purpose of that for me is so that I can achieve my mission, which is to be of service and to help other people

and to alleviate suffering in the ways that I've managed to alleviate it for myself. So the physical stuff, a lot of people kind of in the health world really get caught up in that and forget about the real work, which is the inside, you know, it's facing the shadow and really working out your psychological and, you know, past trauma and relationships and, you know, your spiritual life, whatever that looks like for you. I think that's the number one thing. But if you feel like crap physically, like I was saying, you know, the past the past couple weeks i came down with some crazy bug and i was much less happy and much less effective in the world and was probably not as nice of a person oh i get sick it's the you know what i'm the worst i'll be the first to admit it yeah you gotta have physical energy and

have your mitochondria working properly and producing energy so that you can go out and be of service and be a good person and have patience and not be you know reactionary and hostile toward people at least for me because you get you get in that survival mode when you when you feel low energy and then it's just like you know you become more selfish and just kind of defensive and all that but when you feel you know in those days when you slept really well and you know you're eating right and you feel good you worked out it's like you're just happier and you feel good, you worked out. It's like you're just happier. Your neurotransmitters, your hormones, all that stuff is just firing right. Out of everything, all the trends that you've done, all the different things,

all the wellness things, what's been the most effective and why? Or what's been the most consistent too? You know, it's funny because if you walk in my house, there's, I mean, I have to keep a tidy home, but I try to keep stuff in its right place. But I have all of these really expensive devices, biohacking devices and the infrared sauna and the red light therapy and all kinds of crazy stuff, PEMF and biofeedback and just a lot of really advanced stuff. And that stuff works.

But I think when it comes down to it, it's getting yourself in sync with nature. And so getting adequate amounts of sunlight, especially at the right time of day, avoiding blue light, which is like in interior junk lighting, like LED lighting, much like the light we're under now that it's getting dark. I call it DMV light. Yeah, DMV light, totally. Ice baths, you know, being exposed to cold weather, going out when it's freezing with no clothes on, naked sunbathing, jumping in the freezing ocean, cryotherapy, infrared saunas, you know, like exposing our nervous system and our eyes to natural light, natural temperature variances.

That's what we've lost. You know, we've become so domesticated because we live in 68 degrees and we can make it daytime by turning the lights anytime we want and these devices that produce this crazy junk DMV lighting in our face at all hours of the night. Or Nordstrom's dressing room lighting. Oh, God, that's the worst. What's up with that? What the fuck, Nordstrom's?

We need new lighting in this dressing room. You're so right. You know, that's why I always shop online. I have a box at home from Mr. Porter, and I'm like, I'll order like so much stuff. And my friend's like, dude, that's a down payment on a freaking house. I'm like, no, I'm not going to. I'm only going to keep five things. You get it and you send it back.

Yeah, I try it on. I try it on in my own house because it's that freaking lighting. I can't see anything. You got that EIP membership? No. Oh, you got to get it. Really? What is that?

It's for Mr. Porter, but they hook you up with deals, give you better stuff. What? Yeah. What the hell? I'm Mr. Fashion. I'm going to send you an email.

How do I not have this? I'm going to send you an email. Oh, great. Michael is, you guys are very similar. They give you the stuff in advance. It lets you know what's coming. Oh, great. Michael is, you guys are very similar. They give you like the stuff in advance. It lets you know what's coming. Oh, dude, we need to talk.

Yeah, yeah, yeah. It doesn't cost anything. It's just like, they just hook you up. Oh, dope. Okay. Anyways, we're going on a tangent. So in terms of the, you know, the things that really move the needle, I mean, it's crazy because at the end of the day, after all the, I mean, I've done stem cell injections in

my freaking penis. I've done, you know. Whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa. What? Hold on. We'll just skip over that. Michael wants to do that. What is that? Wait, whoa, whoa, whoa. What? Hold on. We'll just skip over that. Michael wants to do that. What is that?

