Life Enthusiast

Podcast 499: Finding Strength with Strength 24

Welcome back to the Life Enthusiast Podcast! Today, Martin Pytela is joined by Dr. Lyle Wilson to uncover the surprising benefits of Strength24. While many know it for addressing frequent urination, its impact goes far beyond that—this game-changing formula supports metabolic health, reduces inflammation, and enhances overall vitality. Get ready for a deep dive into the science of cellular energy and learn how Strength24 can help you reclaim your health!

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MARTIN: Hello, this is Martin Pytela for Life Enthusiast podcast and today with me, Dr Lyle Wilson. He is bringing to us a product known as Strength24. Dr Wilson!

LYLE: I’m delighted to be here. Thank you so much for having me.

MARTIN: Yeah. We have been selling your product for years and it has been narrowly cast at people who may have issues with frequent urination. But this product is so much more.

LYLE: It is indeed. Yes.

MARTIN: Yeah. Let’s explain what all it actually does help with.

LYLE: Okay. The list is long and pretty glorious. So let’s begin with a little background understanding of what we’re addressing with the key ingredients in this product. Calcium. Most of us, when we think of calcium, we’re thinking about bones and teeth and 99 and a half percent of the kilo’s worth of calcium in our bodies is that. But that other half percent about an ounce and a half of free calcium in the body are calcium ions that because of their unique double plus charge, the body has adapted to and uses that unique quality as a second messenger. And calcium is involved in every function of every cell in our bodies. And so consequently with that very potent charge, our bodies have developed these unique ways of regulating where that calcium is and what it’s doing so that it can use it well to ask the cells to do the work that they do and then stop it when it’s no longer appropriate to continue.

MARTIN: My understanding of this was that calcium is the signaling molecule in the autonomic nervous system, activating and magnesium being its opposite, turning it off. Right, so they play together like that?

LYLE: They do, yes. Yeah.

MARTIN: And in our diet, calcium is rich and magnesium is not. So we end up being too happy or too triggered into the calcium realm, right?

LYLE: Yes, we do. Yeah. And there’s this great huge gradient of calcium ions outside the cell membrane to inside. It’s about a 10,000 to 1 gradient. And so it’s very easy and quick to send the signal and cause a flood of calcium into the cell to trigger its work. But then we have to have a way to regulate that and pull it back out of that activity. So there are a couple of enzymes, calcium ATPase enzymes that we keyed in on in our work with the formulation of this product. And these enzymes are really about relaxation. They’re really about giving the cell the opportunity to relax between times that it’s being called on by the nervous system to do the work that it does.

MARTIN: Yeah, this is like getting the gas pedal unstuck and pulling it back, right?

LYLE: That’s exactly right. Yes. Yeah. So one pretty easy visual way to think about this is that when we get a signal to contract our biceps muscle, that’s that release of the calcium into that muscle fiber. And the actin and myosin do their thing. In order for that muscle to be able to relax that contraction, the calcium ATPase enzyme has to gather up all of that calcium and put it back into storage and then the muscle can relax. And so that’s happening in every kind of cell that we have in our bodies.

MARTIN: Yeah, right. And in microseconds.

LYLE: Yes. Yeah. It’s so fast.

MARTIN: Right.

LYLE: It’s so fast. Yeah. There are 600,000 to 1.4 million chemical reactions a second inside of ourselves. And so all of this is,

MARTIN: So let’s outline. Would you please outline the horror of when things go off the rails? What does actually happen to a person who has this dysregulation going on?

LYLE: Well, what happens is diabetes and cancer and fatigue and heart failure and blood clots and a-fib. And when we are out of balance and unable to pull the cells back from their work and enable them to relax, then we get all of this dysregulation and dysfunction happening, which we step back and look at in the wider world and just call disease.

MARTIN: Right. I was just talking to my wife. She says a relative has been in an emergency room with a-fib. They had to do a cardioversion on him.

LYLE: When we think about that heart muscle, this is a muscle that’s going to beat three and a half or four billion times over the course of a lifetime. And the only time it gets to take a break is between beats. And this calcium ATPase is what allows that relaxation between the beats. And so when we have low function of the sarcoplasmic endoplasmic reticulum calcium ATPase, when that’s not functioning well for us, when that activity level is low, then we start missing beats and we translate that as a-fib or, or more horribly, v-fib.

MARTIN: I don’t know what that is.

LYLE: Ventricular fibrillation.

MARTIN: Okay. So rather than the top side, it’s the bottom side that’s out of rhythm.

LYLE: And the a-fib is acutely uncomfortable and can be life-threatening. V-fib is a heart attack. So.

MARTIN: Oh dear. Okay. And so here we are right back to the calcium magnesium story and the enzyme, the calcium ATPase, which that’s actually everything to do with our ability to convert energy. No, well, spend energy and function. Right? Like all of us, you mentioned it in muscles and heart. So everything that involves spending of energy requires this to function.

LYLE: That’s correct. And the ATPase in the heart of that enzyme is using that energy expenditure to gather a couple of calcium ions and put it back on the other side of itself. And so the ability for that enzyme to recycle, get a fresh ATP molecule into the heart of itself so that it can keep doing what it does, is at the very heart of what this supplement is all about, is that we’re stimulating, serving that enzyme’s ability to be more responsive and reactive to the needs of the body.

MARTIN: So in that sense that name is actually really appropriate. Strength 24.

LYLE: Yes. Yes it is. Yes.

MARTIN: Maybe we should have put down slash 365.

LYLE: Right. Yes.

MARTIN: Yeah. Awesome.

LYLE: Maybe the next version of the product.

MARTIN: No, not needed. I’m just playful. Okay, so here we are. Let’s talk about how did you actually come up with it? How did that come to be?

LYLE: Yeah, it’s a beautiful story. The woman that I co-created this formulation with gave birth to a child who had lots of dysfunction. One of the things that was at issue was that his little body was not making enough of this enzyme. And so she set about to learn everything that she could learn about how to intervene on this. And her father and I are friends and her father is who put us together. We began looking at natural compounds that are available that can stimulate the activity of these calcium ATPase enzymes and do so in a way that was friendly and appropriate to be bringing into the body. And we did create that product really specifically for her child. And in the process of our research, we really figured out that we all begin to lose that optimal function. We hit 25 as a male and 28 as a female. We start seeing a year over year decline in the quality of the function of that enzymatic process and realized that there was an opportunity to help people shift from that steady state decline that we often call the aging process and move it to more of a plateau where we can enjoy that optimal health for a much longer period of time in our life.

MARTIN: If only I had my strength and flexibility and metabolic capacity that I had 50 years ago.

LYLE: Yes.

MARTIN: Yes, indeed. I just heard someone tell me, listen, the way you’re feeling right now, 30 years from now, you really wish you felt like that.

LYLE: What?

MARTIN: Which, it’s an interesting perspective shift. Right? Like as a 25 year old, I had no understanding of what it’s going to be like when I’m 60 or 70.

LYLE: Right.

MARTIN: But anyway, so this is really, really neat. So this boy, did he get better or not?

LYLE: Yes, indeed. He is a couple of years post-graduation with an engineering degree from Georgia Tech and doing beautiful work in the wider world. And so yes, he’s done well.

MARTIN: I guess he’s still using Strength 24 every day, is he?

LYLE: Yes, indeed. Yes, yes.

MARTIN: So I guess in some way the boy was born into a 70 year old body, right?

LYLE: Right. Yes. Yeah, that’s a beautiful way to think of it. And I hadn’t ever really. But yeah, that’s a great way to understand what he was experiencing. And so the ability to lift that up and help his body to begin adapting to and improving from his state is really what we’re looking at being able to do with this idea that we can help ourselves create better versions of ourselves when we make replacement cells in the presence of better quality supplementation, whether it’s our air or our food or the specific substance that we bring in.

MARTIN: Okay, so I’m thinking, well, what could I do to improve my life? So this calcium antidote is magnesium. So I suppose supplementing that would be helpful, right?

LYLE: Yes, indeed. Yes.

MARTIN: And then I guess not eating inflammatory foods would be helpful.

LYLE: Yes, of course.

MARTIN: Yes, not drinking inflammatory drinks would be helpful.

LYLE: Right, right.

MARTIN: Okay, well, talk about this, right? So now we have the ability to essentially get a get out of jail card in a way with this product, right?

LYLE: Yes. You know, one of the things that we haven’t in our marketing addressed with this product nearly as adequately as we’re moving into now is this key idea that this product is broadly anti-inflammatory. This enzyme, this calcium ATPase enzyme also, besides being in every cell of the body as an overall way of thinking about it, it is inside of these specialized immune system cells called mast cells. And when calcium builds inside those mast cells to a point that they’re bursting at the seams with calcium.

MARTIN: I know the story of mast cell degranulation.

LYLE: Exactly.

MARTIN: It actually is sort of like stepping on puffball mushrooms. You squish it and a cloud of horrible molecules is released into your body. They’re not horrible per se, but they are the messengers that says fire!

LYLE: Fire. That’s exactly right. And so when we don’t have great calcium regulation, we automatically have higher systemic level inflammation because we have more mast cells degranulating than we should have based on our environment. We’re creating an internal environment that is causing this higher level of inflammation because we’re causing more mast cell degranulation. So when we provide the body the opportunity to regulate that calcium that is triggering that mast cell degranulation so that we lower the frequency of that happening, then we are in turn lowering systemic level inflammation in the body.

MARTIN: Yeah. I have recently been listening to interviews that include talk about metabolic dysregulation and metabolic disease, as in America as we know it is fed horrible foods grown in horrible ways and that’s causing epidemic scale rise in metabolic disease, which will be listed as obesity, diabetes, heart disease, cancer, and the rest of all of the autoimmune “diseases”, which will include interstitial cystitis, fibromyalgia, vitiligo, vertigo, or Meniere’s, or Sjogren’s. And should I go on, right?

LYLE: Yes, and there was just a report in the New York Times this morning that said that 75% of the adult population in the United States is clinically obese. And that number is up from a third pre-pandemic. And so we’re in an epidemic status with this, with all of this metabolic disease. Yeah.

MARTIN: Indeed.

LYLE: So bringing that specific aspect of this back to this idea of calcium regulation, when we have poor function of circa, when it’s not appropriately activated, then the pancreas is being less effective about creating the regulatory hormones to regulate blood sugar levels appropriately in the body. And so you get this cascading effect of all of those downstream diseases from the metabolic syndrome. When, we talk in fancy terms and we talk about A1C tests and this sort of thing. That A1C test is really measuring how much our red blood cells are being sugar-coated. What percentage of our red blood cells are being sugar-coated?

MARTIN: Yeah, it’s a reflection of the damage we suffer as we go.

LYLE: And so if we can do a better job of regulating those blood sugar levels, then that number, that measurement of that damage can come down. And it reflects the fact that we are shifting in a positive way.

MARTIN: Just to tell people what we’re talking about. The hbA1c, you’ll find it on almost every blood test and it will be a number between four and seven or something like that. And you want it below five. And these days doctors are saying, well, below five and a half you’re okay, but I don’t agree. And then, when you hit six, they declare you in diabetes.

LYLE: Yes.

MARTIN: And I have seen people’s tests that say eight.

LYLE: Yes.

MARTIN: Yeah. And that’s a lot of damage.

LYLE: That is a lot of damage. That’s a lot of damage. And so as you characterized it before, we have an opportunity with this product to begin the consistent, the required consistent work of undoing some of that damage. Because we can improve the pancreas’s ability to create insulin and other regulating hormones. We can improve the sensitivity of the receptor sites for the insulin.

