The Ultimate Human with Gary Brecka - 197. Chris Bumstead: 6X Mr. Olympia’s Peptide Stack, Supplement Guide and Recovery Protocols

Starting point is 00:00:00 Bodybuilding is not a healthy sport. There's a lot you put your body through. Anabolic steroid use, cutting weight, bulking up weight. This is hard on your organs. The vast majority of bodybuilders say that exchange is worth it. I'm willing to borrow for my future for the gain today. Before I ever won an Olympia, I got really sick. I had this insane amount of inflammation. Even myself, I'm sure I was still ignorant to what I was doing at the time. But I knew that the more stress on my put on my body, the worse it would push me back. You put guard rails on the amount of risk that you were willing to take, but you still achieve the top spot in the world multiple times there's only so much you can really learn about bodybuilding once you have good form you get your protein and you train hard but to do that every

Starting point is 00:00:38 day for 10 years that's what makes it hard you know i was expecting you to give this laundry list of supplements and you basically said i had my nutrition dialed then i was taking creatine and protein powders the greatest longevity science and anti-aging experts now have come full circle sometimes you got to boil back to just training hard eating right and doing consistently lots of people want to enjoy the view but they don't want to climb how did you keep keep that very myopic view of being the best bodybuilder from spilling over into every other aspect of your life. It's a great question. And I mean the very nuanced answer. And it's the honest answer is a lot of it is probably like,

Starting point is 00:01:11 Hey guys, welcome back to the ultimate human podcast. I'm your host human biologist Gary where we go down the road of everything, anti-aging, biohacking, longevity, and everything in between. As you know, my heroes are the movers, the shakers, the game changers in all forms of industry, whether they're PhDs, MDs, biohackers, researchers, or just people that have solved a major problem in their life. And today's guest is no stranger to that six-time Mr. Olympia champion in the physique division. You know who he is. A lot of you have been anticipating this podcast. Welcome to the podcast, Chris Bumstead. Thank you, sir. It's an honor. It's an honor to be on here. It's an honor to be

Starting point is 00:02:06 intimidating given the guests you've had, but. Really? Excited to be on here talking about my journey. I'm not intimidating. Well, you too. You're exciting to talk to. I feel like I need to be the one interviewing you so I can learn a little thing. Well, we can go back and forth, you know. We actually, like all my podcast guests, you know, when we get here early, we run half the podcast before the podcast. I'm like, we should talk about this on the pod. But, you know, one of the things we talked about, which is a common theme on my podcast, and I really want to unpack this a little bit with you, is that I feel like the most impactful

Starting point is 00:02:40 people, like the most inspiring, passionate, purpose-driven people are people that solve a major problem in their life. And one of the things we talked about for the podcast was, you know, it's not so impressive to me to be like, great ones. It's impressive to me to be, like, great ones. it's impressive to me to be really great over a long period of time and you held the number one spot and bodybuilding for more than half a decade, which is a long period of time, which means you solved a lot of problems. And by problems, I mean probably internal demons and external forces. And I would love if you would unpack that a little bit and just talk to my audience about let them into the mindset of sebum, you know,

Starting point is 00:03:30 when you're already at the top of your game and you've achieved this astounding level of success, what was it inside you that didn't make you just say, I'm going to take the award and go home. I did it. Like, you know, a lot of people run one traffic, one Kona Iron Man in their life.

Starting point is 00:03:48 They're like, there's the plaque. That's it. It's a great question. And I mean, the very nuanced answer in this, The honest answer is a lot of it is probably like great genes set up to do the right thing, a lot of luck set up in the right place and potentially, honestly, a lot of faults or demons and insecurities of mine that I was trying to use some level of success to seek after. You know, I find a lot of people who reach a high level of success are kind of potentially

Starting point is 00:04:17 compensating at the beginning. And when I started to feel like maybe I was seeking a sense of belonging or validation, my journey began to become more than just like becoming a better body but a better self. How can I use the challenge pushing myself to new limits to discover parts about myself I didn't know before and become a better version of myself and to be able to grow mentally, spiritually, emotionally, relationally along this physical journey. And I think that's what consistently drove me is every year was like a hero's journey where like you're working up to this huge moment and inevitably there's this like chaos and challenge

Starting point is 00:04:50 that comes in the way where you feel defeat and you need to find something. something inside of yourself to get through that, to get to this success. And then it repeats every year, every year. So I was continuously finding new pieces of myself I didn't know before of what I needed and how I operated best. And my journey started with something very health-related. In 2018, before I ever won in Olympia, I got really sick. And I didn't know what was going on.

Starting point is 00:05:15 Is it kidneys? It was autoimmune to my kidneys, yeah. So I had this insane amount of inflammation edema in my legs. It's like I put on like 15 pounds in a day and I had like no knee, no ankle. It was just inflamed. Didn't know what was going on. I was put in the hospital, put on loop diuretics, IV diuretics and all stuff just to get the water off. They didn't know what was going on.

Starting point is 00:05:35 And it was a, I talked through the story quick now, but in the moment I was like 22 years old, terrified for my life at the time. Yeah. Not knowing what was going to go on. You were bodybuilding then, right? I was in the middle of prep. I was four weeks out of the Olympia at this point. Yeah. So it was like the biggest, one of the biggest moments of feeling powerless, just completely powerless.

Starting point is 00:05:55 Yeah. And there's a pastor, I believe, in this Richard Roar who talks about like every man experiencing a journey of powerlessness, which leads to a sense of like just humility and gratitude for the rest of your life because you realize you're not fully in control. There's so much you can do, but there's always a level beyond what you're capable of. So I think my journey starting with that really led to every moment of success and everything that I did win. it was like yes I did this but there's so much out of my control that got me here and there's so much out of my control that could take me from here so it kept me with a sense of humility throughout my entire journey and also what led to that was me knowing I need to approach things differently like there was a reason I got sick and bodybuilding is not a healthy

Starting point is 00:06:35 sport at all there's a lot you'd put your body through so me needing to manage a what started to what felt like it was just physical health and then what I was learning because it was an autoimmune thing with a lot of stress, cortisol, mental stuff, stuff that I held into my life that was causing some kind of reaction to my body to not feel regulated and heal efficiently. So that was kind of how my journey started. And then every year from there was like, how can I just grow and become better? And my mission in life was to become the best version of myself internally and externally. And, you know, there's only so much you can really learn about bodybuilding. Once you have good form, you get your protein in and you train hard. What's

Starting point is 00:07:14 beyond that it's the mind it's what's making you show up consistently yeah like someone could show up in my peak off season or in the peak of my prep and follow me for a day and do everything it did easily it's not that hard but to do that every day for 10 years that's what makes it hard so that yeah it becomes a mental game and you know you got to figure out the things that are driving you and if those fade why did they fade the things that are holding you back is it self-doubt but like minimizing beliefs whatever it may be and my journey was just just a long journey of self-discovery more than anything. I think it's especially true from my perspective in something like bodybuilding because I would imagine, and I've never been a bodybuilder, but I would imagine that

Starting point is 00:07:55 it's a very lonely sport. Yeah. You know, because it's not a team sport. It's a very individual sport. So you don't have a team, maybe other than your trainers and stuff, holding you accountable. You're not showing up for other people. You're showing up for yourself. And I think most of life, is a very individual sport you know and and they say like it's very lonely at the head of the herd right the all you get to do is enjoy the view

Starting point is 00:08:23 right and and you know lots of people want to enjoy the view but they don't want the climb and to do it on your own by yourself who are you competing against like were you competing against yourself

Starting point is 00:08:39 where you just constantly like I want to be a better version of myself And how did you keep that very myopic view of being the best bodybuilder from spilling over into every other aspect of your life? Because, you know, as I went down the rabbit hole preparing for this interview, there are a lot of bodybuilders that have actually ruined their lives outside of the sport. People talk about how difficult they were to get along with, how self-centered they were, how they were tough in their marriage. You somehow been able to navigate all of that. I mean, I find you to be a very genuine, humble human being at the deepest level of respect for that.

Starting point is 00:09:20 Completely devoid of arrogance, but you in this pursuit to be the best version of yourself, how did you keep the rest of your life imbalance? I mean, I'm definitely wasn't always the easiest to deal with, for sure. You know, anyone's died in that. There's moments where my wife would be rolling her eyes in the crowd. She said he's so easy to deal with all the time. My wife does the same thing. People are like, oh, he's so smart.

Starting point is 00:09:44 You're so lucky. She's like, well. She's in the background. Yeah, sure. No, yeah. I mean, the first thing I could attribute to was just the way I was raising in my family. I have an incredible family who I love very much. And they taught me, like, just good morals of staying true to, like, who you are.

Starting point is 00:10:00 And what's most important is treating everyone with respect and equal kindness. And I guess just I had this idea of myself where, like, as hard as I was working, working. It didn't make me any more special than anyone else. And it always was really like a me versus me kind of thing. And bodybuilding is a very egocentric sport. It's very vain. It's just like intense. And there's like almost like a stereotype that's very accurate of the way people are like trying to be beat better than the next guy comparing to this guy. It's a comparison sport. It's subjective. You're being the pageantry. Right. And stage being judged, you know. And I think a lot of bodybuilds before me, they were like, you got to be on stage. You got to be stepping on the saying you're

Starting point is 00:10:38 going to beat this guy. You see it. You see. him you know you're better than him be like that and when i was young i was like okay that's how i have to be to win but it never made it never drove it didn't make me feel like i was getting better if anything it stressed me out it made me anxious because i was comparing myself to others and like trying to be what they were but especially in bodybuilding where it is so subjective you have no control of what the judges do so if you're trying to beat them or do what the judges do and then the judges switch what they want then you're just pissed because you didn't do what you want you might as well just be doing it for yourself creating the body that you are proud of that you think is the best and being the

Starting point is 00:11:14 best version of yourself and there's no way to continuously improve unless that's your goal if i'm trying to beat the next guy when i beat him i'm done then my motivation is gone but if my goal is just best version of myself that's limitless it's just continuous progress of the journey that you love and i think i mean the most that super popular saying the man who loves walking walks farther than the man who loves a destination. You know, I loved bodybuilding, and I didn't just love working out and starving myself and eating 400 grams of protein. Right, yeah, you can't fall in love with that.