Wait, wait, wait, wait. Let's go back here. I want to inject stem cells in Michael's penis. Lift your foreskin. What was the driving force behind this? Well, I had back issues for a long time. And so I got in touch with Dr. Harry Adelson and Amy Killen out at the Docera Clinic in Park City, Utah. Shout out to

them. Great people, great doctors. And we were going to do a podcast and they were going to work on my back. Dr. Harry does injuries, joints, back pain, all that kind of stuff. You know, he's like the injury guy. And Amy does cosmetic stem cell stuff and sexual performance. And she started out doing what's called the, I think it's called the O-shot for women. And she kind of rejuvenates vaginas and stuff. I know exactly what you're talking about. Yeah, she does stem cells and PRP in the lips and clitoris and what do you call it?

Clitoris or clitoris? I always forget. I finally learned how to find it, but I still don't know how to say it. I think as long as you know how to find it, that's all that matters. Michael calls it the man in the little boat. That works.

Maybe not the man. But Amy started doing that. And then she's like well you know i have male clients too and so basically i went out there and they're like dude we're gonna extract stem cells from your your fat like your um muffin top and then they get it out of your uh bone marrow as well called bone portion hurt i can imagine no you're under anesthesia okay yeah yeah and um and so they're like well dude we're gonna be putting it in your back and your hip and stuff. So Amy would be happy to inject your penis. And the idea is that it reinvigorates the tissues and the blood flow and stuff for performance

and longevity and sexual pleasure and all of that. But there's so many tangents to go off here. I wasn't even trying to talk about this. I was just giving you a couple extreme examples. You can't say the word penis on this podcast without me pulling out my magnifying glass. You can't put the words penis stem cell injection together and glaze over it. All right, my bad. Now I know. We should have warned you ahead of time.

Well, what's funny, though, is at the time when I went and did that, I was actually celibate and still am. It's been over a year and a half and so i went and did the thing and all my homies of course like dude is it awesome what happened i go i have no idea literally i've not taken it for a test drive yet wait you say you're celibate i see a wedding ring no wrong hand oh wrong hand yeah it's funny because i was i was i thought that was a wedding ring i was with a lady friend last night and i was like yeah people always think i'm married and she's like well yeah some cultures wear it on the right hand. I thought you were married because of that.

Totally cock blocking myself. Yeah. But that's good because as I said, I'm still celibate. Why did you choose to be celibate? I mean, this just went out to a ton of ladies and you got that new stem cell dick. You're about to get out there. That's funny. You know what?

I just, I had not stopped dating, being in a relationship or having sex since I was 16 years old, which is 1986. I'm 48. I just turned 48. One relationship to another. I mean, not necessarily. There are periods where I was single for years and just dated a lot and had fun. I was having a career and living in Hollywood and doing my thing. But I felt at a certain point that I wanted to have a deeper, more meaningful type of relationship. And I had failed to be able to really do that to my own satisfaction

and was repeating some patterns that weren't really serving me. And I was ending up in situations that I wasn't happy with. And so my solution to that was just to stop and totally step back from the whole thing and just for the first time ever really in my adult life just really work on myself. And so I just went inward and did tons of reading and writing and journaling and just exploring those patterns. Well, it's been amazing because now I just started dating about a month ago or so. And it's been amazing.

I'm a completely different person from how I used to be. I was very sort of free spirited, you know, it's kind of like, if it feels good, do it, whatever, like, fuck it, don't overthink it. I mean, that was always my attitude. And that works for a certain depth of relationship. But if you want like a real true bond, I don't know that that's necessarily the best method by which to achieve that. So I have a buddy that kind of, he doesn't, he's not always in relationship, but just dating, bouncing around all the time. And he's, and what I always tell him is he's not the best at being alone, if that makes sense, right? He's always got to have somebody around stimulating. And I feel like when he gets alone, he starts to be, he gets panicked, he gets anxiety,

he gets depressed. He's not like, I think the reason I think what you're doing is smart is because a lot of people, when they're looking to solve problems, they're always looking to the external. And they never take a step back like you did and say, okay, I need to look inward here. And there's no, I don't think you have the ability to do that if you get a little, unless you get a little bit of isolation. So true. Yeah, it's been amazing, dude, because I've really, more than anything, I think, well, two things. I've gotten very, very clear about what I'm looking for in a partner, like laser focused. I mean, I know the exact attributes of character, the type of person that I want to be with. Describe where there might be someone listening that's just like this person.