MARTIN: That is what matters.

LYLE: Yes. So all of that function rests on the ability for these calcium ATPase molecules to do the work that they do to help those cells function the way that they’re supposed to.

MARTIN: So let’s talk about dosage. I mean, this stuff is a simple tincture, right?

LYLE: It is indeed. Yes.

MARTIN: So how much does a person need? Does it vary?

LYLE: So it does, it does vary. The standard dose is a dropper full, a milliliter, two times a day.

MARTIN: Okay.

LYLE: There are instances where there is significant cellular damage when somebody is pre-diabetic or diabetic or they’re dealing with other more life-threatening illnesses when the body is begging for more support and so more can be taken. I will in periods where I’ve sustained an injury, I had an automobile accident not long ago. I’ll double that dose because my body is wanting more support.

MARTIN: Well, it supports the healing, right? Supports the calcium and magnesium dance in every cell and every reaction. It’s involved in your nerves, in your muscles, in your organs, everywhere. There isn’t a place in the body where it’s not involved.

LYLE: Yes, that’s right. Yeah.

MARTIN: Okay, so the bottles are 2 ounces, right?

LYLE: 2 ounces bottles.

MARTIN: So normal dosing one month.

LYLE: Yeah. At the standard dosage it’s a month supply.

MARTIN: Right.

LYLE: Yeah.

MARTIN: Okay, well, buy six, right?

LYLE: Yes, we give a discount.

LYLE: Wonderful. Yeah. So, here’s a way that I love looking at this. We’re 38 trillion cells in our body. Roughly 80% of those are red blood cells.

MARTIN: Wow.

LYLE: Yeah. And so the life cycle of a red blood cell is about 120 days. So if we can help the bone marrow function optimally by giving it the support to be as beautiful as possible in its production of those cells, then we can shift that balance into a more regenerative place. And that’s really where we want to go when we think about our bodily experiences.

MARTIN: Yeah, that is truly a beautiful message if there is one about health. Right, like which product helps you with carrying oxygen? I mean look back four years when we had this disaster with our bodies not carrying oxygen. Right. We did not have a lung illness, we had an oxygen transport illness.

LYLE: Yes, yes. Yeah, exactly.

MARTIN: Yeah. Had we all been on this, the outcome might have been very different.

LYLE: Yeah. So, we’re looking at an opportunity I think, through our own attention to our well-being, create an ever better version of ourselves. And we’re doing that with being mindful about the air and the water and the quality of the food that we eat. And then this targeted supplementation that really can help us be so much better.

MARTIN: So interesting to me that this product is actually based on jasmine.

LYLE: Yes, it is. Yeah. Yeah.

MARTIN: Is this something in the flower or how is this?

LYLE: Yeah, it is in the flower. And that’s all, all plants make jasminates. They are defense hormones. And so the highest concentration of those is in the jasmine plant, in the flowers.

MARTIN: Is it like a terpene or something of that sort?

LYLE: It is, yeah. And so these jasminates are, I’m getting a little geeky and nerdy, they’re allosteric compounds. These calcium ATPases are proteins. And so an allosteric compound is something that fits into a secondary receptor site on the protein and causes it to change the way it’s shaped.

MARTIN: Yeah. So instead of attack, it’s in defense, right?

LYLE: Yeah. And so on a calcium ATPase molecule, when that jasminate comes in and attaches to that secondary receptor site, it moves that ATPase into the ready state so that it is optimized to do the work that it does. And so, one of the things that, circling back to this problem with obesity is that the utilization of calcium ATPase when it’s cycling like I just described, that’s responsible for 20% of our calorie burn a day. So if we can change that by a half a percent by having the calcium ATPase be in a steady state and ready more often, if you can change that by half a percent, we’re moving the basal metabolic rate in our bodies up and therefore we’re consuming more of the calories that we’re putting in and so we’re able to regulate weight better.

MARTIN: Yeah. Which means in 200 days you will have doubled your burn. Yes, it seems small, but it’s in time. It’s impactful, right?

LYLE: Yes, it is. Yeah.

MARTIN: Yeah. I don’t know what more to say other than I’ve just so enjoyed being with you all these years because you’re just such an awesome character.

LYLE: Thank you.

MARTIN: Not putting on airs, not putting anyone beyond or just, feeling like you treat humanity with kindness.

LYLE: Ah, well, thank you. I appreciate it. That’s a high compliment.

MARTIN: Yeah. Is there something else that you want to mention or share? There are several talking points we had ahead of us to cover. I think we covered most of it, but could you just review?

LYLE: You know, I will tell you that I’ve had a long standing passion with classic Asian medicine as well. And so I’ve had the opportunity to appreciate the jasmine flower extract as the key ingredient in this product from a classic Chinese medicine and an herbal perspective. And all of you who have tasted this wonderful product know that there’s this beautiful sweet quality to the flavor and that has us bringing that in through the earth element from a five element Chinese medicine perspective. And so it’s liver and spleen. The earth element is that central pivot around which all of the rest of our health, that drawing in of resources and transforming those resources into ways that we can use them optimally. That’s our earth element. And so this introduction of Strength 24 into our system through the earth element and the distribution of its lovely qualities through the luo, l-u-o network of the energetic anatomy is how the classic Asian medicine sees this nutrient being delivered to the cells so that it can be utilized. I just find that a gentle,

MARTIN: Very poetic. When I think of spleen, of course that’s the organ where all blood gets filtered, where all the red blood cells get checked.

LYLE: Yes.

MARTIN: So the logic of it. Right. The Eastern tradition tells you that the spleen is on this meridian and truly it is involved with the health of your blood.

LYLE: Yes.

MARTIN: And the liver of course is involved with the inflammation or opposing the inflammation because there the methylation takes place in the liver where we all detoxify and neutralize all these toxic things that would damage us. So, just sological when you understand the anatomy of it. Right?

LYLE: Yes. Yes. So, I guess my parting thought is that because, and thank you for inviting me to talk about Strength 24 as being broadly anti-inflammatory. A positive way to look at that is that it’s pro-longevity. And so it goes back to that idea that I spoke of earlier. This notion of bringing the quality of our life up to move at a high level across a plateau rather than this slow and steady decline.

MARTIN: Yeah. Make me 25 again, thank you. Yeah, yeah. What’s really interesting is that the main marketing push for this product was dealing with getting up at night to urinate.

LYLE: Yes.

MARTIN: And I find that it’s the level of histamine in the body that triggers their urge to go right to wake up.

LYLE: Yes, yes. So, pulling that inflammation level down in the body, pulling that kind of baseline histamine level down in the body has the beneficial effect of letting us sleep more deeply and stay in bed longer.

MARTIN: Right. And get out of your chair without stiffness.

LYLE: Right.

MARTIN: The stiffness on rising. It’s a classic high level inflammation body wide. So I mean the applications, when you say broadly anti-inflammatory for people sometimes it just doesn’t sink in what that means, but it means more grip strength in your hands if you’re starting to lose it or more flexibility if you’re starting to lose it or,

MARTIN: What else would you throw at it?

LYLE: Well, just as you mentioned, that ability to stand up out of a chair, the number one indicator for longevity is quad strength. The ability to stand up out of a chair. And that is directly related to keeping inflammation levels low and giving those muscles the opportunity to do their work well and relax well in between.

MARTIN: Well, if people out there hear this message clearly, you should soon be a rich man. I wish people hear it clearly.

LYLE: I hope so as well. Yes.

MARTIN: Thank you very much. This is Dr Lyle talking about Strength 24. And Martin Pytela, you will find us at life-enthusiast.com and by phone at 866-543-3388. Thank you.

LYLE: Thank you.

The post Podcast 499: Finding Strength with Strength 24 appeared first on Life Enthusiast.

In this episode, Dr. Howard Walsdorf, a chiropractor, shares his holistic approach to wellness by viewing individuals as unique beings rather than clinical cases. He explores the four elements—fire, air, water, and earth—and how they can guide physical resilience, mental well-being, and everyday health practices like mindful walking and nutrition, fostering a deeper connection to self and nature amidst modern stressors.

Download our FREE Chronic Pain Manifesto.

Follow Life Enthusiast Podcast on Amazon Music and get new episodes when they become available!

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MARTIN: Hey, this is Martin Pytela for the Life Enthusiast podcast. And with me today, Dr. Howard Walsdorf, a doctor of chiropractic, if I may say so. And welcome to Life Enthusiast.

HOWARD: Thank you, Martin. I appreciate being with you.

MARTIN: Yeah. I so appreciate people like you who have taken to treating people as individuals as opposed to as their numbers. You know the story, right? The mainstream medical people.

HOWARD: Right, right.

MARTIN: Treat everyone as the lab test. They focus on the illness and not on the person.

HOWARD: Exactly.

MARTIN: I reckon that you take it differently, right?

HOWARD: I would say I do. Every patient of mine, every person that I try to help, I try to see them as a unique balance of, what we’ll talk about shortly, I guess, are these principles. The body, our mind, our spirit, makes us whole through and healthy optimally with. So that’s my approach to everybody – their unique balance.

MARTIN: I really appreciate that you are actually trying to help people beyond what you can touch in the office. In chiropractic, you usually have to see the person right there and put your hands on them, but you have stepped well beyond that now.

HOWARD: I would say so. Most of my patients I do see here, I do some online type of things as well. And I have things that I can send to people or that even in the office they’ll fill out that help me to understand their unique way of balancing these principles. But I do, in my office, a lot of testing with what I call, what’s been called applied kinesiology, muscle testing.

MARTIN: Right.

HOWARD: And kind of challenge out the strengths and the weaknesses that people have in these, what I like to call these primal, cardinal, cosmos-spanning principles that each of us have.

MARTIN: Well, here online, we are trying to help people with whatever they can do without having to go into your office. Right?

HOWARD: Fair enough. Yeah. And that’s why I encourage people to understand. I wrote a book and I have a YouTube channel, and I encourage people to figure it out. I’m here to kind of give them the code, if you will, to figure out how to take what I give them, knowledge base, what they learn, what I present to them that as their weak spot perhaps, and find ways of giving themselves more resilience through how they walk, what they eat, their normal activities, their routine. All those things build that balance of who they are.

MARTIN: Yeah, well, so people can find you on the website fourelementdoctor.com, right?

HOWARD: Exactly. Yes.

MARTIN: So that’s spelled out f-o-u-r element and Dr. D-o-c-t-o-r. So no abbreviations.

HOWARD: I think they could even put in four and they’ll get there. There are ways that try to cover all bases. They’ll all land into four element Dr.

MARTIN: Okay. Well, I was quite impressed with you essentially teaching people in a quick way how to understand the elements. But I’m surprised that in traditional Chinese we have five elements. You just cut it down to four. What’s up with that?

HOWARD: Right. What’s up with that? I love the question. And what I’d like to say is to start off with is, four came before five. So, I took acupuncture courses in chiropractic college and learned about the five elements. Before I took that course, I got turned on to the four elements. I went to grad school at New York State College of Environmental Science and Forestry. So I was a natural oriented guy. And when I was at school there, I took a course in astrology, which is very four element based. So, whether you’re a skeptical person or whatever, what I discovered was this fire, air, water, and earth.

MARTIN: Yeah, let’s do that.