Starting point is 00:11:48 Exactly. I loved seeing the direct results that came from it. You know, like there's few things in life that you have so much control over where you've put X amount of effort and you'll get X amount of result. The gym is one of the things. You know, business doesn't work. Relationship doesn't work like that. You don't know what's coming from it.

Starting point is 00:12:05 But when you eat right and you train hard, you get the result. And when you put yourself in the difficult situations, you're forced to be in a place to grow mentally. And I love that aspect of bodybuilding. So there were times where I didn't necessarily, or plenty of times where I had self-doubt, where I didn't want to show up to the gym and work out. I didn't want to train hard. But I knew how much I loved the end result. And I knew when I consistently did it, the person it made me become.

Starting point is 00:12:30 So I continued to push myself more and more. And every year it was really, you know, I was, I guess, blessed to have a mindset where I was just looking at what was right in front of me. Yeah. You know, I had plenty of years of obstacles like, like an injury, X amount of weeks at the Olympia where I was like, there's no way. I tore my lap one year eight weeks at the Olympia. Well, that's a big one way I'm going to be able to compete. Yeah. All I could do was, okay, well, what can I do today?

Starting point is 00:12:53 You know? I was in Canada. A deal was there. I was like, I need some PRP tomorrow now. I'm flying home, you know? Yeah. I got that done. The next day was like I can't train upper body.

Starting point is 00:13:02 I can go train legs. I train legs every day okay well I'll train them every other day because I need to do something and just progressively doing it one day at a time focusing on what was in my control and you still won that year

Starting point is 00:13:13 and I still won that year yeah wow and I think one of my other biggest cheat codes was I was really like many men these days really bad at feeling emotion and like letting myself be an emotional state I was very avoidant

Starting point is 00:13:26 and just like push it off and when I came face to face with being bad at that I was like I was very, a person, like, how do I prove what I'm bad at? So then if I'm bad at feeling stuff and it's making me feel worse and more anxious, what's the opposite I can do is just embrace the shitty emotions I'm feeling? So if I was like that moment, I had my lat tear and in that moment, it might be like, oh, you hurt yourself, compete next year.

Starting point is 00:13:49 But that was my life. I dedicated my life to bodybuilding. So to me, think of dropping out the Olympia, it was like I'm losing a piece of my life right now. It was devastating. Right. So instead of avoiding that, I learned to let myself feel that emotion. And are you feel like you're going to break down the world's ending and crumbling right now?

Starting point is 00:14:04 Okay, well, be in that. Cry for a moment. Like, be in that and lean on the people who are there and who love you. And luckily, I've met my wife right after I got sick. So she was with me through every Olympia I ever won. She met her in your early 20s. Early 20s to now married with a child. And then through that whole relationship,

Starting point is 00:14:24 she's a very emotional being. So she helped teach me to lean into my emotion to share it with her. And it's so much... it's so hard to explain and maybe some men out there can kind of relate to me in that sense where you feel like you just need to suppress it because it's a bad emotion but to just let it out there's no result to come from it no answer no solution and to have someone that you can share it with it just like releases this block and creates energy in you to move forward and I think being able to apply that throughout my journey and learn how to do that just it kept

Starting point is 00:14:54 moving me forward that's so that's that's so amazing the the injury that you had well I mean you had a lot of injury, but the kidney injury, I've heard you when you were talking to Patrick Beck, David, and some others, and you talked about how that injury made you limit the amount of risk that you took. And I think that that's fascinating because I think in bodybuilding, again, I've never been a bodybuilder, but I would assume that it's win at all costs and there's an exchange for that right i mean um anabolic steroid use um constantly you don't cutting weight bulking up weight i mean this is hard on your organs it's hard on your liver it's hard on your kidneys hard on your heart um and i would assume that the vast majority of

Starting point is 00:15:46 bodybuilders say that exchange is worth it i'm willing to borrow for my future for the gain today but like when you had that injury and you had this swelling and you realize that I have a real critical kidney issue, you know, landing me in the hospital. What were some of those risks that you weren't willing to take? Because I find it even more fascinating that you put guardrails on the amount of risk that you were willing to take,

Starting point is 00:16:14 but you still achieve the top spot in the world multiple times. And that is really what's fascinating to me, and it might be a message for other, you know, younger body. that are on that journey, yes, it is about the gear that you're going to run, but it's also about the path that you set for yourself. So talk a little bit about some of the guardrails that you set for yourself. For sure, yeah. I mean, it's very important for any bodybuilds to understand using any level of PEDs as serious

Starting point is 00:16:44 health risk, you know, like the gear you have to run to be a professional bodybuilder. It's not healthy. Like you said, you're boring from your future life. And even myself, I'm sure I was still ignorant to what I was doing at the time. but I knew that the more stress on I would put on my body the worse it would push me back so there are specific compounds

Starting point is 00:17:02 that bodybuilders take there's an array of them you know bodybills have always been the guinea pig of exactly yeah we've always been guinea pigs for stuff even when we come to peptides like we were taking peptides before

Starting point is 00:17:14 they were ever anything because we're like we'll give it a shot if it works research purposes only sounds great wait it helps injuries it worked in a rat and a monkey exactly exactly yeah but no so when I got to that

Starting point is 00:17:25 point where I go sick, I was like, okay, I was doing X and I got sick. What if I do half of X? If I don't get sick, maybe there's something that was causing it that was too much of a stress on my system. And everything's a multitude of issues. You know, it's not like just the drugs were making me sick. It was the stress, my lifestyle. I was just got out of college. I was drinking a lot in between my off seasons. There was a lot I was doing. So then my shift went on to my health. I focused. Shift my focus on my health. You shift your focus to your health. And then, so then everything I was putting my body. Because that moment made it, threw it in your face.

Starting point is 00:18:00 You're like, whoa, I'm not immortal. I mean, coming out of that, so I still compete in that Olympia, where I ended up in the hospital, probably shouldn't have done that, but I was very stubborn. And I was on, I had a journey. I was a goal. I wasn't going to quit on it. And then after that Olympia, my coach, my sister, my family, myself, like sat down and were like, you shouldn't compete anymore. You should sup this. Like, you put your body at risk.

Starting point is 00:18:22 Like, it's telling you something. You should sup. and I was like, I'm just not ready to stop. You know? If I was given that decision right now, I would suck. But I was 21 years old. You can't be killed by a bullet at 21. Yeah.

Starting point is 00:18:36 One of my favorite stories is that. I got a 21 year old. I thought he was sitting in here. He's in the house. That F1 story of like back in the day of Alonzo racing Schumacher and they go into a corner, Alonzo behind Schumacher, and he rips by him in the corner and like, how do you know to get by him there?

Starting point is 00:18:52 He's like, he has two kids at home. home he was going to break you know wow life changes over time you're on a different journey and nothing wrong with either but when i was young dumb ignorant no family send it you know just get after it i'm 30 now as kids but looking back i wouldn't have made that the same decision so i'm grateful i did but i got it with my health still but that's also why i chose to retire when i did too yeah no decisions are different but yeah no the guardrails i put on that were just limiting how much you took and what I took specific things like trend are one of the hardest things on your liver specifically they're super toxic on your body they're the

Starting point is 00:19:30 ones that worked the best sadly and they say the hardcore that's yeah a reason that's hardcore for a reason it's more adverse effects and benefits for sure from when you get to that level so I just kind of like essentially cut what I was taking in half and was like I'm gonna try it again I'm gonna take care of my health I'm gonna take care of the food that I put in my body I'm not gonna be like, oh, I need protein. I'm going to go to five guys. No, I'm going to go get a grass-fed steak and sweet potato and, like, switch everything I'm putting in my body now. Because body bill was back in the day, it was just like macros or all that matters, you know? Right. But it's a lot more

Starting point is 00:20:05 than that, of course. I've heard some people on, you know, even on Instagram today, there's like macros. Calories in, calories out. And there's a lot of science that just prove that to you. For sure. I mean, you can get your calories from donuts, but you, right? But there's consequences to that. And, but what's, what's also fascinating to me is there's so much about bodybuilding that's like not done in the gym. And, you know, I think some of the, some of the leading entrepreneurs in the world, Kevin Leary, for example, some, some of the leading financial entrepreneurs in the world will say, the greatest decision he'll ever make is the person that you choose to spend the rest of your life with. And I've heard you talk about your wife a lot.

Starting point is 00:20:48 lot as that foundation, as that rock. And I find it to be very sincere. I don't think that you're just on a podcast trying to pay how much to your wife. I think that, you know, when you're competing in a sport as lonely as bodybuilding, and you're sort of taking your family on the journey, whether they want to go or not, it has to take a very special person to constantly support you and be willing to make sacrifices on their side of the table. You know, I, you know, I find this area particularly fascinating because for me, I found a lot of love and gratitude and foundation after I met my second wife, Sage, and we did all the things that you're not supposed to do, right?

Starting point is 00:21:35 Moved in together, built a house together, started a business together, combined our families. And I think maybe the greatest relationships are the ones that go through everything that's meant to tear you apart, but you're still together. And so I wonder if you just talk a little bit about, you know, what kind of foundation or strength you got from her. How important was that decision? Because I think men were weaker than we profess to be. For sure. And we're a lot more emotional creatures than we also let out.