Well, I'm not telling you, this is not like a dating ploy here. Taylor, open up the phone lines. Yeah, yeah. It has to do with alignment. It really has to do with shared values. It has to do with honesty and integrity and loyalty and someone who's a giver and someone who has access to their feminine energy and someone who is about service and someone who's about God and someone who is about using a relationship as a vehicle to grow as people and about just having the same values. And I think many times in my relationships, there was compatibility in different areas, but not necessarily in terms of what's really important to us and where we're going in life. And also in knowing the positive attributes that I want in someone else, also

knowing what the deal breakers are too. And those were often things that I overlooked because it was fun and there was chemistry and they were a great person in so many ways and they had so many great qualities, but there were things that just weren't in alignment with my life and my values that I would sort of let slide. And eventually those started to become problematic. But what's interesting and the other part of it is that as I've become more acutely aware and very focused on what it is that I want, it's also made me really up-level myself and know, well, if that's the shit that I want in someone else, I better

have a hundredfold of that. That's what I need to bring. And so it's really helped me in terms of really getting down to my self-worth and you know, and issues that I had about not deserving a partner like that or not deserving a relationship like that and really owning the great qualities that I have and cultivating those over the past year and a half and feeling like, holy shit, I actually really have a lot to offer. And I was not really aware of that to the degree I'm now. So my standards for a partner are higher than they've ever been, but my standards for myself, more importantly, and I know exactly what I can bring to a relationship. Well, this is why I think it's so smart, right? Because I don't know if you'll be able to figure that stuff out if you're just,

if you don't break that pattern and take some time to isolate yourself and figure out exactly what you want, exactly who you are, right? And a lot of people just, they never take the time to do that. And the next thing you know, you're in a relationship that's not really serving you. It's not really serving your partner and then you're lost and then you have a problem. Yeah, dude. Yeah. It's the stepping back from the painting. You know, it's like if your nose is pressed against the Mona Lisa, you can't really see it. You know, you got to step back. You step back and really take a pause. And it's been, it's been interesting because I've spent so much time. I mean, not just like not in relationships, but all my closest homies are all in relationships. So I'm alone a lot of the time. I mean, a lot of the time just by myself. I work, you know, for myself by myself primarily. And so I had to go through a

little period of like, wow, this is kind of lonely feeling. I'm just home every night by myself, me and my old pal Luke, just chilling. You know, it's like, it's weird when you're someone who's been very social and, you know, either been in a relationship or dated a lot and done the things that I've done. It's been it's been a huge. So are you happier now? Oh, my God. Yeah, dude. Yeah.

Because I learned how to be happy on my own. I was very happy. It sounds like a big theme of your life is accountability, which I'm obsessed with accountability. I think people like instead of you blaming outside forces or other people, it sounds like you've taken extreme accountability. I think people like instead of you blaming outside forces or other people, it sounds like you've taken extreme accountability. Well, that started that started when I got sober, because you're not a victim, you have to take responsibility for your own decisions. No one stuck a crack pipe in my face. Yeah, I was like, Oh, I probably shouldn't do that. Let me go do that. That's the attitude I always had. Just tell me not to do something. I'm just gonna go do it

just to spite you. I mean, that's how I was when I was a kid. I was so rebellious and defiant. And when I, you know, wrecked my own life in so many ways, and then even in relationships, yeah, I can't blame anyone else. It's like, if you're ever in a relationship, right, and it doesn't work out, and you think that maybe you have resentment or hostility toward that person or something, which I typically don't, but I might have a regret or just kind of like find the things that they did wrong and point the finger. You always have to go, well, I'm the one that chose them. You know, water really does seek its own level. So whatever level of maturity or however much emotional availability I had, I met the perfect match at that time to bring into my life. And I'm the one that chose them. And we resonated

together and there was something for us to learn. And then when you part, if you don't want to repeat that same thing over and over again, then, as Michael said, yeah, taking that time aside to go, well, hmm, what is it in me that's bringing about these patterns that aren't serving me? And that's not just for relationship. That's for everything. You know, it's like money and all of that. So if someone came to you, and they wanted you to coach them and they're not able to take accountability, is that someone that's uncoachable for you? God, probably, you know, I think the ability to be honest with yourself and have some humility is critical to being coached.