HOWARD: It’s fire, air, water, and earth. The son of nature is the fire element, right? And earth under our feet, terra firma would be earth and air is lighter than water. So it’s that I like to say, if you want to remember, I do encourage strongly for people out there who are listening, they kind of remember that word of fire, air, water, and the way to remember it is with somebody from Boston, might say four. So the four elements is fire, air, water. That e of fire is silent. So that’s the order to always keep in mind that the four elements. Anyhow, wood, as I see it, is the fifth element.

And so what I came to realize is that when you fracture the oneness into four parts, you get the four elements, and when you fracture it into five parts, you get the five elements. So the Chinese broke that oneness into five parts and they sacrificed air, in my opinion, to bring in wood.

MARTIN: Yes.

HOWARD: And because of that, there’s an imbalance of sorts, because there’s five and this air is missing. It’s kind of partially taken care of by wood, and you throw a kind of this imbalance in it. So I actually believe that metal is actually the sixth principle and that, so you have wood as the fifth principle that kind of takes over air, and then you have metal that kind of counteracts that. So metal actually has more air in it, in my opinion.

MARTIN: Yeah.

HOWARD: And if I can go one more step, what I believe is that wood is fire, primary polarity, combining with water. So fire and water come together and create wood, and air and earth come together and create metal. So, think of metal as this sword, that metal sword that is oftentimes used in that tradition. And so a sword has that earthy physicality, but it’s thinned out in space and air. So in my opinion, that’s the metal principle.

MARTIN: Well, and in a way, it’s nicer to have only four rather than five to mess with. And it’s quite logical. Right? Like, I can count to four, I can count to five and try to conceptualize what I’m trying to do. But what I think is what’s wonderful about what you’re doing is that you’re giving people a guideline or concepts that they can actually directly apply in life.

HOWARD: Yes. I like to think of it that way.

MARTIN: Which is what I would like you to at least hint at. Yes. We want people to go ahead and buy your book, but try and explain it. Why do they need to do that?

HOWARD: Well, because in today’s world, I see a lot of patients who are stressed out. I see students. I’m in the university community here, so I see a lot of young people and they’re anxious. I’ve been here for 40 years, and I’ve seen them kind of degrade in a sense, the young people, and they’re anxious, they have worse posture because of their texting, and we’re all, a lot of people are getting that way. So, I love engaging young people and they’re open-minded, more or less. So they’ve helped me to utilize it with them in ways that older people are not always as eager to change their way.

But that said, all my patients seem to appreciate the way I make it practical by way of, as a chiropractor can you see how the earth of our body are the bones, right? So kind of earthy, bones are solid. Patients usually get that the bones of the earth are bones of the body, of the earth element. That solid part of them. And in the mental frame of reference is that they need to be practical, mundane. So these four elements kind of show up on all levels of our body, mind and spirit, if you will. But let’s just stick with the body right now that, patients come in, they’ve got pain, they’re anxious even. So that earth principle kind of gives their sturdiness, stability, that need that many people have in this high-tech world. We’re moving fast. All that fire of stimulating stuff into our brains through screens and the like. We lack that earth principle, that thing that balances the fieriness of our modern times, if you will. So for example, that’s why walking is such a valuable thing to do.

I’m a very fortunate person, I get to walk to work every day. So it’s a mile that I walk every day. And I recommend to people to actually engage the ground a little differently than they might otherwise. So I get right in there with talking about their way of walking, and in this holistic paradigm where, I don’t know if your audience knows what holism is all about, but it’s about kind of this, the H, holistic with the W is about the whole thing. Whereas holism with an H, in my opinion, is looking at a pattern that repeats, this holistic paradigm is that patterns repeat on all levels. So this whole way of thinking is that this form pattern repeats on all levels of the cosmos, including the universe.

MARTIN: You’re talking about the fractal nature of the universe.

HOWARD: Exactly, yes. It’s another approach to a way of diving into the holistic. So my point here really could finish up on your maybe would be I’d like to tell them that just as all their bones of their body of the earth, I ask them, can you see how the feet have even more of that earth? That they’re the very bottom of the body. There’s more density of bones there. And then I say, well, even within your feet, can you see that the heel has even more of that earth? And the earth side of the body is that heel size. So every backside of the body, in a very practical way, is where that earth principle is meant to operate.

What does Earth do? It gives us sturdiness, it gives us alignment. And all that misalignment comes frequently in our days and that forward part of what we do. So it’s always a good idea. The practical way is to bring ourselves back. So when you walk, getting back to that, even just a heel strike, focus a little bit more on the heel is a good thing to add that quotient of sturdiness into your life. So even if you’re walking, just to have a little bit of a focus on the back half inch of the heel can channel, if you will, this earth principle into your body. And, and here it is, I’m a scientist. I believe that all these things are ultimately mumbo jumbo, spiritual mumbo jumbo I call it in the book, that doesn’t have some physicality to it to make it real. That’s my MO.

MARTIN: So are you essentially trying to teach people how to walk more consciously?

HOWARD: That’s just only one important part as far as earth is considered into the equation. Yeah. And if it’s only that, it’s a great thing to do. If I could help people just to walk better, I think I’ve done a good service to people.

MARTIN: Yeah, a favor.

HOWARD: The environment and the earth and even your physical body will change. Your posture can change if you use that as a portal, if you will, to do other things. Earth is the foundational element. And once you change something in a walk like heel strike, which would include perhaps bringing your shoulders back as you walk. What I say is when you walk, as your right heels engage the ground, that your right shoulder normally goes back a little bit. Bring it back a little bit. Get a little bit extra muscular robustness, I like to call it, and bring your hip back, maybe even on that side a little bit more. And it starts from there. So you can enter that, that circuit of walking and it’ll change you bodily. I believe it changed you in a mental, even spiritual way if you do it with a certain mindfulness.

MARTIN: Right on. So what we need to recommend is that people actually listen to it while walking. Right?

HOWARD: Listen to their body. Not so much the podcast or something.

MARTIN: Well, both.

HOWARD: All right. I’m kidding around. I’m somebody who likes to walk without anything in my ears. Whatever gets you outside is always a good thing. But I do say that walking about engaging in something besides nature is a good thing to do.

MARTIN: All right, so that’s probably the opposite of the head forward tragedy that we’re experiencing these days, right?

HOWARD: Absolutely. Yeah. It’s such a, I think it’s one of the most underappreciated things that are affecting us these days. I have a theory that Alzheimer’s and brain health is more affected by this head posture. Coming from things that we’re doing then, we’re all searching for this pill that’s going to make it all better, Alzheimer’s, and all that kind of thing.

MARTIN: So take this back a little.

HOWARD: Yeah, people are told to do. But if you’re aware of just how to do it by focusing on the heel, maybe and just bringing yourself back, it can be a good cue as well as just, going like that. But anything that gets you to do that is good.

MARTIN: All right, awesome. So, so this book, what chapters are in there? What all do you cover?

HOWARD: Well, I cover from a practical perspective. I cover nutrition, for example, a four-element way of looking at nutrition. I believe that these four principles show up in, like Earth for example show up as protein. I don’t want to get weighed down in the weeds for that much. But can you see how the protein builds the physical structure of your body? Sugar is the fire in the body, like the quick energy of fire. I’m not going to go much deeper than that right now, but what I would say is that, and I’m an herbalist as well in my practice. So I use herbal tradition mostly of Chinese medicine, because I like their energetics, their five elements and the way that they integrate things with herbs. But anyhow, what was my point there? I believe that nature, it doesn’t stop with four and then it doesn’t stop with five or six principles for that matter.

What nature does is fracture the oneness, if you will, into all the diversity of this wonderful planet and this planet we’re on, which is such a beautiful thing in this solar system. Maybe our galaxy, for all you know, the best that might be there. We’re this unique balance of all these principles, I believe. So my point is that the oneness didn’t just stop with four or five or six. Nature has kind of fractured this oneness to create all of life. So the herbalists call it herbal principles. And I believe that food also has these food principles and we call them vitamins, we call them minerals, the phytochemistries of life. I believe they’re all principles on some level. So it’s always healthy to bring more of these principles, less counterfeit denatured food, as I like to call them, and more wholesome life-positive biochemistries of life that I like to call principles of nutrition of food.

I don’t know if that answered your question, but it’s a good intro that my book tries to give. Instead of being very specific like take this, or take this for this illness, this problem, be aware of how to eat healthy to begin with and work with a doctor, work with me, whoever’s more naturally oriented to kind of maybe fine-tune what would be good for your particular health issue. But by and large, to be inspired to see things in a more wholesome way I think is a good thing to do nutritionally. So that’s one part of my book.

MARTIN: I noticed that one of the chapters, you’re focusing on the life force or the chi itself, right? Because I think we humans are dynamic, in dynamic balance with the universe or with the world that we interact. And so it all has to flow.

MARTIN: If it doesn’t flow …,

HOWARD: Then things start to fall apart. If it doesn’t flow, what happens is your resilience as an individual, that unique way that we’re meant to balance these principles in some fashion and these principles are always balanced one way or another within us. They could be precariously balanced or they could be elegantly balanced in a healthy way. When we see beauty in the world on some level, I think that we’re seeing them in an elegant, productive, beautiful way, in a balance. When they’re not balanced, well, things fall apart, they’re precarious. We get injured and we don’t recover. We have weak links, genetically, constitutionally, whatever, they fester within us. So we need ways of recalibrating balances.

And I don’t think the medical model quite does that. And so chi, and I see chi as this life force that we each have that we’re meant to keep strong. And I call chi, you might not see it quite this way, I see chi as the air element of our bodies. It’s the elbow room. I like to tell my patients think of elbow room need muscles to give our chi. That’s the air element. It’s the muscles of the body that move us through space, which is the air element. But I’m getting a little too complicated maybe.

MARTIN: Well, these are the principles. I would like to see some practical bits that we can share with people just so that they can say, oh, look at that, they taught me this. And I’ll go get the book so I can learn the rest of it.

HOWARD: Sure, I love that. So, what I’ve done in the book is introduce how you can draw these principles. So, as much as I’m into, I’ve been here for 40 years. I have lots of tools that I’ve developed in my tool chest, beyond chiropractic, beyond nutrition. I was very much into nutrition. I still am, but I have created what I like to call this holistic anatomy and biomechanics model that I use these four elements to understand the anatomy and the functionality, the somatic nature. I believe that we’re all on a somatic journey, a bodily journey with our own particular body.

I’ve created this four element yoga that I’m quite proud of. One day I took to get it out there a little bit more. But my form yoga works with this concept of drawing in these forces as we move. Not just walking, exercising, doing yoga and things on that or so as far as a practical thing I’d like to just mention is the way you use your muscles are your way that you draw chi into yourself. At least that’s what I believe. In a certain way, you can tap into the power of this air element of chi, if you will, by healthy eating and healthy other things. But I believe that how we use our physical body in the musculature that we channel into ourselves through our activities give us that elbow room, that muscular robustness. Each of the regions of the body, so I’m into the chakras, for example, but each of these regions of the body are meant to have these muscles working in that vertical level.

And that increases the chi and the well-being of each of those seven regions of the body. So that’s in the book too, to find practical ways of applying it to themselves. So for example, if you had neck issues, you might want to do something where you’re going like this (Howard shows a stretching movement, pulling elbows high and back) having your hands, just kind of bring yourself back. You might want to draw that water principle by going back and forth like that, you learn that the x-axis is the axis that water works within. Water is about blood and nourishing tides that work within this x-axis, if you will. Every level of your body needs, depends upon not just the blood 120 over 80 or the local cellular level. We need 10 millimeters of pressure and movement. That’s why walking is so healthy.