Starting point is 00:22:10 You know, we're taught to suppress our emotions and not show fear or not not show gratitude. That's weakness. not talk about her faith and not talk about her family relationships, but you're very open about it. So how much of a support system did you have from her? And like, how did that matter so much to your career? You think you would have made it six times in a row? Not bad for her.

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Starting point is 00:23:15 dot com that's drink h2 tab.com and upgrade your hydration today now let's get back to the ultimate human podcast i'm assuming she's watching us if she's watching you know i think there's a difference between making it and then losing yourself along the way and still making it and i think that makes all the difference so if you ask if i would be successful with her absolutely not could i've won some Olympias, sure. But to me, success isn't just having some trophies on my shelf. It's, you know, finishing my career, like, proud of who I am, how I treated people, the relationship I built and kept along the way. Like, that to me is success. When I go to sleep at night, it's not because of trophies. It's because of the peace I feel at my heart with my character, my relationships,

Starting point is 00:24:02 and the love I have for my wife and knowing that that is like my constant rock in life. And so what she has helped me with is beyond what I could really ever explain. And like, were saying we're not the best at feeling or expressing emotion, but I think the more we hold things in, the bigger reaction they have within our body, whether from a scientific point of producing more cortisol or just physically feeling numb, you know? And I was definitely someone who would numb things out. And in one of my Olympia's speech is one year, something that I like learned from her was that if you numb the bad, you numb the good. If you're trying to suppress everything, you're like putting yourself in this box of what you can feel. So you might be trying

Starting point is 00:24:40 not to feel negative emotion, but you're putting glass ceiling on the positive motion, you can feel too. You're just like this like numb being. So she really taught me to just open that box up and allow myself to be seen, you know, as humans were wide for a connection. And you can't feel connected unless you're letting your genuine self be seen. Yeah. You know, to like, in a moment, I was just talking about this with Henry. We were like filming something and I had my official wedding two weeks ago now. And oh, you did? Yeah. We've been married, but we have the official wedding. Yeah, we're We've got to, Sage and I got to do the same thing. We've been married for years and we never actually had.

Starting point is 00:25:17 Where did you celebrate? We were in Italy, Tuscany. Oh, too. That's awesome. It's where our son's going to get married. Oh, that's awesome. Like Como. Yeah.

Starting point is 00:25:24 Oh, yeah. Is that in Tuscany? No. Or that's, no. No, it's. Where is that? Sorry. Mid?

Starting point is 00:25:30 South. So, anyway. Italy's beautiful. It's beautiful. It's engaged there and he's also going to get married there. And my wife for a while didn't want to tell people we were married because we hadn't had the ceremony. Yeah. And,

Starting point is 00:25:41 And so you had it in Tuske? Yeah. So was it like small family? Oh yeah, we had eight people there. No. Yeah. It was my parents, siblings, her mom, siblings, and that was it. And her daughter.

Starting point is 00:25:54 And your daughter, yeah. Yeah. And even in that small thing, there was this moment where, like, we had this live band playing music. It was an emotional day. We wrote our vows by hand in the morning, you know, like lots of stuff coming up and they're playing this song. And I just like had tears coming to my eyes where I started crying because I was just so grateful for like the love that we were sharing.

Starting point is 00:26:11 the day that we're in and I noticed myself just like we're on one side of the table and there's only six people on the other side and I just turned to her because like that was my safe place to like feel and be seen and whatever like my true vulnerable self was like she I can share that with her and I'm not alone in that so like even though with my closest family there she's still my safest rock to be with so I turned and she was the only one who could see me cry and she like knows who I am and she like saw me put a hand on me didn't say anything was just like there for me and that kind of like unspoken ability to be seen and unspoken connection and trust between us like that's the kind of

Starting point is 00:26:47 confidence that can instill you to be able to do anything you know you come home from a day and you're like i'm fucking injured i feel like shit this happened like how the fuck am i going to win another don't be like this is why am i even doing this you know and to be able to share that with someone who knows you and sees you and for them to be there for you in that moment like to let that out and then to get to the true thing that's unraveling it's like okay what are you really dealing with why is this pain coming up and to be able to process that, not alone? Yeah. That's what instills confidence.

Starting point is 00:27:17 And to me, those are the kind of things that allows you not to win once, two, three, four, five, six times. And become a better person along the way and not lose yourself on a journey of excellence. Yeah, that's so awesome, man, because you grew in mind, body, grew in spirit, you know. And I guess about 15 months ago, that's when God gave you the greatest blessing, right? Your daughter, she's 15 months old. Yeah. Yeah. That had to be a material change.

Starting point is 00:27:42 Does that factor into you retiring? Absolutely. It did. Yeah. Yeah. So when my wife was like, I don't know, four or five months pregnant at my second last Olympia, and that was supposed to be my last. I was like ready to retire on that one.

Starting point is 00:27:57 And that was the year I tore my lat. Just a lot of stuff felt like it was lining up for me to be done. It was your last one that you tore your last. Second last one. Oh, second and last one. When I was, I plan to retire. Okay. And then from there, there was some.

Starting point is 00:28:10 things that I was going through internally and I was just like I want to finish on a little bit more of a positive note, you know, stepping away not from fear, but from just a choice of power. But then like that same story of that guy, you know, breaking into the corner. It's like, okay, I have my family at home. I've had my success. One's enough enough. Yeah. You know, like. You never get that time, Brady, Michael Jordan. I got one more in me. Of course. You know, constantly. I think he did that six times. He did. Yeah. And he crushed it. He did. He did. He did. But I don't think that is fades. I'm sure I'll be like, I'm sure he'll be 80 years old

Starting point is 00:28:42 or be chilling, be like, I could have done more, you know? Yeah. Well, he wants to play in the Olympics now. Yeah, true, true. He actually, you know, interestingly, Tom reminds me a lot about you. He has a childlike fascination

Starting point is 00:28:54 with performance and optimal health. You know, all of our discussions have always been centered around, like, how can he take better care of himself? How can he sleep better? How can he perform better? So I find it fascinating with someone who has had a career like that,

Starting point is 00:29:09 too. It's still trying to be the best off the field of what he does for, you know, for himself. But I had a daughter first too, Maddie. And that is a life-changing experience. You know, it's really kind of strange for me because the very first day that we brought her home, I kind of felt like it was a foreigner in my house. I was like, is somebody going to come pick this thing up? Like, is this like going to stay? You know? And then it's terrifying. It's terrifying. It's because there's no guidebook. Like, you don't know what to do. They're like, go home.

Starting point is 00:29:43 Yeah, but then what's crazy is this whole, I get goosebumps telling this story. And my first wife, Amy, the mother of my kids, who's an amazing, amazing person. Still a very close friend of mine to this day. But was so astounding to me was, you know, we bought this thing home. And I'm like, I feel like I'm going to break it.

Starting point is 00:30:03 I don't know how to feed it. It's so small. So fragile. It's so fragile. And then, but something in her, she just knew what to do. I was like, where did you get all this knowledge? Like, you've been reading books? Like, she's like, my daughter would cry and she goes, oh, she's gassy.

Starting point is 00:30:20 Or she needs to eat or she wants me to come in and hold her. I'm like, how the hell do you know that? It just sounds like noise. And she knew the difference in the cries. And it was like, so what was really cool was to see this whole like woman come out of your wife, at least that was my experience, that just showed up because there was a kid all of a sudden in the house.

Starting point is 00:30:44 Like, God imparts this wisdom upon them somehow. Yep. They sort of know what to do because you and I are just fumbling around in the dark. Just trying to help. Bottle you, how do I help? What do you need me to do? I'm like, so scared.

Starting point is 00:30:57 But now she's, so she's 15 months, she's pulling herself up on stuff, wreaking havoc. Walk and running around, yeah. Yeah. You have any advice that I'm an older daughter than me? Tips I need to know. Yeah, you know, it's, it's, you're going to cave and you're going to melt. And there's, you know, my only parenting advice, and I've raised three kids, I have a fourth one now with Sage, that she had from previous marriage.

Starting point is 00:31:21 My only advice is just incorporate your kids into your daily life. Like, do not stop your life and turn it all onto your kid. Like, we brought Madison to busy restaurants, we brought her out to eat, we traveled with her. Even in the little, they had this, the coolest stroller at the time, it was called the Bugaboo. It's made out of aircraft aluminum. So, like, I was a scientist.

Starting point is 00:31:43 Oh, yeah. Oh, it's aircraft aluminum. It's so cool. And so we got one of these. But literally, you know, we would go over to some of our friend's house, and they'd be like, shh, the baby's sleeping.

Starting point is 00:31:53 The door's close. They got about exactly 6 o'clock. And so we tiptoe around, then they wake them up exactly 5.30 in the morning. And we were like, oh, we brought our baby with us. It's not in the car She was sleeping in the house

Starting point is 00:32:08 And it just made it so easy and adaptive And then we noticed like when we would take flights People's babies would be screaming And just bouncing off the wall Because they knocked them off their schedule But Madison was just so used to sleep And where she had to sleep There was noise in the room

Starting point is 00:32:26 There was noise in the room I mean we didn't purposely disrupt their life But her her you know nursery room door was open And we would have folks over for January down the family. It was noisy. She would sleep through it.

Starting point is 00:32:38 And that's my only advice. I don't like to give a lot of parenting advice. I've become a better parent after my kids were adults than when they were younger. As long as you figure it out. But I think our role as fathers is to just believe in our kids until they learn to believe them themselves. And now I'm seeing that switch in my kids like as they're starting to believe in themselves and they're starting to stand on their own two feet and they're starting businesses and they're

Starting point is 00:33:04 really making their way in the world. And that, for me, is the greatest level of satisfaction. So my only parenting advice is just don't sell your life down. No to do. Bring your daughter with you wherever. And if people don't like it, get them out of your life. They're the problem. Yeah, they're the problem.