You have to be teachable and it takes some humility and humility comes from being self-honest. Humility is so underrated. We need to talk about, people need to talk about humility more. You know what? It's such a becoming quality. Well, you're talking to one of the most humble guys in Hollywood at the moment. Well, I'll add that to your Tinder profile. I might be the most humble guy in the room.

I don't know if I've ever heard somebody be able to brag about. I'm totally kidding, dude. But I like it. Totally kidding. Well, here's the thing. You know, for a long time, I thought being humble was like, it's sort of false humility. You compliment, oh man, you have a great shirt, or I love the way you do this or that. I was like, oh no, no, it's nothing really. It's a false humility. Humility is not just that you don't think too highly of yourself. It's that you don't think about yourself so much at all. And it's also, for me, the humility that I work on is not so much like, oh, I make sure that I don't feel

superior to other people and like be conceited or something. It's more like humility is accepting my gifts and actually celebrating those and not hiding, not staying small. To me, humility is being just the right size. You know, it's going, someone says, hey man, you're really good at this or that. You go, yeah, wow, you're right, thank you. I am, I'm badass at that. And there's also this other shit over here that I really suck at that I'm working on, that I'm getting better at.

You know, it's having that sense of balance. But it's one of my most cherished principles, you know, in myself and in other people, something I'm always striving for is like, how can I have a more honest and realistic appraisal of where I am in my life, knowing that there's, you know, there's goals and things that I need to work on, ways in which I need to improve myself and mature. But then there's also a lot of stuff that I've worked through that I've overcome, man. I mean, I've done some pretty- That you should celebrate.

Yeah, that I've done some pretty amazing things. I think we're getting to a dangerous place in society when people can't celebrate success anymore, right? You don't want to be over the top and you don't want to be pretentious about it but like you should celebrate your victories because i mean but if not like what's the point right like you just yeah every time you do something great someone says it's great no it's not that great like it's just like it's a it's a self-deprecating attitude i feel like yeah you're not able to celebrate and say you know what i did do that really good like i am proud of this podcast or i am part of this blog or whatever it is you know and then also having the humility to say you know but there's a lot of other things I

can work on right yeah what does success mean to you when you think of success I think success to me is really having an understanding of who you are you know who you truly are of being able to identify yourself as spirit and know what your role is here you know to know who you truly are, of being able to identify yourself as spirit and know what your role is here, you know, to know who you are, why you were born, what your purpose is here, and to be doing your best to live that purpose. It sounds like it seems like to me and tell me if I'm wrong, but it seems like that meditation has been a huge, huge help in you getting to the space. Is that true? Oh, my god. Yeah. Well, that brings us back before we got diverted by me leaking the penis stem cell treatment,

which is like not even the weirdest thing I've done either. So well, now you really quickly have to tell us. I read something I was looking at you up earlier. I read something like you ate some like frog venom or something or toad venom. Well, yeah, it's called Cambo Frog. It's a South American sort of shaman medicine type deal. Is that when they say like lick the toad? No, that's different. That's different, okay. Yeah, that's a psychedelic kind of thing. Yeah, no, I didn't do that, weirdly.

I haven't tried that. Cambo Frog is where they burn your skin with a little stick, like a little piece of bamboo to open your lymphatic system. And then they put this poison excretion that comes out of the, they call it, people say cambo, but it's combo frog, K-A-M-B-O. And what they do is they irritate the frog and they kind of spread eagle it with string and then they scratch it and they make this poison excrete from their skin. They

dry it out, turn it into a powder. You have a ritual in which they burn your skin and open up your lymphatic system, but not your blood system because if it's in your blood, it could kill you. So they rub this poison in these little five to seven holes, either behind your neck, or I did mine like on my arm and my upper arm. And, you know, the thing about it is no one really knows exactly why you do it. You know, it's just it's what they do before they go out on hunts in the Amazon. And I can tell you subjectively, I don't know what it did scientifically, but I was like freaking Jason Bourne for two weeks. I mean, my mind was like, I mean, just my vision was incredibly clear.