It pumps vitality and nourishment into the cells, that are right, left, right, left. So when you do a form of yoga and you do something that’s right, left, right, left, it kind of stirs up vitality there. That’s just an example of people out there may want to start paying attention to just the way they might create rhythms of motion in a weak area of their body. Walk with a little bit more finesse of right, left, right, left, things like that for just tidal forces of nutrition, locally. What I love to say when the sun is shining, feel the power of the fire element. In Syracuse where I am, it’s 40 degrees out today, or maybe lower than that. But the sun was shining, the blue skies are there. And there’s something about taking in these elemental principles, if you will. When the sun shines and it’s cold out, you can feel this fire element stirring up your spirit. Have you ever experienced that?

MARTIN: Absolutely, yes. What I hear you tell is that our urban living and our, especially the students who are essentially pushed toward sticking their heads in screens and sucking in information that way, would do themselves a favor by stepping outside and enjoying the elements. Even if it’s,

HOWARD: Well, a lot of them walk. I tell them one day you’re going to remember me telling you 10 years from now, when you were walking as a student to campus and around campus, that was the healthiest part of your life. And I hope you continue walking, because it is probably the healthiest thing you can do, is to walk. And remember this. So I try to make an impression upon them. And I tell my patients who come, before you get into your car, maybe walk around the block once to just kind of recalibrate your body after an adjustment or talking to me about health and all.

HOWARD: Process things.

MARTIN: Yeah. Get the flow happening again.

HOWARD: Yeah. Life is movement. Movement is life. I tell them. And in this day and age, it’s hard to be motivated to get movement. We’ve become addicted to being entertained in a sedentary way or working in a sedentary way. There’s not a need for us to walk from here or there. And I tell my patients, if you don’t have a dog, if you’re not walking now, get a dog and don’t just chain them up in the backyard, but get out there and walk them every day.

MARTIN: Right on. Yeah. That’s a good motivator.

HOWARD: I’d like to think so. Yeah.

MARTIN: All right. So on balance, actually, when I went to your website, the fourelementdoctor.com, it actually popped up an invitation to participate in some testing of an application.

HOWARD: Right. I have a phone app that my team is developing, and one day I hope, it should have been done like two months ago. To be honest with you, Martin. Maybe even six months ago. But everything good takes time, and I’m hoping that it’s going to get done. But it’s, I like to call it, The Holistic Life Balance plus Cool journal app.

MARTIN: Okay.

HOWARD: So what I’ve done there is I’ve divided the four elements into or divided the activities of one’s life into seeing how each of these principles have, I’ve given them eight activities that each of these four elements can be involved in. And so each one is a screen which, four screens, with these eight activities that you kind of say, oh, I did this today, I did that today. They get points for it. They’re rewarded with something that we will give them.

MARTIN: All right.

HOWARD: And the goal is to build, I like to say a great life is built upon good routines, good activities, build a good routine. So it’s not always easy to build routines and to, there’s a whole industry about having good habits and routines and that kind of thing. And it is a struggle, I deal with patients trying to motivate them, and it’s not easy.

And let me just add this if I could. I don’t know how much time we have, but you have modernity and you have, I like to say, modernity and nature or technology and nature. And they’re like the primitive pole and the modern pole. And the modern pole is technology, and the primitive pole is nature. And we’re all intrigued by technology, the newness that technology does and offers us a more exciting, interesting life in a way. But nature is the primitive pole that is slower, it is subtler. It makes us feel things in a deeper way. And the problem with today is that there’s a bigger gulf between the modern and the primitive today than there ever was. There’s always will be a larger and larger gulf between the primitive and the modern, between nature and technology as it is in our human life in a generation that we’re in. But that span between the two has never grown so exponentially wide. And I believe that’s the stress that so many people are feeling.

This imbalance between the modern and the primitive, they know that something’s out of balance. They know that something is nice about natural and all that kind of stuff. They don’t know quite how to draw into their lives, perhaps. But my point here is at the core of nature, this primitive pole I believe, are those four elements. Fire, air, wood, and earth. And once you understand what these four principles, elements, forces of nature, energies of life are, the more you can create more balance in your life in a practical way even. And that’s what this phone app in a long-winded way here is to bring more balance into our lives.

MARTIN: Yeah, well, in a form it’s an affordable coach. It’s somebody who will be there to remind me, have you done this? Have you done that? All the bits that I should be taking care of. And it’s a great reminder because as you started earlier today saying that we find ourselves stuck in the conveniences of doing what we should be doing or staying, watching a movie instead of going out to walk the dog. Right.

HOWARD: Yes. Yeah. It ain’t easy being a human being these days, but on some level, it’s never been easier.

MARTIN: I think the convenience is what it’s killing us.

HOWARD: Yeah, it’s true.

MARTIN: I think life was meant to be challenging. I think we were meant to be pushing against resistance because if you stop pushing against resistance, you atrophy, you give up your strength by not exercising them.

HOWARD: Exactly. That’s that, you know, that air principle of robustness, that muscular robustness of using our muscles to become more active in the world.

MARTIN: All right, well, there we have it. Introduction to Dr Howard Walsdorf and His world of Four Elements. It’s well worth checking out. So go to fourelementdoctor.com and take a look. The book is listed there, the app will probably be presented and all the principles are there. And if you find yourself,

HOWARD: I also, I might have mentioned I have a Patreon platform, and for $5 a month you can join and you’ll get access to all my videos. Quite a few of them are on YouTube. I recommend my YouTube channel for the doctor.

MARTIN: Right.

HOWARD: I’m even on TikTok for that matter and Instagram. I’ve got a little team helping me out here.

MARTIN: All right.

HOWARD: I’m not a high-tech kind of guy, but somebody’s got to get out there and do things for the Four Elements. And I’ve tried to get people around me to help me out. I appreciate you, Martin, helping me get my message, my mission to be more accomplished. So I do appreciate your time as well.

MARTIN: You bet. And if you should find yourself in Syracuse, New York, then you could actually drop in on the office and get yourself straight.

HOWARD: Absolutely.

MARTIN: All right.

HOWARD: Thank you very much for that.

MARTIN: Howard Walsdorf, thank you very much. Thank you for taking your time to help people be more educated.

HOWARD: Thank you, Martin.

MARTIN: This is Martin Pytela for Life Enthusiast. And you can find me at life-enthusiast.com. Thank you.

The post Podcast 498: The Four Elements appeared first on Life Enthusiast.

Podcast 496: Martin Pytela on the Mindset Cafe

Today, we’re doing something a little different! Martin recently joined Devon on the Mindset Cafe podcast for an inspiring interview, and we thought it was so insightful that we just had to share it with you here.

In this engaging conversation, Martin Pytela, a functional medicine expert, takes us through his incredible journey from the tech industry to becoming a passionate health advocate. After facing his own health challenges, Martin found his purpose in guiding others through the transformative power of metabolic typing.

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DEVAN: What’s up guys? Welcome to another episode of the Mindset Cafe podcast. It’s your host, Devan Gonzalez. And today we got a special guest for you. We got Martin Pytela. He is a functional medicine expert, really focusing on metabolic-type coaching. And he has had over 1200 clients since 2011. And he has some online courses and stuff that we’re going to dig into. But I thought he would be an amazing guest for you guys because this is the Mindset Cafe where we work on mindset and personal development. So Martin, thank you so much for coming on today.

MARTIN: It’s a pleasure. Thanks.

DEVAN: So let’s dive into it a little bit. How did you get involved in the medicinal space and what led to your entrepreneurial start?

MARTIN: Yeah, I actually started out with computer Science and business administration. I had a pretty fun career in information technology and all that, but I ended up getting quite ill because of mercury toxicity in my body. I picked it up in a dentist’s office by just innocently saying, okay, well help me get my teeth right. And I had no idea that they were going to use mercury amalgam fillings. Turns out that mercury is super toxic, and my genetics are such that I don’t detoxify too well, and so I ended up just breaking down in a bad way. And so all of a sudden there I am, quite sick, like my back started to go bad and periodontal disease and allergies and you name it like it was awful, awful, awful. And so I went to the professionals, orthopedic surgeon to help me with my plantar fasciitis and a chiropractor to help me with my bad back, and a naturopath to help me with my allergies. They all went after the symptoms. They only treated the symptoms they never asked, and what’s the cause of this? And I’m in business consulting. We always do that. It’s when you come to a business and you see something that’s a problem. Then you say, well, what is causing the problem? You don’t just say, well, let’s just paint over it. But that’s what happens in the world of medicine. So that’s how I got into it. This was like in the 1980’s before the internet. So I just read a lot of books, there’s a bunch of them on my shelf still, and figured it out. It was that medicine, unlike many other things, does not ask the fundamental question, what is the root cause here? Functional medicine does. But the insurance covered, the Rockefeller Carnegie Medicine that’s ruling the mainstream, they don’t. So that’s that’s how I got here.

DEVAN: No, I mean, that’s awesome. I mean, I do agree with you to an extent on the medical space themselves, like they do ask what the symptoms are and then they come to a conclusion after hearing the symptoms and it’s like, okay, well you have this symptom. So this is what you’re going to take versus like okay, well what led to that symptom. So I completely agree on that. What do you feel like is a generic or typical root cause for let’s say majority of people’s illnesses or diseases?

MARTIN: Yeah. Just to illustrate, your headache is not caused by a deficiency of Tylenol. Your breast cancer is not caused by a deficiency in Tamoxifen. Just isn’t. So in general, you have two kinds of problems. One, you may have a genetic problem, if you are born with a club foot, you got a club foot. The other thing is physical assaults. Like if you get a bullet in your chest, well, you have to go to an emergency room if they can get you there in time and put you back together. Car accidents, falls, all of that. Broken limbs from skiing and other incidents. That’s physical stuff. For that, I’m super grateful to have surgeons that have trained on a lot of badly mangled people, mostly in wars. The other stuff, the chronic degenerative disease that’s associated with aging, that’s primarily lifestyle. That’s what you put in your nose, your mouth. And so it’s the water you drink, the air you breathe, the food you eat, the cosmetics you put on, the stuff you live around, surround yourself with. The plastics and the volatile organic compounds and all of that. That will come into your body and interact with it. And that is the primary driver for all of that stuff other than injuries.

MARTIN: So you think it really comes down to like the root cause of nutrition?

MARTIN: Well, it’s one of them, right? Toxic water. Toxic food. Toxic. Well, I see it this way. Toxicity, malnutrition, stagnation and unresolved trauma, which would inhibit, toxicity, is the industrial age. I mean, so many conveniences. Right? And yet, with a price, if you surround yourself with formaldehyde, it’s going to toxify you. If you eat food that has been grown with glyphosate, it will kill off the microbiome living inside of you and give you trouble. So there are all these consequences of what we eat and how we produce it.

DEVAN: You said something earlier that, obviously a headache isn’t a deficiency in Tylenol, which I completely agree with that. But then you said, breast cancer isn’t a deficiency in Tamoxifen, right? And so would you, those are two like ends of the spectrum. People get headaches all the time. But breast cancer is something people believe is genetic. Are you saying that it isn’t genetic?

MARTIN: Yeah. So it has been proven beyond doubt that cancer is a metabolic disease. However, the mainstream refuses to follow that. They keep on insisting that it’s a genetic problem. It’s not. It’s an epigenetic problem. Epigenetics is the branch where you are actually understanding how your personal genetics interact with the environment. Your life as you know it. And cancer as such is actually when the cells that normally use the method of respiration for generating energy switch to fermentation for generating energy, which is a very different process, but they’re reversible.