Starting point is 00:33:20 They were a baby too on screen. They were having a kid. But it's, you know, what's awesome, too, is that there's this fear of the unknown. Like, am I parenting right? Am I raising them right? Am I doing the right thing? Am I being the right role model? But eventually, like, every stage gets better and better.

Starting point is 00:33:39 Like, there is nothing in this world better than watching your kid play a sport or, like, the first time you go and watch your daughter sing at the Christmas players. It's just so amazing. And now they're my best friends as adults. I mean, I could truly say my kids are my best friends. There's no one I'd rather travel with. There's no one I'd rather be in business with. There's no one I'd trust more than them. So that's awesome

Starting point is 00:34:05 To the extent that helps That's all I got Good advice It's good advice Because we just took her to To our trip to our wedding To Italy Oh you did

Starting point is 00:34:13 It was chaos We're like we're never going back To Europe with a baby again That decision So maybe we'll travel closer Than a six hour time change Well I mean that's yeah You just went all in

Starting point is 00:34:22 Out of the gate You know that's a little heavy But I think the more you do with them The more adaptive they become You know They will learn way more From observation than they do from what you try to teach them.

Starting point is 00:34:33 For sure, yeah. And they are way more observant than what you think. Yeah. You know, when those first sentences start coming out of their mouth and you realize how much they know about the world around them, because when they're not speaking, they're observing. Yeah, they're watching. They're learning. Yeah, and they're formulating their own opinions.

Starting point is 00:34:50 So, sorry, I had a great, the mother of my kids is a great, great woman, too. And so when we decided we were going to separate, we only separated the husband and the wife. We never separated the mother and the father. I think that was a big plus for kids, too. So I want to switch gears a little bit. I mean, obviously, you have one of the greatest bodybuilders in the world on your podcast. We got to talk a little bit about your journey. Everybody's going to want to know, what did he take?

Starting point is 00:35:17 How did he eat? What did he do, you know, to get there? I also found it fascinating on a podcast that was watching of yours when you talked about time where a young kid came up to you that was going to start bodybuilding. and he was like, should I start using steroids? And you told him, no. He said, it's a really bad idea. And I thought that was really interesting, you know,

Starting point is 00:35:42 because here you are one of the greatest bodybuilders of all time, dominating the sport. It's clearly, you know, using PEDs. And your recommendation out of the gate to this young bodybuilder starting out was, don't start with steroids. You said that on the Petrick of David podcast, just as a reminder. Um, so why did you do that? I mean, the easy response to that, someone watching that, but like, yeah, easy for you say,

Starting point is 00:36:08 you're hypocrite. Yeah, yeah, exactly. I want to. And valid, too, you know? Right, right. I mean, was a decision that serious if you're going to walk up to a stranger and let their answer, just depict if you're going to do something that's potentially harming your health? Like, you need to be making that decision for yourself.

Starting point is 00:36:25 You need to be understanding what the risk are. You need to be understanding how small the benefits are. like did people can look at my life and be like wow like I want that how many people actually make it in any sport you know right let alone body but how many people are gym then how many people become mr. lumpia and beyond that there's people who are second place of the mr. Olympia and they're making that cash that check for that prize money is like 20 grand their sponsors maybe some of these people are making like low six figures a year like it's not a life of lux and then your shelf life is done when you're 30 what do you do from

Starting point is 00:36:59 there like it's not as exciting as you might think it's a really high risk and most people don't see the success that they think they're going to see you know so i definitely tell anybody young who's trying to take that seriously is to really tick off all your like boxes and that being the last one like have you spent consistent years training hard learning how to train with proper form proper prioritization good programs you know good nutrition good rest and doing everything that you can to get to a point where you can actually see what your genetic capabilities are because one of the biggest thing that limits a bodybuilder

Starting point is 00:37:34 is your genetics. You know, once you're on the Olympia stage, everyone's the top 0-0-0-1% in the gene pool of not only your ability to put on muscle, but just your ratio of joint to muscle belly, to waist size, to like your ability to grow legs and lots so you can create an expert,

Starting point is 00:37:48 like all the little things are so dependent on that. So if you just jump in to jumping on steroids at a young age before you know any of that, then you have horrible genetics, you've just put yourself at risk for no reason. That's a really good point. I mean, on this path that you went on, I mean, there's not really, you've even talked about it before, there's no real guidebook.

Starting point is 00:38:08 It's not like, hey, go read this book. It's bodybuilding steroid 101. You start here. This is what you do, month one, month six, month 12. There isn't really a guide. And I kind of feel like maybe the guys at the top of their game aren't really that willing to share what they're doing behind the scenes because any little edge. that they have is an edge that they keep for themselves.

Starting point is 00:38:31 And so what were you using as a resource? Like where were you getting your training advice from? I mean, obviously you go in and you lift heavy, but you would have gotten a lot more injured a lot more frequently if you didn't know what you were doing. So where did you get the guidance from for training? Where did you get the guidance from on your gear, on your nutrition,

Starting point is 00:38:53 or were you really just figuring it out along the way? A lot of specifically training, at least, started with my brother-in-law. He was a young bodybuilder. Your wife's brother? My wife's husband. Sorry. Hopefully not your wife's husband. My sister's husband.

Starting point is 00:39:11 We just found a polygamous in our midst. I expose myself on the ultimate human. My sister's husband, they were dating at the time when I was in high school, which old was to me, he had local bodybuilder. And he was just, to this day, like, he became a professional bodybuilder as well. And he was like notoriously one of the strongest, hardest training guys in the whole, like, league. Really? So me being able to be in grade 12 and that being like my training partner some days gave me like a massive cheat code.

Starting point is 00:39:38 Another moment of like being right place, right time, like God's timing to be in the right position of like this young kid who loves training now. He was this incredible bodybuilder with insane work ethic who is the guy I'm looking up to. Ah, that's cool. He taught me more than anything just what true intensity was, you know. people think they're training hard in the gym but the idea of taking like every set close to failure or two failure every single day and pushing every single week after week year after year it's it's different you know so that was my standard when I started training at like 16 years old and that was like my huge cheat code to this day where I'll train with bigger but bigger body

Starting point is 00:40:15 bills than me and I often have better form and stronger than them because I've just that was just my like blood you know what I've been doing so he was a huge resource for me he coached me through the beginning of my crew. So he was actually in the gym with you, coaching you. Yeah, that's awesome. Doing my diet, nutrition. And I really think so much of it is so much more simple than people realize. And I imagine you see this a lot too when people stressing about

Starting point is 00:40:36 health trying to find his perfect solution and answer. Sometimes you've got to boil back to just training hard, eating right, and doing consistently. I totally agree with you, Vin. I told you one of my favorite comments that you ever made that was shocking to me was you know, you talked about

Starting point is 00:40:52 going into Mr. Olympia prep and you know I was expecting you to give this laundry list of supplements and this laundry list of you know peptides and all of this stuff and you basically said I had my nutrition dial then I was taking creatine and protein powders and I was like wow um and I often talk about that how like the greatest longevity science and anti-aging experts now have come full circle and we're like getting back to the basics yeah sunlight um vitamin D3, grounding in breath work, whole food diet, focusing on sleep, like the basics, the things that you can't manage your way around. I'm sure you couldn't train your way around a crappy diet. And you couldn't eat your way around poor training. And so there's some just those

Starting point is 00:41:39 fundamentals. It's like the fundamentals of longevity, if you follow the blue zone, whole food diet, sense of connection and purpose, and mobility into later in life. That's what the data says, right and I and I think you're saying bodybuilding is like nutrition train hard sleep recover repeat yeah for sure um major oversimplifying it but um but I do want to go into the supplement bandwagon a little bit um I I got a list of um some of your some of your favorites and I wondered if you just talk about these and like how you incorporate them into your daily regimen and how important they were for you weigh protein was like the big one was that your main in addition to whole foods was that your your main other source of protein trying to get to what 200 grams of protein 210 grams of protein i mean i would typically aim to get like at least 200 to 250 grams from whole foods of protein and then i would stack on anywhere from 50 to 100 grams from protein shakes but the goal was always whole food but when you're eating 300 plus grams of protein it's just a lot of food yeah

Starting point is 00:42:49 Especially, like, life's busier, whatever you walk out of a gym, just being able to have that in your bag, mix it with water and go is, it's super simple and convenient. So that's probably, you know, been over two days, I haven't taken protein powder in the last decade. Really? I remember I had a very short stint as a triathlete. And I actually was the age group champion amateur for my age group in Florida. and I went so psycho that one year, biking, running, swimming, biking, running, swimming that I did the Chesapeake Half Iron Man, and I came home and I hung my bike up on the garage. And if I still had that garage, it would still be there.

Starting point is 00:43:28 That was 18 years ago. And so, and that's part of what fascinates me so much because the grind and the mental fortitude that it has to take to, to, maintain that level of intensity over such a prolonged period of time is just still fascinating to me. Creatine was one of your must-aftaves. Yep, for sure. And I say every woman over 40 years old needs to be on creatine. It's no longer a bodybuilding supplement. It never has been, but I mean, no longer just for bodybuilders. I think it's fallen into that bodybuilding category, but for cognitive function, it's dirt cheap. You took creatine. monohydrate, right?

Starting point is 00:44:16 Yeah. How much of that were you taking? Typically, five grams, and then in, like, competition season, I would be doing five grams pre-am post-workout, so up to 10 grams. And then just recently, I was just learning about the cognitive benefits, too. So before I do, like, a podcast or something, I'll take 20 grams of it and just get ready to go. I was sipping on electrolytes and creatine on my way here.