I was hyper alert. It was like the ultimate smart drug or the ultimate nootropic. I was so focused. But subjectively, when you have it done, it's done in ceremony, kind of like an ayahuasca type thing, but it's not psychoactive at all. But it makes you so, so sick. There's purging, everyone's throwing up in buckets, people are running to the bathroom, crapping their pants. I did not throw up, but I did almost lose one in my drawers, but I thankfully made it to the bathroom. But cambofrog, yeah, that was one of the weirder things.

And just, you know, doing float tanks, sensory deprivation tanks. Float tanks is not nearly as strange as opening your lymphatic system. I'm obsessed with the lymphatic system, so that sounds interesting. Float tanks, that makes, you know, go in there, get some sensory deprivation, meditate a little bit. But that's a lot different than putting venom into your skin with a little frog. When you're asleep tonight, I'm going to inject your penis with frog venom. Oh, my God. That would be a very painful situation.

I don't think anyone would win. But to bring it back around to your question about meditation, as I was saying earlier, despite all of the kind of outlandish and experimental things that I do and have done, just because it's fun and interesting to do different things to your body. I think the body as a vehicle is just a really interesting sort of meat suit supercomputer. I mean, the brain, the body, they're just fucking bizarre. And there's so many different things you can do to sort of work with the energy of the body. But as I was saying earlier, all of the bodily practices really just serve the purpose of having a strong and stable and healthy energetic vessel so that you can do the real work, which is going into the metaphysical, you know, the meditation. And for me, if you had to break it down, as we were saying earlier, like what are the things that really work if someone wants to get healthier or get more in touch with who they really are? You know, the sun, the cold water exposure, the saunas, all the stuff that I mentioned earlier, which is just about being in alignment

with nature. Well, in terms of reaching your spiritual potential, it's about developing a witness perspective. In other words, having the visceral experience that your thoughts and your feelings are not who you are, and that those are phenomenon that happen as you live your life, and that you in fact are a spirit or a soul that's inhabiting the body that's observing that whole thing. And you can get that kind of as an intellectual concept when you hear it said, or maybe you have an epiphany now and then, but when you really have a deep practice of meditation where you've been trained and you know, you have a very specific way that you do it, you have not that there's a right or wrong way, but more so than just, oh, I have a little app on my phone. It relaxes me for 10 minutes, but like, you know, I actually have an app on my

phone that relaxes me for 10 minutes. I do too. It's great. I do it all. Like, trust me. But, you know, a practice like I've practiced Vedic meditation now for a number of years. And that's a very traditional Indian style of meditation with a mantra. What do you do? Like TM. You don't do anything. No, you you have a mantra. Okay. You're given a mantra by your teacher okay and the mantra is a sanskrit word or sound you could you don't share your mantra it's part of the tradition michelle from cosmo does this yeah it's a tm is a similar lineage um and so the idea and even in you know in buddhist mindfulness meditation same idea you're following your breath what you're doing is you're you're repeating the mantra or following your breath to distract the mind so that you can

disassociate from the mind and be with who and what you really are, which is a spirit who's watching the mind. So a way you can do it, for example, and we could have the experience right now. You could say, and if anyone's listening, maybe not if you're driving, but just stop for a second and say to yourself inside, I wonder what my next thought is going to be. And you'll wait. And the thought that just came for me is like, dude, that's too much dead air on a podcast. Start talking again. But I saw that voice say that before I actually verbalized.

So there's a me and then there's a me watching the me. You see what I mean mean it's almost like your ego not your ego but a ego in general i always envision it as even weird as it sounds it's like you know like in the cartoon i mean when i'm meditating if i and i do it not as much as i should but i'm getting more into it like you know like when you see the cartoon and like the spirit like dies out a little body and he steps back looking down like that's how i feel about looking at my own mind right like you're like watching it from above exactly it's weird i know it's weird to say it out loud but that's not weird at all dude that's i mean when you get to that sweet

spot in meditation or whatever practice takes you there i mean for some people it is a float tank or it is a you know a mindfulness app it doesn't really matter the point that i'm trying to make is that it's just a fact it's a fundamental fact that we are not a body. We are not a mind. We are not the thoughts that our mind has. We are not our emotions, our sensations, our feelings. We're the one experiencing those things, right? However, most of us, and this was true for the early part of my life, really believe the things our mind tells us. And we are reacting to the feelings and emotions that we experience throughout the day. And when somebody gets close to our car, we feel like, oh, we should kill them now. And a bill comes in the mail or the letter from the IRS, and we feel like we're going