DEVAN: So that’s that’s very interesting. It’s definitely an interesting approach. I think if I’m understanding it right, it’s similar to someone that’s lactose intolerant and someone that’s not right? It’s your genes and your genetics play a role in your environment, in your nutrition, in all those different things. But it’s not necessarily like just because of your genetics, you’re born with it. Am I getting that right?

MARTIN: Yeah. It’s the interaction of the two, right? Like, if you’re a turtle, there’s no way you’re going to jump.

DEVAN: Okay.

MARTIN: If you’re born with a weak constitution, you’re going to have to live a life that’s more careful than somebody who’s born with a strong constitution. Like you have guys who are naturally strong and resilient. You probably see them. At school, there’s always 1 or 2, maybe more now, kids who are just a target for bullying. They’re just something with them. They end up being called nerds or weird or whatever, and it’s their genetics. They are in that box. They cannot really step out of it. They have to live with that and learn to work with it. So likewise, there are other modifications in the genetic picture. So some of us are more likely to get, for example, myself, I have a less efficient detox pathway. I’m a poor Methylator. Methylation is a method by which the liver will neutralize toxic things so that they can be eliminated. So I have to live with that, that I don’t detox as well as somebody else might.

DEVAN: That’s interesting. So, in your opinion, is there, if it’s been proven and stuff, just staying on the cancer topic for one more second before I want to get into some other stuff, too. But is there a solution or a remedy for things, let’s say, like cancer or are some underlying causes still yet to be developed with even a functional solution?

MARTIN: Right, right. Well, so there’s this researcher, his name is Doctor Thomas Seyfried, and he put out a video on YouTube back in 2008 where he is illustrating his research, where he says, I took the nucleus of a cancerous cell and put it into a healthy cell, and the cell stayed healthy. Therefore, it’s not the nucleus that, which is the genetics, that when you move it into a healthy cell, you don’t make it cancerous. But it’s the other way around, it’s when you move the nucleus of a healthy cell into a cancerous cell, it still stays cancerous. So that confirms the theory that the problem is metabolic.

DEVAN: Okay.

MARTIN: And in general, what that means is that cancer, and that has been also documented is an obligate glucose metabolizer, meaning this, a cancer cell can only convert glucose into its feed. It cannot convert fat, lipid into its feed. So a healthy normal cell will exist by living on fat. Cancer cells cannot do that. Therefore, you can have a person who’s got, let’s just say, breast cancer. We talked about that. If they switch to a diet that’s super low in starch, which is the source of glucose, but feed themselves fat, they will survive, but the cancer cells will start going away. They will start shutting down, because. I’ll give you a metaphor. You have a rat problem behind your restaurant. The medical approach would be okay, well, let’s just start shooting the things. Well, rats come out mostly at night, so you’ll shoot, you’ll be shooting in low light. You’ll shoot all kinds of things. Never mind just the rats. And the second thing you will do is you will lay poisoned food for the rats to die. Rat poison. Well, if the rat dies and then the eagle comes and finds it and eats that rat. The eagle dies because the rat was poisoned, right? The unintended consequences of putting poison in the system.

DEVAN: Right.

MARTIN: The solution. Look in the garbage can behind the restaurant. It’s full of rat food. Get rid of it, rats move away.

DEVAN: Interesting.

MARTIN: So with cancer, if you take away the source of what causes cancer, it just goes away. If, on the other hand, you use the chemical approach, you burn it, you shoot it, you cut it, but you don’t change the inputs. Five years later you say, oh, it just all came back. No, it never went away.

DEVAN: Interesting.

MARTIN: So that’s that’s the functional approach. Looking for the source, right? Looking for the reason, the root cause of the problem.

DEVAN: So, I mean, it’s interesting because I actually heard someone else talk about this, and this is why I was kind of asking you a little bit more about it. Do you know who Gary Brecka is?

MARTIN: I’m not familiar. No.

DEVAN: So he’s a little bit bigger. The only reason I know his name is he’s a little bit bigger in the social media space. And he really dives into the functional medicine and the functional approach, I should say. And he had a talk where he said that cancer is essentially diabetes, a third type of diabetes. And it’s like a different classification of diabetes. And this is why. And then he basically goes into like a whole glucose breakdown and stuff.

MARTIN: Yeah. Well we definitely share the concept of the cancer cell is converting starch. Well, starch is converted into glucose automatically using enzymes and then the glucose is consumed by the cancerous cell to create lactic acid and other short chain fatty acids. What we could speculate on is that the body, in its wisdom, is actually needing more of short chain fatty acids, and is converting glucose into fatty acids to perhaps fulfill another need. And so if we fed the body a whole bunch of short chain fatty acids, we might actually fulfill the need that the cancer cell is trying to fulfill.

DEVAN: Interesting.

MARTIN: Yeah.

DEVAN: So with your with your courses and stuff that you teach online, is it going into finding a lot of the root causes for people. Are you trying to spread the word of the functional approach of medicine.

MARTIN: Right. Well, both. The method really is this. Once you understand how your genetics interact with your food, you will not be hesitating about how you should be eating. Like, if you know that carbs make you more acidic, and being more acidic means that you’re impatient, short tempered, worried, anxious, angry. Those are the characteristics of a mindset caused by acidity. Whereas if you switch, the overly alkaline problem is procrastination, despondence, depression. Those are things associated with over alkalinity, so you can go one way or the other. And the levers we have is carbs on one side and fats and proteins on the other side. And you can adjust your diet to figure out what’s better for you. So if you are tending to be swinging back and forth between. This used to be called bipolar. Overly acidic, anxiety riddled and then manic. Just overly confident for no good reason. And you can be swinging back and forth. And that’s swinging between acidity and alkalinity. And we can control that with what you put on your plate, what you put on your fork. So once you understand it, it’s almost like learning to drive a bulldozer. There are a bunch of levers. It’s a little different than a car, but there’s this the blade up, blade down and swing left, swing right. Go back. Whatever. Right? All the different levers.

Once you understand it, it’s like having a manual to your body. You don’t have to wonder, well, what’s going to happen when I have three drinks? This is a really interesting thing. Alcohol is a carbohydrate. And so when you see a cocktail party, one group of people is going to be getting louder and louder and more argumentative. Those are the oxidizers. If they keep drinking, they end up picking a fight with each other. The other group, the autonomics, they start getting more emotional. They start oversharing. They’ll be saying things that they wish they hadn’t said. Stuff like that. And then if they keep drinking, they’ll just fall asleep. So that’s the two main groups. And so once you understand it, as an owner of the body, you can control your outcomes. Instead of just being wondering, why am I so hungry angry, hangry? Well, you’re hangry because you are either a probably a fast oxidizer. No, no, I said it badly. You’re probably a sympathetic dominant. That would be, we have these four names, sympathetic, parasympathetic, slow oxidizer, fast oxidizer. And you would belong to one of the four corners. And you can swing in and out of it depending on how you feed yourself.

DEVAN: Now is there a form of, like a test or something that someone can do to get that initial? Like, this is where I am and this is what my body needs essentially.

MARTIN: Yeah. So you can tease it out, figure it out on yourself or by yourself, by checking what happens when you do something. Or you can take the test. We have an online quiz. It’s called Advanced Metabolic Typing Test. You can just do it. It’s about 120 multiple choice questions. And it answers this, how you metabolize. And it also answers how you gain weight or lose weight based on your endocrine dominance.

DEVAN: Interesting.

MARTIN: Which is also interesting because so many people are lost as to why one person loses weight on the, I don’t know, X diet. Keto diet is awesome for the thyroid dominant to get slim and it puts weight on the adrenal dominant. Go figure.

DEVAN: Right. I think a lot of those like the nutrition quote unquote fads where, you know, the carnivore diet and all these things that are coming out in social media online, not saying that they’re bad or that they’re good. It’s not one case fits all, right? It might be really well for one person because of not only their genetics but because of their lifestyle. Right?

MARTIN: Yeah, precisely. A mix of the genetics versus the inputs.

DEVAN: So I think that’s where people get kind of confused and saying that, someone is going to gain weight off of it or lose weight off of it. It’s hard. Sometimes you just have to try it out. If it doesn’t work, then switch it up.

MARTIN: Okay. Yeah, that’s one way. The other way is to do the test, and you’ll know ahead.

DEVAN: Right. Right. So, now kind of changing gears a little bit. I know one of your things is that eating healthy is basically an art. Can you go into that a little bit?

MARTIN: Mhm. Okay. Well living in the industrial age, we are now faced by professionals who design foods that are designed for us to want more because they want to sell you more of what they make. So they make it addictive. It’s practically food porn. And we need to figure out how to control that, how to understand our genetics and adapt our diet to match the genetics. Because if your ancestors lived in the tropics, then you probably are easily going to be a vegetarian and have lots of fruit in your diet without any trouble. But if your ancestors were meat eaters like Norwegians or Cherokee, you will not do well on a farmer diet.

DEVAN: Interesting.

MARTIN: So for some people, pizza is like Kryptonite. It’s just very addictive. And it leads to bad outcomes. And you see that, the rates of obesity and diabetes and high blood pressure and all of that, that’s just increasing. Mainly because the willpower is no match to the addiction that these things can create.

DEVAN: Do you think that and I feel like I know your answer on this one, but do you think that when people say that they’re addicted to something, whether it is food, whether it is smoking or alcohol, that an addiction is genetic or, because a lot of people say you have an addictive gene in your family. Right? And for me, I personally don’t think that something like addiction can be genetic. Some things are addictive in my opinion, but your willpower and your mindset to be addicted to it is a huge aspect, at least in my opinion.

MARTIN: You know, the truth is that there is such a thing as a genetic. I don’t know what you will, there’s a name for it, but I can’t think of it right now. But it’s the sort of passionate attachment to things. Some people have this, like if you put a scale from 1 to 10, some people are three. They don’t care. Take it or leave it. Some people are a nine. You start it and you can’t let go of it. There are people who become addicted and there are the addictive personality. And they will be addictive to food, to sex, to music. I don’t know, anything. And you name it, any one thing, they’ll have this, there’s this brain transmitter, dopamine, which will either be highly stimulative or not. So, yeah, don’t look down your nose on some people who just can’t handle it. Like, for some people, you try it once and you’re addicted. For another person, yeah, I can take it. I can leave it, I don’t care. And in food I would say there are two types. One person will live to eat. Foodie. Loves it. Just talks all day long about the next meal he’s going to come up and the other he just eats to live. Couldn’t care less. “Oh, yeah. Okay, I’ll have the same thing again.”

DEVAN: So I mean that that kind of goes against what you were saying earlier though then because something like addiction, were it an action, is now being formed down to a genetic trait, essentially. Right. A personality type, a genetic trait and something like cancer and all other things always have a root cause and that can be eliminated. For example, I have alcoholism in my family line and there’s been other addictions in my family line. But at the same time some people can kick it. Some people say they can’t. And at the end of the day, it’s the root cause of addiction essentially is there’s something. Right. And you mentioned earlier past trauma, whatever it is. But you’re using the addiction to cope with that one thing. Being addicted to something is a choice. And it’s not like you’re handcuffed to that one thing. Right.

MARTIN: Yeah. Well, and it’s both. It’s a continuum. Some people will have a much harder time getting off of it than others. I promise you that for some people, it’s harder to quit.