Starting point is 00:44:37 Oh, were you really? Yeah. I think we did, but hydrogen water and a couple other things, you know, on the way in here. You also talked about multivitamins. You had a basic multi that you took, which is to cover the basis, like B vitamins. Yeah, exactly. More so just even learning, like you know, better than most is the nutrients and our food is pretty lacking right now. Yeah.

Starting point is 00:44:59 And when you get them, A, nutrients in our food is so much lower than it's been in the past. But B, when you're dieting super strict near the end of prep, like you don't even have the luxury. I'll start cutting up vegetables and foods because your calories are so low everywhere you put it matters. So you're not going to get enough nutrients when your priority is getting enough protein and then enough energy to get through your workout. So being able to take a multivitamin for me was also something that was super beneficial. That's great. And you've also talked about glutamine, which I'm also a big fan of.

Starting point is 00:45:29 What were you taking the glutamine for? For my gut health. God health. Yeah, I would throw that into pretty much every shake I had. I'd put at least 10 grams into that. Listen, there's what I share on this podcast, and then there's what I share with my inner circle. If you've been following me for a while, you know how I hold nothing back here, but my VIP community, that's where the real magic happens. Picture this, you're struggling with energy crashes, brain fog, or just feeling like you're not operating at your peak, and you don't know where to get real answers.

Starting point is 00:45:58 But here's what really sets this apart. You're not just getting my insights. When I have incredible guests on the podcast, VIP members get to submit questions for a private podcast segment. So that world-renowned expert we just interviewed, you get exclusive access to the podcast. their knowledge, tailored to your specific situation. This section is under the private podcast section in the ultimate human community. And speaking of exclusive, you're getting my personal protocols. The exact tools I use for water fasting, gut optimization, and morning routines that have taken me decades to perfect. This isn't theory. This is what works in the real world.

Starting point is 00:46:31 The community launches challenges throughout the year where you get direct access to me and my network of experts. It's like having a personal health advisory board for less than $100 a month. Your health is your wealth, and this investment pays dividends for life. Join the VIP community at the ultimatehuman.com forward slash VIP and step into your ultimate potential. Now let's get back to the Ultimate Human podcast. Yeah. I'm first of all, I agree with all of these.

Starting point is 00:46:57 And then resveratrol, which I take a pie seed form of resveritral. Risveratrol is grape seed extract. That's why a lot of people say that red wine's good for you. You know, I can actually lose the alcohol and still get to benefit. Yeah. The polyphenols and the resveratrol and the few studies that were like, oh, a glass of wine a day keeps the doctor away. It was like, no, it wasn't the wine.

Starting point is 00:47:19 It was the polyphenols and the resveratrol. Either way. They can convince himself, though. So you added the resveratrol, turmeric and corcumin. You took a lot of electrolytes. Interesting one that I found, which I'm also a big fan of, is something called Bergamont. And what were you taking the Bergamont for?

Starting point is 00:47:38 That's for, like, cardiovascular health. cholesterol. It's a big thing in the body in the community. It's been just something that was always spoken about you need to be taking this. So you're like, okay.

Starting point is 00:47:47 PEDs. I was like, can't miss that one. I don't want to be missing out. Exactly. I did a podcast with Dr. Gundry and he's a cardiologist, cardiovascular surgeon,

Starting point is 00:47:59 and I have the genetic predisposition to lipo little A. cholesterol is amazing. Triglaccharide's amazing. And I eat very clean, but I have the liposolid which there are no pharmaceutical solutions for it. But Bergamot and slow release niacin, he told me to start taking

Starting point is 00:48:17 those. And it dramatically reduced those for me. And so those are the real, those are the dangerous ones for cardiovascular disease. And, you know, because we know that steroid use is going to be hard on the liver, it's going to be tough on your cholesterol. I imagine you stop drinking. Oh, yeah. Yeah. I mean, that's been gone for a long time. Yeah. But because these things were so hard on the rest of your organs you were supplementing to kind of offset that. Exactly. Yeah. You know, I, we were talking before we came on the podcast that, you know, I believe that

Starting point is 00:48:52 things like peptides are going to be, some of them are going to be as common as a multivitamin. And as soon as five here. Yeah. Because peptides are amino acid sequences. When you put them in the body, they act a bunch of different ways. They can act like mymetics and mimic other compounds in the body. They can act like secretagogues and cause organs and glands to secrete things that they would normally do. And there's a whole host of peptides.

Starting point is 00:49:25 I actually wanted to go through some of them, tissue-healing peptides or pair of peptides. Not a scientific dive into them. I'm just curious which ones you've used and supported. And in full disclosure, you and I are partners in a peptide manufacturer called Visalis, Visalius Longevity Labs, and they manufacture peptides called Peptual. But this is not a commercial for Peptual. And this is just a discussion on peptides,

Starting point is 00:49:53 but just in full disclosure, first of all, proud to be your partner in that. And so is the crown prince of Saudi. These are one of our partners now, too. Yeah. So if you want to have an extra 747 line around, I know you try to give one to Donald Trump. I'm also in the market for a private 747 if they have an extra. I'm not sure I could afford to upkeep that thing. Yeah, I know, exactly. We could accept the gift, but that'd actually not fill it with gas. Flip it, yeah. Yeah, but I'll just park it and put my friends on it and have a party. But I think the world of peptides is fascinating. It's been around a lot longer than people think. And then there's this whole new emerging world. of some of these designer approaches to modulating human performance. You know, Dr. Mike from RP Strength, you know who he is?

Starting point is 00:50:44 This guy, I actually really like this guy. I think he's super intelligent and he toes the line very well between the valid science and the risks and things. He's actually called me out a lot on social media, and it pisses me off. But then I'm like, ah, he's right, you know. I have to go and delete videos. You're like, shit, he got me there.

Starting point is 00:51:04 Yeah, but I'm like, but he helps me sharpen my sword because I'm like, dude, he's actually right. But he's one of the few guys that I trust in this whole PED category as being just authentic and knowledgeable. And he was talking about these non-angiogenic anabolics. And I know that's a mouthful. And I forget the two drugs he was specifically referring to, but one of them was like the folostatin gene therapies.

Starting point is 00:51:33 was similar to that and it inhibited myostatin which is one of the compounds that actually stops our muscles from growing and he was hypothesizing that the whole era of steroids may very soon be going away because we can safely enhance and modulate the body's ability to grow massive amounts of muscle by harnessing our own innate genetics and our own innate ability to turn genes off that are inhibiting our ability to grow muscle. I mean, those areas of science are so fascinating to me, like safer. But they're the same genes, though, that are inhibiting, like, cancer cells from growing too, are they not?

Starting point is 00:52:17 Yeah, I mean, I think they are. And I think that's where things get a little bit dicey. And I think, as with any new, you know, therapy, there's obviously got to be the risks. But peptides, you know, there's been... Enormous numbers of scripts written for these with very few adverse events. I think they fall into several major categories. I just wanted to run through some of them for tissue repair. Have you used BPC 157, TB 500?

Starting point is 00:52:49 Yeah. Those are like, those are, what you say? It'll be a multivitamin to the average person. They're a multivitamin to the average bodybuilder. Yeah. At least the last five of you. They're like, oh, those are baby. Like that's it?

Starting point is 00:53:01 No, when I talk about injuries. When I talk about injuries I've had throughout my career, there's few that I've gotten through where I've healed, like, how do you heal so fast, where I wasn't taking those spot injecting it right into my lat, my shoulder, or whatever it may be. I will tell you, anecdotally, you know, I've seen miracles with these kinds of peptides and can't recall adverse events, except when people are online getting them from, like, Chinese pharmacies and whatnot. I think one of the reasons why we back this vizalias.

Starting point is 00:53:32 longevity labs is you're going to stand behind peptides. They've got to be GMP certified and you've got to know the source of them and they have to be stability, sterility, potency tested. But BPC 157 is known for its anti-inflammatory properties. It's a gastric pentadeecopeptide. It's actually synthesized from gastric juice. One of the things I have seen in tens of thousands of patients that came through our clinic system was significant improvements in gut healing and gut repair. I don't think we approached a single Crohn's patient or diverticulitis or a patient that had irritable bowel syndrome that our clinical team didn't think about BPC 157. Is that both injectable and oral or just oral mainly for the gut? Oral, you know, the interesting thing about BPC 157 is because

Starting point is 00:54:24 it's synthesized from gastric juice, it's actually tolerated very well orally. You can do it through an intranasal spray. You can do it in oral capsule form or you can, like you did, side-inject it. So post-surgical repair, wound repair, gut permeability, especially in leaky gut, just fascinating accelerations. And it's kind of sad that these are not NSF certified because you're only harnessing the body's ability to heal itself. Yeah. And, you know, what I wanted to discuss here was, you know, you used a lot of these. peptides, maybe not to get bigger or give you an advantage, but to recover and heal from the damage that you were doing. And everybody listening to this podcast has some kind of nips and bibles,

Starting point is 00:55:09 right? Knee, hip, shoulder, rotator cuff, low back, elbow, something. And if you don't, good for you. You're jealous. Because, yeah, he's jealous. But I feel like it's just one of those universal peptides. When did you, when did you first start discovering peptides? And when did you first start, using him right out of the gate? I think it was right around 2018 around that time when I got sick too because one of the first ones I took. He was sick a lot, dude.

Starting point is 00:55:37 It was the same time, the same time. Okay, this is the same one time. Okay, good. It was just a big moment in my life. Okay, so big signals. But because it was autoimmune, I had a local guy tell me about thymonds in alpha one. And like the immune regulation modulation that can come from that. How like there was a lot of studies already at that point helping people with autoimmune

Starting point is 00:55:56 prevent flare ups and being able to just regulate. the immune system, preventing it from attacking itself. And when I heard that, I was, at that point, I was just like, I'll try anything. So when I bought into that, that's when I learned about the BPC and the TV as well. And you're never not injured as a professional bodybuilder somewhere. I got it. So you just start with that. And that's kind of what kicked off my journey.