to die. You know, the talk with your spouse, and they want to get divorced. You know, those things that we experience that are just part of normal life are experienced in a totally different way when you've developed the practice of realizing that you're the one watching these things happen. And it starts out where you're just experiencing that during meditation, as you described. You're the little ghost who's floated out of your body, and you're looking down on yourself. Then you have to ask, who's the one watching? When I just said, what's my next thought going to be? Who's the one watching? When I just said, what's my next thought going to be? Who's the one watching the next thought? It's not the thought. Do you see what

I'm saying? I'm not trying to get crazy and esoteric here. It's just the way it works. But what the real beauty is in any type of prayer practice or meditative practice or living a life of contemplation is that when you get up from your meditation cushion or wherever you do it, mine happens to be a sofa where I meditate every day, is when you get up is that you can keep that perspective going, you know, the more you practice and the longer you practice. So even as I'm sitting here with you two, I know my personality's in the room, my ego's in the room. I know that I want to sound relatively coherent and smart and be a popular guest and have you guys like me and all those normal human things are present. But there's also my spiritual self that's just kind of watching

this whole three-way conversation transpire. And I'm not doing anything special. I'm just keeping my meditative practice alive, even though we're right here. And so if I go out and the valet guy has scratched my car, I'm much less likely to have a hissy fit about it. Or if I, you know, go pick up my dog from the groomer, and they didn't do it. Or like, if you're moving from San Diego to LA, and you're my husband and need to meditate on the couch tomorrow. Yeah, yeah. You see what I'm saying? So it's like the sweet part of meditation is not just when you're doing it, it's the effect that it has on your life. And so, you know, going back to like the addiction piece, you know, it's like,

yeah, I had that one moment where I was struck by God. I mean, there's just no other way to say it. It was just like, boom, Moses came in the room or whatever. And just like, boom, you're free. And I have been free. But if I hadn't learned to meditate, then when the divorces happen, when the breakups, when the deaths, when the illness, when the taxes, when the career fails, when the business partnership breaks up, when those things happen, because they're going to, that's when a guy like me doesn't have to go, well, this hurts. I better do heroin. You know, this hurts.

I better destroy my whole life and make it hurt more just so it's all even it's like oh no this is just an experience that I'm having and you're able to stay keep your head above water and not be so much at the prey of the day-to-day whims of your your feelings your thoughts and your emotions even coming over here today I was like oh my god I felt like so foggy I think I just stayed up late and slept in a little late and I just like oh my god am I gonna be able to put a sentence together when I get here? And I saw there was a little bit of fear and nervousness. But I observed that.

I wasn't caught up in that. I just went, OK, cool. So maybe I'm not 100 percent. Like, whatever. Well, you put some sentences together today. And you're a wildly interesting dude. We got to talk again. Where can everybody find you?

When you get the podcast, where else? I've got the Lifestylist podcast, which has been a huge gift as we were talking about earlier, just to be able to get time with so many fantastic people. It's an incredible experience to be able to do that. All the people that I would probably pay to talk to come talk to me for free. And I get to explore all things, physical health and spirituality. So that's kind of my main content channel. And then I also speak at a lot of events and do workshops and things like that. And you can find out everything I'm doing at lukestory.com. And Instagram is probably my most active social media. I do a lot of funny hijinks on my stories

and a lot of Instagram lives of my interviews and things over there. Awesome. You might get a couple girls sliding in your DM box. That's funny. They're going to be looking into that stem cell dick. My friend Taro had to take a social media break. Oh, I know Taro. He got a little

bit too many girls in his inbox. That is hilarious. Yeah, not my intention but, you know, whatever. If it happens, it happens. I'm open to whatever the universe presents. Thank you for doing this. Thank you so much for coming on. Thank you guys for having me.

Great conversation. Hey guys, thank you for tuning in again. Don't forget to check out the new podcast site over at tscpodcast.com. All the show notes from this episode and all of our other episodes can be found there. It's a really great resource that highlights all of the great people we've had on this show,

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