DEVAN: Right. No, I don’t have,

MARTIN: They still have to get their act together, or else they die by it.

DEVAN: No. Yeah, I agree with that. I’m not saying that it’s impossible or someone can’t get off of it or it’s going to be easy for everyone, but at the same time, like it is something that just because you have that genetic trait in your family line, it doesn’t mean you’re going to be locked in on that one thing or anything if you choose not to. Right. Because there’s the underlying cause kind of going back to what you were saying earlier, and if you can figure out what the underlying cause is.

MARTIN: Well, specifically carbs, whether it’s sugar or flour, as in pizza or just a generic word for it, or alcohol are harder for certain types, it really is. I promise you that baked goods are more addictive than cocaine. Like it’s harder to give up donuts than cocaine.

DEVAN: Do you think that’s because it’s a lot easier to get donuts than it is to get cocaine?

MARTIN: No no no no no. The chemistry in the brain, the chemistry in the brain makes it more addictive.

DEVAN: Interesting.

MARTIN: Yeah.

MARTIN: So, where can people learn more about themselves? I know you have some online courses and stuff like that, but how can someone start to learn about eating cleaner or eating for their body type or for their genetic code and connect with you?

MARTIN: Well, the method we use is called Metabolic Typing. You can find it on our website. The website is Life Enthusiast. Life-enthusiast.com so if you search the word metabolic you’ll find it. There are many podcasts and blog posts and articles and we have health coaches available. So when you present and say I want help, help me figure out why I have X, I don’t know, blood pressure and diabetes, we can start discussing understanding why that is and what you can do differently on the food side so that your body supports itself better.

DEVAN: No. It’s awesome. I’ll definitely put the link. If you guys are listening, I’ll put the link into the podcast description. And if you’re watching this on YouTube then it’ll be in the YouTube description. Now, Martin, before we go, I do want to ask one question that I ask everybody. Right. So just to clarify, this is not a tombstone, you know? Like a tombstone writing this is your legacy wall, right? Someone walks past it. It is your one piece of knowledge that you’ve got to, that you’ve learned, or that you’ve basically developed over your years and your experience that you want to leave for younger generations to come.

MARTIN: Mm. Okay. I’m more an integrator than a researcher. So in that sense, I’m able to understand things in a broad perspective. And I would be saying things like: It’s not what happens, it’s what you do in response. Learn to respond and figure out how root causes are affecting your outcomes. So it’s the anti-victim personality, right? Nobody has the right to remain a victim. That’s a choice. You can actually change both your future and your past.

DEVAN: I like that. That’s awesome. And that’s something I really do align with as well. Anything that happens to you or anything that you do or any emotion that you do feel, there’s always time to evaluate why that made you feel that way, why that happened. And again, you can always change your future starting today. So, Martin, I want to thank you so much for coming on today. Guys, make sure you guys share this with a friend. And like always, we appreciate you guys. We love y’all. And we’ll see you on the next one. Thank you Martin.

MARTIN: Thanks Devan.

The post Podcast 496: Martin Pytela on the Mindset Cafe appeared first on Life Enthusiast.

Podcast 495: 2024 Year in Review and What to Expect in 2025

In this special annual episode, join hosts Scott Patton and Martin Pytela as they reflect on the year 2024, examining the most impactful events and trends that have emerged. With a focus on the astrological influences of Pluto in Capricorn transitioning to Pluto in Aquarius, they explore how these celestial movements resonate with societal changes, individual responsibilities, and emerging technologies. The episode also delves into the critical role of Uranus, particularly as it sets the stage for revolutionary shifts beginning in 2025, and what that means for humanity’s future.

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SCOTT: Ho ho ho! Merry Christmas everybody. It’s Christmas Eve. It’s early in the day on the West Coast. It’s midday on the East coast. Who knows what time it is in Europe, but we’re here for our annual look back, look forward, and we’re going to get into it right after this.

Merry Christmas Martin.

MARTIN: Merry Christmas Scott. I like the new look of that intro piece that you put together. That’s really sweet.

SCOTT: Thank you. And I did it just for you before Christmas as a Christmas gift.

MARTIN: Gratitude abounds.

SCOTT: Weeks and weeks and weeks of editing and learning, I had to learn all the music, all the instruments in order to be able to play the background music. So, Martin, we spend a lot of time talking about health, and things that we can eat and mental things that we can do, emotional things that we can do. We rarely spend any time on the stars and the moons and the impacts that the planets that have on our life. Except usually for this look forward, look back that we do every year. So why don’t we talk a little bit about the past year and actually like the past 16 years maybe. And what that cycle was and what we saw happening in the last almost 20 years, and what we see coming, or what the astrology says is going to be coming in the next little while. See what happens.

MARTIN: Yes indeed. This is the time to review. Here’s something really interesting. Astrology, I’m not really interested in catching every little thing, as the planets move day to day minute to minute. I’m not too interested in that. But the outer planets, they actually create movements, they actually affect us here in large scale long term things. We have had, well, we were looking at Pluto. And Pluto is the planet of rebirth, reconfiguration, of renewal. Pluto’s energy is as such that it burns down everything. It’s sort of like burning down the barn so you can find all the nails that you use, so you can go and move and build a new one somewhere else. It’s a serious burn down. Sifting in ashes looking for diamonds. It’s that sort of energy of really bringing it down. So, the Pluto in Capricorn ended on November 19th 2024, just a month ago. And we are now firmly in Pluto in Aquarius. And we’ll talk about that, but I’d like to review what the prediction for Pluto in Capricorn was, it started in about 2008. And here’s what we have, corrupting influence of power, real powers behind the throne, that which will be renewed. Pluto demands that we reform and change our approach, if we don’t we crash. Pluto in Capricorn is testing the foundations of our power structures to see if they are built in alignment with the laws of deeper reality. So anything that is built on lies, deception, illusion, egotism, all that will be burned through. Transformed.

SCOTT: Would this apply also to the individuals who lives are built on lies?

MARTIN: Oh yeah, we lived through the period. It affects us, all of us individually, and collectively it’s projecting through our entire society.

SCOTT: Because there’s been a signifcant change in censorship the last little while. Right.

MARTIN: Yeah, well, this is not the end of the world, it’s the breakdown of trust in government and disillusionment with authority. This was written at the beginning of it, right? By the way, I want to acknowledge Jessica Davidson. She is an awesome astrologer, and I have looked at her work for years. She deserves—well, if you’re into it, go look at her website—www.jessicadavidson.co.uk and spend $10 on her, just like I do, to appreciate the work that she’s done. She’s just phenomenal. Anyway, here’s a line from her work: “Pluto in Capricorn is telling us it’s time for all individuals to step up and take responsibility for themselves as global citizens.” Did we? Some of us did, right? Yeah, and I can’t help feel that the consequences for not doing it were severe. Not severe by some outside force, like the police or rescuer or something like that but in terms of like excess deaths that have been going on.

MARTIN: Yeah. Well, let’s make it personal. Pluto in Capricorn is about how you, each one of us, use your power and the inner sense of responsibility for yourself. As in the agency. Right? Am I the author of my life, or am I just buffeted by winds of change. We can transmute pain into wisdom. How’s that for a line?

SCOTT: Transmute pain into wisdom. Yes. I mean, there’s so many people that aren’t doing that.

MARTIN: Yeah. We have learned so much through these last four years. This Covid episode was just such a learning opportunity. You may undergo the slow death of the ego or your false self and experience a psychological and emotional rebirth. How many of us have had our nuts in a vise and finally have come on the other side, realizing that we have to stand for something?

SCOTT: Yeah, that’s true. There are so many people that are speaking out and researching stuff and telling their friends to vote for this mayor. I mean, don’t vote for the city council. Don’t vote for the school board person. It’s amazing the change, the activity, right?

MARTIN: Yeah.

SCOTT: And I think it’s because they realized we abdicated our responsibilities. And because of that, there was a lot of things happening in the schools, in the cities and the states and in the country people didn’t like.

MARTIN: Step up. Here’s another line from Jessica. Pluto in Capricorn was encouraging you to redefine your relationship with authority, not just with those in power over you, but your own inner authority. It may be time to accept your own power, accept your own power, and do what you can to serve humanity at this critical time. So thoughts. These things that we had to contemplate over the last 18, 16 years, how do you take responsibility for yourself? Are you a leader or a follower? Do you allow yourself to be herded like a sheep by those in power? Can you learn to become more self-sufficient? Are you aligned with your true moral compass within? How solid is the ground on which you have built your life structure?

SCOTT: Right. What comes up for me, Martin, as you’re talking, is the power of no. Like, no, I’m not doing that. Right? And we’ve seen lots of protests, large protests, that sort of thing. But what came up for me was, I was in a hotel in Medellin, Colombia, and it was a really funky hotel. And but the room that I was in, the air conditioning didn’t work. Now, I don’t know how, maybe didn’t work before I moved in, and they knew, but they gave me this room. It wasn’t hot, so I mean, I didn’t need the air conditioning, but they came in. They said the air conditioning is not working. We’re going to move you to another room just as funky, like basically the one down the hall. And so I moved in and I unpacked everything. And then at 10:00 at night, this guy knocks on my door and he’s the receptionist downstairs and he says: “Oh, you’re in here.” And I go “yeah, they moved me in here.” He say: “Well, you have to go back because I guess they didn’t change booking” or whatever it was. So the result was someone else came in late and booked that room. So I’m looking at him. It’s 10:30 at night. I’m tired. I have unpacked everything and I just said “No.” He looks at me. I said: “No, they moved me in here. It’s late. Put him in that room.” To my shock and amazement, I was expecting it like a fight. He just said: “Okay.” And he left. I think that we are so conflict averse for some reason. Yeah, we just don’t stand up. Right. And I thought, well,

MARTIN: Well, there are two personalities styles, right? To get along type and the I’m right, you’re not. So that’s the, there are some of us are internally referencing, others are externally referencing. And the externally referencing person will say, well, what do you think? The internal referencing person will say here’s how we’re going to do it. He’s not asking what you think. He already knows what he wants to do. Right. So there’s the balance of it, right? Sometimes we need to play along to get along. Sometimes not so much. I think it was just perfectly fine. I mean, the logical conclusion was, look, you have a room, just not this one.

SCOTT: That’s right. Yeah. And I think that we need to just stand up and say no more often, right? Like, there was a fellow whose child was not allowed to go to school unless they had the vaccination.

MARTIN: Yep.

SCOTT: And, and so he, he talked to the school and everything that they told him was like, no, there’s no way he can come to school. And the man said, well, no, my son’s coming to school. And then he did. So then he got off the phone with the principal. He did a little research, and he discovered that there was an exemption form that you could fill out. It was masks. Sorry. You have to wear a mask at school, not the vaccine. And so he’s finds this form and he calls the school up and he says, I understand there’s this mask exemption form. And they go, oh yeah. Like they could have told him, right? But they knew.

MARTIN: But they don’t want the exception.

SCOTT: They didn’t want the exception. Right. Because what would that do to everybody else? So they said yeah, they sent him the form, emailed him the form, and then he emailed it to 500 parents of the school.

MARTIN: Right.

SCOTT: Almost nobody in that school wore a mask. Right. Because they all showed up with this piece of paper, oh, my!