Starting point is 00:56:17 What about now? Do you have any lasting injuries from it? I mean, it seemed like you're getting around really good. I moved pretty. I'm like, my body's tight. No crazy injuries. I just had a shoulder operation a few months ago. It's bouncing back still right now.

Starting point is 00:56:30 I took a couple rotator cuffs. A couple rotator cuffs. Yeah, like three, so a deal action did to themselves right in there. So that helps heal that up. Some scapulars, yeah. Yeah, no, it's still just like nagging little things, but nothing crazy. Luckily, knocko wood. Well, I mean, three tears in the rotate.

Starting point is 00:56:46 There's only four muscles in the rotator cuff. So three quarters of them. It's moving now, though. Yeah, I remember in chiropractic school, they were like, it only really does the first like 15 degrees of abduction and internal rotation. So when you have big delts like that, it's pretty common, too, with, like, pitchers because you have this big deltoid, and then all of a sudden it handles, it hands all this load over to these four tiny little muscles, and they can, they can snap. But you started talking about stem cells for a moment, too. I'm a huge fan of stem cells. For a while, it was on the NFL Alumni Association's Athletica. And that organization is full of repetitive use injuries. And so most of them are not major traumatic injuries, just repetitive use, like what a bodybuilder would have, what every 50, 60-year-old man or woman is going to have. And stem cells, which, contrary to popular belief, are legal in the United States.

Starting point is 00:57:45 You can do them into your joints. And there's some states, like Florida now that I think you can do them intravenously. Yeah, I think as long as they're manufactured in Florida or something. Yeah. There's some guidelines still, but they're open now, yeah. Yeah, yeah, Pradeep, Dr. Pradeep, who also sits on our board at Vis-Science Longevity Labs. He was instrumental in kind of helping the legislation get through Florida.

Starting point is 00:58:08 But I think that's important because now, you know, for most of these treatments, people have to go to third world countries. And I don't have anything against Costa Rica or Medellin, Colombia, or Panama, or Tijuana, Mexico. But I think if I were the FDA, I would say, before I, let everyone just leave the country and go into these foreign countries where we have no reach into their maybe we should take a look at the safety profile on some of these um they bear a lot of risk too because obviously they get misused like anything else um but how important would you rank peptides like tb 500 bpc 157 even your stem cell injections in your ability to have recovered

Starting point is 00:58:52 It's really hard to say, but I would say they were definitely a massive cheat cut for my career for me to be able to push for, like I did for as long as I did, especially with an autoimmune condition and keeping my body's inflammation, low ability to recover as high as possible. The kidney conditions was determined to be autoimmune. Yeah. Yeah. And where does that stand now? I mean, I haven't had a true flare up since that 2018, one which is incredible, get knock on wood,

Starting point is 00:59:22 But changed my lifestyle a lot from that. Now that I'm retired, hoping it's only going to get better. But you still take the time it's in alpha? I do, yeah. Okay, great. Not all year, but I take it in cycles throughout the year. So it's been, my health has just been increasing since I retired. And typically every year, I appreciate it.

Starting point is 00:59:39 No offense. Typically, they had a system every year where compete and then focus on my health as long as they could and then compete again. And it was just like never progressing. So now that I'm retired, my focus is just on anti-aging. I know. You actually text me in November. Do you remember that? You sent me a DM. Yeah. Yeah. I pulled it up and I thought it was really cool because I was like, oh, Chris Bowms has hit me up on the DMs and you might if I talk about? Yeah, sure. Okay. And you were asking me about the genetic test. Because you said, you know, I beat my body up a lot, bodybuilding and I just want to get to the next level. And I was, I was like, I love this guy because, you know, you're not just giving up. You're, you're, you're not just giving up. You're your life.

Starting point is 01:00:21 Like now in that post-professional career pursuit of excellence, which is like, how can I just live the longest, healthiest, happiest life possible? That's probably why 95% of people come see me. For you, I imagine a lot of it's driven by your daughter. But yeah. Family is everything. I took years off my life from competing. I need to add those back on.

Starting point is 01:00:44 Yeah. Yeah, she's expecting you around for a long time. You're going to have more? Oh, yeah. Absolutely. Yeah, I did. I love having to try. Yeah, you know, I remember when we had, I know we're bouncing around a lot,

Starting point is 01:00:56 but I remember when we had our third child, I used to mess with my wife all the time because she would like go out of town and like, listen, I've got an ADHD. Now we got three. So pick your favorite two and I'll have them here when you get back, but I can't promise three. The third one we never know. It's like, it's a joke, but you're outnumbered, dude. Yeah. Two to three at that point is a big jump.

Starting point is 01:01:16 That's what we're calling Grandma and Grandpa. Give you a heads out. Once you get the three, screw it. Just get a family bus and just have it out of it. See you later here. Yeah. Yeah. Once you can't fit in a regular car, it's game over. Yeah. Well, was that show that used to be that the reality show was like 17 and counting or something. Oh, yeah. Do you ever see that?

Starting point is 01:01:32 I remember seeing some of us. How much family had a whole bus? Insane. I'm not going there. There's another peptide called GHK-C-U. It's a copper peptide, so you being the copper stimulating collagen production. I see it showing up in all kinds of. of skin care products now.

Starting point is 01:01:54 It's also topical for hair. Have you ever used the GHKCU Peptide? I was just recently recommended that for part of my shoulder injury and just like overall recovery, but I haven't. My wife has some of it in her skin care products, but I haven't dove in deep into that one. Yeah, I think the combination of BPC-157, TB 500, and GHCCU is about all you good at massive tissue repair. If I was recovering from surgery, that would be, you know, the stack that I would be on.

Starting point is 01:02:27 And then there's this whole category of fatty acid metabolizers, fat, I won't say fat burners, but it helped the body mobilize and metabolize fat and growth hormone peptides. And I think here is where peptides have a very, potentially very special place in performance, it's maybe even bodybuilding because we know that any time you take something from outside the body and put it in, you're potentially reducing your body's ability to replace that on its own. Testosterone, for example, if you take it exogenously, you're going to reduce your own

Starting point is 01:03:04 testicular production of that hormone. But growth hormone releasing peptides and growth hormone releasing hormones like CJC-1295, hypomorlin, sirmoreland. Somoreland is probably the one that I know has been around the longest. I want to say that it was FDA approved in 1983, right around there for dwarfism and pituitary tumors or pituitary adenomas. So we have a lot of data on these peptides.

Starting point is 01:03:31 There's a prevailing wisdom that they're not safe, but they're amino acid chains. They've been around, in most cases, for decades. Bluminous amounts of people have taken them with very little side effects. And when I compare things like that to pharma, who has a tendency to attack these things and say they're for research purposes only, the only working rats.

Starting point is 01:03:54 But then you see mass populations of humans that have benefited from them. I'm really hopeful that the regulatory lanes will widen for these things so they can become less expensive, more available to the public. But have you used the growth hormone peptides? Those I have not. Okay. You just went straight to the raw sauce. So good stuff.

Starting point is 01:04:16 do the good stuff cut that out please so yeah what what's really cool is if if you can stimulate you know I always say that no matter what anyone tells you there's no better hormone than one the body produces on its own so

Starting point is 01:04:35 competitive bodybuilding you probably need to go beyond that yeah met of bodybuilding is a lot different than the average person trying to be healthy and optimizing their body Yeah. I mean, I got these guns with growth hormone peptides. They're not those guns. They're not even close to those guns. This is a water pistol in the gun category. I don't even need a permit to carry these. But, you know, when when we talk about these growth hormone peptides, the reason why I wanted to just bring them up on this show is because I would think that somebody like yourself that had used synthetic growth hormone for so long might be sweet. switching to something like a growth hormone peptide. But you still are massive, dude.

Starting point is 01:05:20 Yeah. How are you maintaining that size and you're just off all the gear? I mean, you'd be surprised what the body can do in terms of once it's had something for a decade. Yeah. You know, muscle. You're not thinking yourself into guns. You've got to be doing something. I'm just meditating.

Starting point is 01:05:35 I mean, I still train full tilt just without the boosts I used to have. But I've definitely been looking into these peptides, especially the growth hormone, inducing ones because I haven't taken growth hormone now next in a period of time at all. I wanted to make sure my levels would come back naturally just as they were. So then I've been definitely looking into these peptides for the future. Amazing.

Starting point is 01:05:57 I think Simorland. I think Samorland. Hypomorlin or CGC 1295 and... What about Tessamorellon? Tessimorellin is probably the most powerful of all of them. You know, Tessimerolyn, you know, there's growth hormone releasing peptides and growth hormone releasing hormones, which is why

Starting point is 01:06:15 you don't see, you know, Tessimerell and Somerlin. You use them in combination. One mainly acts on the pituitary. One mainly acts on the hypothalamus. Because in the body and physiology, we have something called a negative feedback loop. Or why do your testicles not keep secreting testosterone and it just keeps clotting? Because there's a feedback loop that tells the pituitary, hey, we've got enough testosterone, and it starts to turn the signal down, lutonizing hormone, follicle stimulating hormone.

Starting point is 01:06:45 What's fascinating about the human body is scantly a single gland in the body decides how much hormone it produce. It almost always has a boss. It's like these speakers in this room, they don't determine how loud they play. There's a tuner somewhere. And if I turn the signal up, the volume increases. And so if we can discover, if we understand that very often as we age, our bodies don't lose the ability to produce youth. levels of hormone, growth hormone, testosterone, and other compounds. Very often the signal just gets turned down. So when peptides act like signaling molecules, they turn this volume back up.