SCOTT: I find it just, that’s standing up to authority, right? But the authority is abused when they, this is the way it is when the fact is there are options. Right. The principal said, listen, we have an exemption form if you want to fill it out. Blah Blah Blah. But their, bureaucratic mind was we were told masks, and we’re going to make sure you wear those masks. And that I think is a huge problem with authority, right? Like if you don’t want to do it, just say no.

MARTIN: Right. So, again reflecting on the last 16 years, the social structures we have built are collapsing because they’re based on values and ideas that no longer work for the mass of humanity. So now there was one other powerful alignment, Uranus-Pluto square. And that coincided with the 2008. I don’t know if you remember back in 2008, that’s when this whole thing kicked off and it was amplified by this energy of Uranus-Pluto square. And we had the financial crisis. Yeah, we had the financial collapse in the United States. the kickoff of the Pluto in Capricorn. And the greatest peak of that period was Saturn-Pluto alignment, the conjunction. And that happened in January of 2020.

SCOTT: Mhm.

MARTIN: Do you remember January 2020?

SCOTT: I do. I had a really bad cold that didn’t seem to go away.

MARTIN: Yeah. The madness kicked off. And then finally to the end or towards the end, now nearing 2024. Saturn was aligning with Uranus, which is an upset… Well, okay. There was this one period was Pluto return, which is soul searching for America. So the Pluto return 2022, 2023 is an opportunity to reaffirm the values of the Constitution and apply them to all peoples. Can you believe that this was written in 2008? Pluto return 22-23 will be an opportunity to reaffirm the values of the Constitution in the United States and apply them to all peoples, no matter their color, gender, religion or wealth.

SCOTT: So that was an opportunity. Do you think that it was realized?

MARTIN: Well, I think yes, I think the entire collapse of the establishment hold on the government and the election of this bunch of renegades, just a bunch of misfits, all rejects, right? Like the Democrat Party, the one that’s currently held by the establishment, the deep state, the the big corporations. Those are their buddies, all of the rejects. They rejected Tulsi Gabbard, they rejected Robert Kennedy, they rejected, I don’t know, a whole bunch of other names that I can’t recall on the spot. They all banded together. It’s almost like Star Wars in the ragtag bunch of rebels that are just taking down the empire. That’s what that felt like to me.

Yeah. Okay, so anyway, I’m just saying this to to establish that Pluto in Capricorn was predictable, predicted and written out. And we could have read these lines back in 2008 and wonder what that’s going to mean in reality. Well, the reality is that Pluto is demanding that we reform and change our approach. If we don’t, we crash.

SCOTT: And that’s definitely the platform of the incoming president and congress and senate. Is we need to we need to, everything that’s been happening has been not good. And they’re going to rip it all apart. So the draining of the swamp that they talked about.

MARTIN: Yeah, yeah. It’s happening. So listen to this. So Pluto is now in Aquarius and will be there until 2044. So the next 20 years. Okay. Last time this happened, it was in 1777 to 1797.

SCOTT: Wow. So it takes a long time to rotate through these.

MARTIN: Oh, yeah. 248 years. So we had Catherine the Great in Russia doing reformations and reforms. America happened. What happened in 1770 something, right? In 76, we had the independence declared. But then in 83, we have the war and then Treaty of Versailles, the Constitution, Bill of rights. All of that happened under that influence.

MARTIN: French Revolution occurred then, too, didn’t it? Yeah, right. 1789, July 14th, Bastille Day.

MARTIN: And there was a whole bunch of revolutionary stuff taken. Well, I’ll explain.

SCOTT: The power was going back to the people. Right.

SCOTT: They guillotined the king of France.

MARTIN: Yeah. That’s right. But there was more. Right. Like revolutionary things in technology, too, taking place. So here’s what we have. Here are the words looking forward into the next 20 years. The need of our society to reform by introducing new ideas and working together in friendship to create a greater freedom. Aquarius takes an objective view, so it can take new theories and plans and create change. Now unfortunately, not all of these ideas will be correct. So groupthink and fanaticism is a possible downside of it. And we’re still seeing that there are a whole bunch of people who have ideas of the collectivist sort, or who have ideas of the transhumanist sort, where they want to merge humans with technology. It’s one group and the other group,

SCOTT: So. Martin, let me interrupt you for a second because you have experience of communism.

MARTIN: Yes, I did. Intimate.

SCOTT: I totally agree that there’s definitely a strong fringe reality according which is quoting the Prime Minister of Canada, left wing, that really wants hard on Chinese Communism to take over. So can you talk for a few minutes about your experience of communism and what it was like living under communism?

MARTIN: Yeah, I was born in Czechoslovakia in 1952, four years prior to that, in 1948, there was a coup where the Communist Party took government. It was supported by Russia, the Soviet Union then. And all of a sudden you had communists in power. Almost immediately they started cleansing the party and they created a whole bunch of judicial processes. They were actually similar to what happened in the United States during the days of McCarthy. Mccarthyism, the un-American activities. Well, back there in Europe, people were chased and hounded for activities that would be counter to rule of the worker class. Anyway, I was born into this madness and grew up in a society where a lie was perpetrated on everyone. We would be taught in the school, I actually went all the way to university and I do have a board exam, meaning that I was there in front of three educated professor types, and I was supposed to advance or show how good I was at understanding. And the subject was Marxist-Leninist doctrine. So I actually have a state board exam in that. And so in studying for that, I had to read the information Karl Marx, the Kapital, the Russian, Lenin, Stalin, all of that sort of stuff. Here’s the bottom of it. I knew I was lying when I was saying the things that I was saying. The commission knew that I was lying. I knew that they knew I was lying. They knew that I knew that they knew they were lying. It was just a charade. We were just standing up there and quoting the verse and chapter of this bullshit story that was put forward.

Anyway, all it was a violent repression of people’s freedom. That’s all it was. We were living in an open air prison. Eventually, in 1976, together with some friends, I found a way to fool the system and get out. I applied in Austria for asylum under the United Nations Charter, and I ended up in Canada soon thereafter in search for freedom. Because I knew that if I stayed there, I would not be able to keep my mouth shut and somebody would inform on me.

I mean, it was very common. Probably 1 in 4 people in that country was an informant. So you never knew when you opened your mouth, like whether somebody was going to write that down, take it to the whatever. And then when you when you apply for a job or apply for an advancement or something like that, they will haul out your papers and say, well, Mr. Pytela, you have, back in September of 1974, at a party, made a joke about something, and that shows that you are completely not dedicated and devoted to the rule of the Communist Party over this country. We cannot advance you.

SCOTT: Well, that sounds like the people that turned in their friends who were partying too hard or weren’t six feet apart or went to an empty beach.

MARTIN: Yeah. Like that. Or this guy, he is not wearing his mask correctly.

SCOTT: Right. I mean, I watched Total Control.

MARTIN: I watched people beat one another up when somebody who refused to put the mask on wanted to enter a grocery store.

SCOTT: Yeah.

MARTIN: There were people so convinced, they were so righteous about their need to protect everyone from this horrendous danger. Which,

SCOTT: I have a slightly different theory about that, Martin. I think that the majority of people live their lives being told what to do, or if they are in a position where they interact with the public, they have to act within a very narrow range. The customer is not pleasant to them, they still have to smile, that sort of thing. And what Covid did was give people permission to be assholes, to be quite frank. Right.

MARTIN: Power, power, power.

SCOTT: Power, power, power. But they never got a chance to exercise that power. They never had any control. Now all of a sudden, they did. Right. And if you were a cashier and a black man went up and you were not black and a black man went up, you had to check him through. Right? But if anybody walked up to you and they weren’t wearing their mask, you could refuse to serve them. And I’ve seen examples of like videos of that. Or someone walks up, they’re not wearing a mask.

The cashier calls the supervisor, the supervisor calls, checks them out. The cashier goes 20 feet away. We would have called it racism if it was about color, but because it was about a mask, it seemed to be okay. And of course, everyone believes, oh, this is really terrible because the mass media is telling you this is awful. And it doesn’t matter that four years later, Fauci goes on, he’s in front of the Congress committee of something and says, well, we just thought it was a good idea to wear a mask. We didn’t know, we didn’t check any, and I did. When I heard about the mask, I went to the Lancet website, which is where lots of studies are published, and I did a search on masks and I found lots of studies, but I only looked at one study a year because I’m not going to spend weeks going through all this stuff. There was not one study that said wearing a mask was good. In fact, there was one study that said, because people always say, well, what about surgeons and people in hospitals? They don’t wear the mask to prevent bacteria or something getting into their lungs. They wear it more so that they don’t actually accidentally drool and drop a bunch of their saliva onto a heart.

MARTIN: Yeah, yeah, it is correct. You want to keep the operation site sterile and not contaminated, and you’re protecting the other side. So that was the message, you’re not wearing the mask to protect yourself, you’re wearing the mask to protect the other people. But even that is total bullshit, because it is the particle size that gets through,

SCOTT: Every study they looked at, they did a study where they put people into a room who had some disease that they could that they could test for. Right. Like we can test for this microbe. And they put them in a room, they closed the door of the room beside it. They closed the corridor. Then they had the person with a mask walk out of the room, down the corridor and through the door. Then they went into the other closed room to test for this stuff, and they found it everywhere, like almost instantaneously. Right. So there was no way that a mask would protect anybody.

MARTIN: I was going to say something. Which is this, Scott, the mask, it cannot trap the particle size that you’re trying to catch. It’s sort of like trying to block mosquitoes with a chicken wire fence. The particle size and the openings in mesh just do not match. It was total nonsense. We know it. They knew it and they pushed it anyway. And I think it was a form of showing who is willing to put the mask on and who’s going to fight it.

SCOTT: Yeah. There’s definitely a schism in the world now between people that are like absolutely adamant they’re not going to do anything that the government says regarding health. And the people that are on the fence, you know, a certain percentage of them have dropped off on either side. Right. Depending on whatever.

MARTIN: So let me just read a couple of more sentences about what’s coming. Okay. When Pluto enters Aquarius, we’re in it now for the next 20 years. We can expect the desire for reform and revolution to grow, especially in the area of science and technology and how society is organized. But first, all the problems with these things will have to come to the surface. We have to become aware of what needs to be changed and why before we can figure out what to do about it. So this here process, as we’re just going through, just reflecting on the nonsense that we’ve gone through. This has to happen in pretty much every area of what we do, because we need to figure out what it actually means to be human and how to live together on this planet without fighting over everything. Aquarius and we’re in it, is future oriented and wants to make society and the future a better place. All right. We will be radically transformed.

SCOTT: Well, the AI and the ability to put cameras everywhere. It’s absolutely amazing.

MARTIN: Yep, that’s the black side of it.

SCOTT: Here’s a question I want you to check on.

MARTIN: Yeah. Have we lost connection?

SCOTT: No, I’m just putting you in the spotlight, Martin.

MARTIN: Okay. Try me. What?

SCOTT: So here’s a question from Stephanie. Can you ask Martin about the info, I don’t know what info she sent, there’s a number of bills that the Liberal Party in Canada is trying to pass, which would make it illegal to say certain things on the internet and that sort of stuff. And he also already, Emergency Powers Act or whatever it was to kick out the convoy, the trucker convoy a couple of years ago. And what can we do?

MARTIN: Yeah. Canada’s in trouble because Canada has on its books this emergency powers act that the government can activate. And he’s done it. Trudeau has done it. All he had to do is sit down with the protesters and treat them like humans. All he needed to do is just say, okay, I see you have a concern. Instead, he spat in their face and said, you’re scum and declared the law.

SCOTT: He put people in jail for, it’s been four years.