Starting point is 01:07:28 And you go, wow, I walked into the room. I couldn't hear the music, but I found the tuner and boom, the music's loud. And so I realized that I could turn up my testicular production of testosterone. I realized I could turn up my pituitary's production of growth hormone. And because these secret Paragogs act very quickly, you can take them and time them with your normal circadian pulses. Like we have our largest pulse of growth hormone at night right before bed. So if you take peptides far enough away from a meal and right before bed, you match what is your normal circadian pulse of that hormone. So it can deepen your sleep, improve your muscle mass, improve your lean muscle mass,

Starting point is 01:08:09 can improve the way that you metabolize and mobilize fat with very little downsides. And there's pretty good studies on tachylaxis, which is the desensitization response, that, you know, over prolonged periods of time, taking the right breaks, like five days on and two off, you can, you can safely use these things over a prolonged period of time. I don't know if I'm going to get trouble from saying that, but I hope not. And the benefit of that versus taking growth hormone is that you're not shutting off that negative feedback loop and your body's still using its natural system. Yeah, anytime you tell the pituitary, we've produced a lot of growth hormone. And then what happens is the boss, which is the hypothalamus, which is the pituitary's boss, is going to send a signal to the pituitary to shut off production of growth hormone. One of the reasons why you use both is because one is acting on the pituitary's boss

Starting point is 01:08:58 and one's acting directly on the pituitary. So you don't know when you take a growth hormone peptide if you've recently had the if the pituitary has recently released growth hormone. So if you just took Samorlin, for example, and your pituitary had recently secreted growth hormone, the Samorland would do nothing. But if you took CGC-1295 in Ipomorland or, you know, Samorland and Tessimorland, you would find that even if you had just recently had a pulse of growth hormone, you would still get another pulse because you've overridden that feedback. The only one that I'm not a major fan of is the MK677. It's called Ib utomorin.

Starting point is 01:09:39 Because the more research I read on that, the more it seems to cause, instead of of a bolus dose of growth hormone, it seems to cause what's called a hormonal bleed. So sort of as your pituitary is making growth hormone, it's leaking it into the bloodstream. And that's very fatiguing to these glands. So if I were going down, and I am not a physician, not licensed to practice medicine, but if I was going down the road, taking your growth hormone, or looking at taking, you know, one of these growth hormone peptides, I would combine the GHRP with the GHRH. I would leave mk67 alone just my personal opinion um because the longer more well studied more viable ones will get you as you know as far as you want to go and in terms of like tissue repair and

Starting point is 01:10:26 post-surgical repair i mean these things are miracles yeah for people um dimison alpha you said you've already been to you know you've already taken you want to talk about some of the sexual health ones because i know you've taken those No, like PT-141, oxytocin. I mean, try to have it, no. Chris, come on, man. I guess I'm missing out. Dude, your wife's going to love me.

Starting point is 01:10:53 I don't even know these were out there. Yeah, yeah. Bodybuilders are so single-minded. We're like, how do we get checked? Dude, PT-141, you've got to sneak into your wife's ham sandwich. It makes women go crazy. This is the one you're going to get in trouble for. This is, all right, that one I'm going to get in trouble for.

Starting point is 01:11:08 Can we cut this out? I'm just kidding. But it improves arousal. it you know it improves sexual desire and men and women yeah and men and women yeah in low dose so you have to use it right oxytocin is the is is the one that they say is in cupid zero it's part of the psychosomatic response of creating an erection and arousal and libido and so sometimes people they they they miscue love and attraction with libido and arousal like you You can be madly in love with your wife, madly attracted to her.

Starting point is 01:11:46 She can be madly in love with you, madly attracted to you, but not have any libido, right? And it's a completely separate thing. And I know that that wreaks havoc on a lot of relationships. I've seen it over the last decade of having a functional medicine clinic where people think that when one's spouses or the other sexual desire goes away, that the love and the attraction is leaving. And that's not what's happening. the emotion, the psychosomatic response of arousal and libido is going away. And that's different.

Starting point is 01:12:19 And a lot of times these can be brought back with PT-141 or oxytocin. Oxytocin is often combined with the d'alphil. And then at lunch we were talking about some of the longevity peptides, which are epithelon, which is a telomerase lengthener. So I'm really surprised you haven't gone down this road. You tiptoed into it, but if you want protein to build lean muscle, but without the caloric impact or need to cut, you need perfect amino. It's pure essential amino acids, the building blocks of proteins in a precise form and

Starting point is 01:12:52 ratio that allows for near 100% utilization in building lean muscle and no caloric impact. So we build protein six times as much as way, but without the excess body fat we normally get during bulking. This is the new era of protein supplementation and it's real. If you want to build lean muscle without having to cut, you need perfect amino. Now let's get back to the ultimate human podcast. Tiptoed, yeah. It's been very like, okay, I'm injured. How do I fix it? Yeah. It was all based on deep. I just came out of like the bubble of bodybuilding into the real world now. Yeah. Now I'm already talking to him about hydrogen baths and methylation. Yeah, we're going to turn you into the post Mr. Olympia superhuman. That's the goal. All right. We're going to go. I'm

Starting point is 01:13:35 emulate your condo from my back there. Yeah, it was funny. We were walking around. He's like, my wife would love this place. He and I have the boat, both have the same issue. We don't, we're not into watches or cars, but we're into biohacking stuff. Equally expensive. Yeah, yeah. Oh, no, it can, it can put it, definitely put a strain on, on your budget. So I want to, I want to bring this full circle for a moment and just get back to, um, the, the post-professional career um you know i think there's there's so many things that you've done in your life that are applicable to anything business marriage being an entrepreneur starting a company i mean pushing yourself to the top of an industry maintaining that spot for more than half a decade there's no

Starting point is 01:14:23 question that you have discipline um and for you was that always more important than being motivated had to be a lot of days that you were not motivated yeah how did you handle that Do you just walk into the gym even if you felt like shit? Did you ever just look at the weights and go, fuck, yes. There were, there were days where I would, before going to the gym, like, have to put my shoe on and look down to my shoe and be like, I don't have the energy to bend down and put my shoe. How am I supposed to go, like, lift four and pounds?

Starting point is 01:14:53 And were you, like, aching from the workout before? Either aching or just so exhausted, like, you know, when you're 250 pounds eating 1,400 calories doing an hour and a half of cardio and training for two hours a day, like, there's nothing left in you, you know? So pulling from that, it definitely comes the essence of burst of motivation, but usually they're all burned out by the end of a prep, you know, you have a goal, you have a passion, you know, it's remembering why you started doing something and knowing how worth it the result will be, but it really comes down to discipline, comes down to systems, I believe, you know.

Starting point is 01:15:27 Systems. Anyone who's, any entrepreneur will tell you, like, the best way to run a business has growing is to have the systems in place to make sure it's actually happening and bodybuilding is the same thing, especially when you've been dieting, you're tired, you're having a shitty day, whatever it might be, having a system in place where you don't even have to think, it's just you're rolling forward through the day. Like, I wake up at the same time, I eat, drink the same thing, take the same supplement, eat the same thing at the same time, go to the gym at the same time. It just becomes, like, so habitual after you do that same thing. So if it's a 16-week

Starting point is 01:15:56 prep, first 10 weeks you have a little bit more energy, the last six weeks, you're just following back into that routine, that system that you built. I've seen videos of guys just passing out the stage in the middle of a post just dropping. Usually those guys are doing some crazy shit. The top guys who knows what they're doing at heart. They don't do that. Well, there's some people who like push weird loop diuretics and do some weird like potassium loading things on top of the diuretic in order to help them get like lean and full.

Starting point is 01:16:20 But people who know what they're doing aren't really doing that crazy shit. Ideally aren't passing out. But you are dehydrated and exhausted up there for sure. But that's like when you're dehydrated, you're exhausted. that's like to me that's like the mental sandpaper it just never goes away it's always just grinding on you

Starting point is 01:16:39 grinding on you and it's like chronic pain almost it just breaks the will of the strongest people and I've seen it happen to family members of mine that would have like a serious back injury and like this just strong bold vibrant person

Starting point is 01:16:55 in the beginning of the injury they're like I'm not letting this take me down pain's not going to stop me and then you know the edge that willpower goes from a 10 to a 7 to a 5 to a 3 and somehow you're still going into the gym at a 3 and when you when you would walk in there and just the monotony of doing maybe it's different movements but it's the same shit every day that is a grind you know like they talk about the number of foul shots the Michael Jordan shot they take talk about the number of times that Kobe Bryant would show up to practice early and shoot foul shots.

Starting point is 01:17:35 Fowl shots has got to be the easiest thing for professional basketball player to do, but to just show up and grind. And he talked about how he did the really, really, really boring things so he would still love the game. I kind of understand that. But like purposely torturing himself mentally so that he'd never lose the love for the game. it's like when my kids started playing sports at a young age I remember the coach would be like the aggression's gonna come just get them to like it yeah but so at some point you loved it

Starting point is 01:18:08 but at some point you had to hate it yeah and those are the moments I want to talk about like when you walked in there spent dehydrated hungry frustrated and you had to pick up the same weight and do the same shit like what was it that where was you did you have a why were you thinking about your family or are you just like, this is what I do?

Starting point is 01:18:34 I don't think there's a genuine, like... I'm looking for the trick. There's no trick, because I want to write a book about it. That's the thing that... Everybody is. Maybe there's not. I mean, if you're honest about it. I think it's having the conscious awareness that it's a decision and that everyone has

Starting point is 01:18:51 the ability to make that decision every single day, but what's going to separate you is the people who can make the tough decision and do the thing they don't want to do first not you know everybody no matter what you're doing is going to have days where you don't want to do it but what separates the people from who are successful and those who aren't are the ones who do it on the days they don't want to you know and i had plenty of days where i was in there and i didn't want to do it but it was like i was saying before just getting through one moment at a time one set at a time one a rep at a time like i'd literally be like

Starting point is 01:19:19 i'm going to finish this workout early i don't have the energy for this but i'm just going to do one more set then i finish that set and i'm like all right i'm just going to do one more set and I get through a full workout just like that and then you finish that workout and you realize how good you feel and it's just remembering those small little wins everything with every little win that you can add up and stack in your mind

Starting point is 01:19:38 before thinking oh I'm going to win the Olympia it's like I finished my set I got an extra rep that set and being able to be proud of those wins you know those little wins that nobody ever gets to see those moments where like you chose to do something that no one will ever know you know it's moving you towards your goal you just got to be a little crazy and those got to be the things.

Starting point is 01:19:56 Yeah, yeah, you've got to have a screw a little bit. You've got to be a little fucked up. Yeah, yeah, got to be a little fucked up. It's just the way it works. So what does the post-professional career look like for you? What's going to replace that drive, that addiction? It's got to be, you've got a director for some, because it's just who you are now.

Starting point is 01:20:12 Yeah. Where is that going? Is it going into your supplement company? Is it going into your family? Is it going into your next to career as an entrepreneur? You're young. Yeah. You got a big, long life ahead of you.

Starting point is 01:20:24 I mean, to be fully transparent. I think I'm still figuring that out. I think I've come to the conclusion and the honest answer to myself that nothing will replace that. Yeah. There will be other things in my life that are just as important, but they're not the same. Maybe more important, but they're not the same. That feeling of that competitive drive, like, we all watch a sports movie and they're like, I want to compete and do something, like, be better than people.

Starting point is 01:20:50 And like, there's something beautiful about competitive sports. Yeah. And be able to, like, compete. And it's got to, dude, I, I try to put my, I've watched a lot of your videos and things and just the thought of like, you're standing up there, you're posing on that stage, everything comes down to that one moment, it's totally in somebody's hand. So it is somewhat subjective. It's not objective.

Starting point is 01:21:14 I mean, you could have beat someone and you might have lost. It's like boxing. There's three judges. Possibly. And maybe they didn't count every punch that landed. and you get robbed. I mean, the anxiety. And do you find out right away?

Starting point is 01:21:31 Like, do you find out the day that you finished? Yeah, you're on stage. They tell you you, they tell you, I, that's so. Yeah, they lined you up and they're terrified. And is that moment, like, as the countdown's going on and the announcers reading that,

Starting point is 01:21:46 are you, there had to be the thought in your mind, maybe not this time. There definitely are, there were years and near the end. And I was truly like, I think one of the biggest things I learned mentally to do was to let go of that result, especially in that moment. The idea of being present is to let go of what you believe the future is going to be, let go of what the past was and just be in the moment. And though they're some of the most vivid, beautiful memories I have from competing is standing on stage, they would call 5, 4, 3, and then they'd bring up the next 2 to stand there. And then the Olympia's thing that they do is they call first place before a second place, just so they have that moment to celebrate.

Starting point is 01:22:23 and every single year I remember they called me up I'd pull there and I'd close my eyes and I would just like I would turn out look at the Olympia stage I'd see my family in the crowd just like that's out dude I'm so anxious right now it was it was the most like human experience of just like presence there was so much just like you're just there there's nothing going on in my mind

Starting point is 01:22:43 we talked about meditating that Theta state it's like I learned how to access that on stage of just like whatever happened I remembered what it took to get me there and just standing there in that moment like the most beautiful moment ever i used to visualize every day doing cardio that whole peak week leading up to that moment really get chills and tears running down my eyes on the treadmill just waiting for them to call my name and when i was up there in the actual visualizing i was able to just be present and it was incredible those are those are

Starting point is 01:23:13 that's a moment where i talk about like i will never get that again yeah and that's it's sad but it's also why they were so beautiful because they're so rare. You know, I have a very good friend of mine named Billy Davis. He's a two-time Super Bowl champ. He went to this Super Bowl with the Cowboys, and that tells you how long ago it was, and Ravens. And I was asking him that same question. I'm like, dude, how, how as a professional athlete, you know, all of a sudden you start to gain some fame, you start to get, you start to get some money. And yet you got to stay at the top of your career. The nightclubs and the women and you're single and you're wealthy.

Starting point is 01:23:52 People start to know who you are and you're on the main stage. So I get it. You know, you went in and did this once, whatever, a prolonged period of time. And he described something very similar, just reminded me of it to what you're describing.

Starting point is 01:24:03 He said there, there was a moment. I never heard an athlete describe it like this. And it just became so crystal clear for me and it made so much sense. I go, wow, get it. He goes, there was a moment. I'm getting goosebumps,

Starting point is 01:24:15 actually, just talking about the story. and he said i would break off the line i'd be running down the side of the field and he said um 70 000 people or something in a stadium all screaming but i could hear one voice like i would my hearing was so like alert i could hear one voice going go billy and he goes i could feel the ball get released i knew it had just gotten released i wasn't looking back at it but i knew that it was in the air and and he said i could feel the defender coming across the field to like hit me and i knew he wasn't coming to give me a kiss yeah and so and he would turn around and right before he turned around to like grab the ball he could tell that the trumpet player that was too close to the sideline was

Starting point is 01:24:59 going to be right where he was going to go out and he was going to get tackled and run right into that guy and then the moment would happen and it like it would happen so fast and he would hit the trumpet player he'd be blasting out the sideline and he was like that moment that second before the ball hit my hands before the defender hit me before i got knocked out of bounds undescribable yeah he's like it was like the best buzz with the best orgasm with the best night's sleep the best drug with the best you know he's like it was just a a cascade of emotion he's like i chased it like a rat to They've done a lot of studies on like the flow state. I was like, wow.

Starting point is 01:25:38 They're the athlete's ability to access that flow state where you can like shut off your conscious mind and access like everything your brain's capable of doing by being fully present like that. Yeah. It's obviously more conducive in a athletic sport like that. Yeah, yeah. For it's just being able to enjoy them calling your name,

Starting point is 01:25:54 but still it's like you said, there's a few things in the world that feel like that. Everything you've done in your life is coming down to one second. Yeah. and the winner is bang i mean that's just got to be amazing um chris um you know it's it's been amazing having you on uh before um i let any of my guests go we uh i have a private VIP group that uh these are my just most loyal followers um we're going to go into that private

Starting point is 01:26:31 room because they have some questions for you. They're the ones that I tell who who's going to be on the podcast before they come on the podcast. So they have some really good questions for you. You got you got some big fans in there waiting for you. If you're interested in becoming a VIP, you can go over to the ultimate human.com forward slash VIP. Sign up to be a VIP. And then you can have a private podcast with any of my podcast guests. But I wind down all of my podcasts by asking my guests the same question. And there's no right or wrong answer for this. But what does it mean to you to be an ultimate human. Damn.

Starting point is 01:27:05 Damn. I wish I'd prep for that one. I guess to me an ultimate human, I would say this thing about champion mentality. Because the idea of being a champion is like the objective winning, but having the mentality is like the subjective being. So it's, to me, it's the ability to be the best version of yourself. It's not necessarily the best, but what the best you is. And that comes more so than just putting in the work, but taking the time to reflect on what your most important values are.

Starting point is 01:27:37 You know, when you're young, maybe it's being jack, making money. And then as you get old, like you need to be wise enough to re-reflect, have the introspection to see as that changes. And it becomes family and presence and gratitude and different things that evolves. So I guess to me, the ultimate human is someone who is able to consistently reflect on what those values are. and to actually work every day to be the best version of themselves within that. And also on top of that, I guess people who do the hard shit,

Starting point is 01:28:10 there's that person who can run 100 miles at 4 a.m. on a Tuesday, which isn't me and it's still hard. David Goggins. David Goggins, you know, all this shit. But a lot of what I've learned is the hard shit as what I talked about in the podcast is like being vulnerable,

Starting point is 01:28:23 being having the courage to be seen in your relationship, have a set a boundary with a parent who's having hard, have a hard conversation with a child, you know, doing those kind of hard things. Yeah. And being able to ask questions of yourself, okay,

Starting point is 01:28:36 what are my highest values? You can say out loud, my kids are the most important thing to me, but I'm a professional bodybuilder still. I won six Olympians, but I'm going for seven because I self-lushed you just want more success. But it's sacrificing time with my family, stress at home,

Starting point is 01:28:48 my ability for my daughter to play with me because I'm tired. Like being able to actually reflect internally and be honest enough with yourself if you're really living up to what you say is most important to you and then having the courage to make the changes to do that and to continuously be that best version of yourself and smart enough to understand what that even is to yourself. Wow.

Starting point is 01:29:10 I think that might be the best answer we've gotten to. I really do. I love that you have the courage to admit that you don't have all the answers. I mean, it might be the most humbling thing I've ever seen. anybody do because i think in your position people look up to you and think he's got all the answers yeah and i love that you're still just figuring it out um you know what your after life after professional life is going to be like um i think that's one of the most profound answers ever um if my audience wants to know more about you where can they find you

Starting point is 01:29:48 instagram is sebum youtube as chris bum said okay not hard to find it google my name people are good at the internet these days you know they're good well you got 25 million people that know where to find you so you're doing just fine for yourself appreciate it Chris this has been amazing thank you for having me on the privilege and excited to learn lots more from you oh we're about to start our journey too for sure yeah report back maybe we'll jump back on in a few months and see how it's going yeah and until next time guys that's just science

The Ultimate Human with Gary Brecka - 197. Chris Bumstead: 6X Mr. Olympia’s Peptide Stack, Supplement Guide and Recovery Protocols

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