MARTIN: Yeah, yeah. He de-platformed a whole bunch of people. I mean, it was amazing. The government, with its powers enacted, was able to take away your Bank account. So no money. They canceled your truck’s insurance. You have no insurance on the truck. If you had a loan on it and got called and so on. It was economic assassination of the people. And even folks who sent $20 to the cause had their accounts garnished, closed, stopped or whatever. It was dramatic actually. Well, Trudeau is about to pay the price for this hubris and for that he’s about to be sent, he’s a dead tree standing in the forest waiting for someone to push it over.

SCOTT: Yeah. So what can you do? First thing you can do is write to your MLA and your MP and your mayor. I think getting involved at the local level is really, really important. Find out what’s going on in the schools. There are books in the elementary school libraries that are just horrific, you know? Anyway, I don’t want to get into that.

MARTIN: That doesn’t matter. No. Yeah. Okay. So what can you do? Get local. Talk to your neighbors, talk to your family. Find people who resonate with your ideas and it will happen. I mean, it’s a slow moving thing. This representative democracy is a slow moving train, but it will come to a station at some point.

SCOTT: There was a law, it was the like the day before Christmas, the Congress people yet another 1500 page bill and basically said, don’t bother reading it, you need to vote or the government is going to go down and money, blah, blah, blah. And so they encouraged everybody to call their congressmen and say, don’t vote for this. We don’t know what’s in it. But it also was released and there was thousands of people that were reading parts of it and then saying, this is what this part says. And they found pork barrel like crazy, billions of dollars for this and a billion dollars for that and all like, stupid things. And it got stopped. And then it went from 1500 pages to 115 pages and got passed. So the idea of having these massive bills and then slipping in something on page 3241, paragraph 17 is hopefully over. And that’s the way that it should be. Like when you’re having a bill about garbage, there should be nothing in it about school, right?

MARTIN: Yeah, that’s the whole thing. It should be that you no longer can do omnibus bills. Everything should be line item vote, right. You want this? Yes. No.

SCOTT: That’s right. And a lot of stuff won’t make it through.

MARTIN: Yeah. The truck is coming. Everything that’s in it has to be approved. No.

SCOTT: Yeah.

MARTIN: No. And this is the power of no.

SCOTT: No. That’s right. Not going to do that. And it’s also the power of the people, right? They mobilize the people. The people said, hey, you’re not doing this. And you still have the power when enough people say like, no, no, no, no, this isn’t good, don’t forget too, everybody multiplies anything that happens by ten. If one person calls, then they think it’s the same as ten. If a thousand people call, they figure it’s the same as 10,000. If 100,000 people call, it’s like a million. And when it gets up into those numbers. Oh, dear. It’s scary for the politicians, right?

MARTIN: Stephanie just shared a YouTube link. I don’t know, we can’t really do that within this show. I don’t think so. We’ll have to look at it later. We can’t do it right now. We’re live on on YouTube itself. So anyway, what I want to say is this. You, everyone, you have the power in your wallet. It’s the money. How you spend the money is like oxygen to the economy. So whatever you buy, a replacement will be made. Because when you buy something, it’s like a purchase order for the next one. So be careful with what you’re buying. Get smart. Buy stuff that’s worth having.

SCOTT: Yeah. Pardon me. The other side to that is in the whole Covid thing, it really looked like it was an attack on small business because you can go into Walmart and you could go into Costco, but you couldn’t go into the little store next door, and of course, it’s the almighty dollar and we have inflation, and I think this is part of the reason why. But I think you need to look at Costco and Walmart and say what are the alternatives? Are there farmer markets? Are there farms nearby where you could contact the farmer and say, listen, I want a side of beef, or I want to get your vegetables and really work with those people. Because you’re going to get better quality food, first of all, it’s not going to be like mass produced in, in food factories, right? It’s pretty scary the way that they slaughter animals, for example. And we keep hearing about it. (And they recall tons of lettuce ?)

MARTIN: Let me try and put the big picture back on. So this story from communist ruled Czechoslovakia, the story there is that the means of production are owned by the state, by the government, and the state government equals the Communist Party at that point, too. So means of production, right? That would be the offices, the mines, the banks, the roads, everything. And the other way to get there is that it’s called fascism or corporatism. And you get to the same place, but this time the money owns the government. So in the Communist Party, the government owns all the money and the means. And in the fascist corporatist style, the big money owns the government itself and controls everything.

MARTIN: Right now, we have a system where a senator has to make a phone call asking for money so he can be reelected fundraising for political cause. So when they call me because I’m the billionaire dude, I will ask, what have you done for me since the last time you called? And what are you promising to do for me from this payment? I don’t even have to ask it. It’s implied. It’s known. I will not send you more money if you do not do my bidding. So there it is. The vote is for sale and they built the playing field in favor of the big business. You just spoke about the big business being open and small busines being shut down. That’s the idea, because when you take away the means of production from the small business, you make them into slaves.

SCOTT: So government and big business merge. I don’t know if that’s the right word. Do we call that fascism?

MARTIN: That’s by definition fascism or corporatism.

SCOTT: Corporatism and then it’s kind of like this circle and you go one way and like capitalism, we should all be like companies and stuff. But then you go so far and it’s like communism and fascism meet, how much different is it

MARTIN: Yeah. Yeah. The whole idea is that the ones in power control big masses and it becomes dictatorial and all of that.

SCOTT: Dictatorial with the flavor of democracy. Because every four years we ask you to vote.

MARTIN: Well, yeah, sure. In Germany in the 1930s, the party was called the National Socialist Party and as the National Socialist German Workers party. Arbeiter Partei. Yeah. So they were actually sounding like they’re for the people, which they were. And then once they got in power, then they just, I don’t know. Well, it went pretty, pretty bad, pretty quick. So, okay. Let me go back to what’s coming and why. I really want you to get this. This next 20 years is going to roll forward with increasing speed. But there definitely is the revelation … Here’s a sentence the technocratic view isn’t going to survive much longer. It’s already running up against natural limits, and over the coming decade it will implode. Pluto in Aquarius is going to dredge up all the corruption in science to the surface and reveal the fantasy behind our technological obsession. It will also reveal the dark side of technology wars fought through screens, drones, robots, biotech, DNA, all of that.

SCOTT: I saw a video the other day of a robot dog and everything that it could do, and the person that shared it said, just imagine this with three or 4 or 5 guns pointing in all directions as it roars through a crowd.

MARTIN: Yep.

SCOTT: Oh my God. Asimov had the Three Laws of Robotics, which I wish that everyone involved with AI and robotics would adhere to.

MARTIN: Yes, it should be implemented, indeed,

SCOTT: But it’s ignored.

MARTIN: Well maybe not. There is a new guy in charge of AI and crypto. His name is David Sachs and he is a wise man. He’s been through the crucible. And it should be okay. So not just dredging up useless old crap out of the systems. It will also see breakthroughs and new ideas in science like we are in for fast advance over the next 20 years. We will probably see complete redefinition of physics. We will probably finally see the Electrogravitic technologies reintroduced. We will stop being dependent on petrochemicals. Carbon economy. There is infinite energy available in the universe. The free energy stuff. I would expect that under the influence of this next 20 years to be revealed, disclosed and deployed. I really expect that. Also, here’s an interesting line Pluto in Aquarius means that power shifts to the people and society at large, rather than the small group that dominates from the top down.

SCOTT: That’s very optimistic.

MARTIN: They won’t give up their power easily.

SCOTT: That might sound condescending. I didn’t mean it. I meant, like, I’m really happy to hear that.

MARTIN: Yeah, but listen, they will not give up their power easily. That means things won’t change unless we change. Now hold on. Scott. There’s a there’s a really important bit coming through revolution in politics. There’s a really important bit coming. And that’s Uranus, the planet that’s just in from, it’s the planet of disruption, the planet of, what shall we call it? Inventions. Crashes. Disturbance. But here’s the important bit, it’s coming on sixth. No, 8th of July. This coming year, 2025. Okay. That’s a really important kick that must be watched for. These first six months will be, what’s the word? Revolutionary. And then after that, it will be transformative. And it’s going to be there for seven years, from 2025 to 2033. So the first part,

SCOTT: That sounds a lot like what people are expecting with Trump when he takes over is a lot of disruption.

MARTIN: Well, listen to this one. Uranus represents the principle of revolution, freedom and change, and the need for originality and independence from the old ways. Sudden and unexpected breakdowns and breakthroughs. Flashes of insight. Awakenings. Rebellions. Electrifying energy that speeds things up and creates excitement, restlessness and plugging us into the universal mind and stimulating innovation and brilliance. This is one of the most forward thinking periods that we could possibly have. And it’s upon us starting in July.

SCOTT: Right. Well, I think the last five years set it up brilliantly.

MARTIN: Yeah. Oh, yeah. It burned through the old stuff. Now the power is shifting. And then now we’re going to accelerate it with this revolutionary change. And this is in Gemini, which means that it will be changing the way we think, we communicate, we trade and transport goods, all of that sort of stuff. So. Technological innovations. That’s what we’ll have.

SCOTT: So what’s going to happen to the average human or the mass of humans as we go through this change? Are we going to see a breakdown of beliefs that people have held that have been false?

MARTIN: Yeah. The story of Emperor’s New Clothes will be replayed in so many ways. We need to be prepared. Like the little child, to point at the Emperor and saying, but he has no clothes, but he is naked. We have been told these stories, sold these stories by people in power that have described to us how finance works, how medicine works, how physics work, and so on. All of these things have been built on control and lies and that balloon of hot air has been pricked.

SCOTT: So what happens, Martin to the people who are so deep into the cult of whatever it is that they believe that there’s, because I firmly believe that brainwashing and manipulation is at a very high level by the elite or the bad guys. And I’ve seen that where it doesn’t matter what you say, they just spew out whatever was on CNN last night.

MARTIN: I remember Mark Twain writing. Maybe I got it wrong, maybe it was Sinclair Lewis. Anyway, the story is, it’s hard to convince a man that something is not true if believing it makes him dependent or depends on him holding his job, how he makes his money.

SCOTT: Yeah, you can’t teach a man something that he’s paid not to know.

MARTIN: Yeah, that’s that’s a better way of saying it. I’m paraphrasing, I’m not remembering it clearly, but the whole idea is that some people will go to their grave believing what they’ve always believed. Others,

SCOTT: Right. Like Paul Offit, he makes a fortune from his patents in vaccines. So there is absolutely no way that you’re ever going to convince him that vaccines are bad, even though he has way better access to real data on all that stuff than we do. He’s going to be like, no, no, it’s saves people and it doesn’t matter,

MARTIN: He’s willing to kill thousands and maim millions with his conviction.

SCOTT: I was talking to a fellow who was on the board of directors, a friend of mine, of a pharmaceutical company, 10 or 20 years ago, and he said one of the things they would have this drug and they would have trials, and then they would meet to see, like, do we apply to get this, like out in the world or not? And what they did is they said, well, one out of 3000 people are going to die from it. Well that’s an acceptable number of people that are going to die. So I was like, what? He says, yeah. He says, a lot of the stuff you post is right on Scott, because it’s not, they know some people are going to be worse off. They know some people are going to die. And the question is, is that acceptable? I would think no, but.

MARTIN: Well, we have a society where it’s okay for 50,000 people a year to die in car accidents. That’s in the United States, or 100,000 people to die of fentanyl overdose. We’re living with it. We’re using cars. We could do better. We could do better.

SCOTT: Well, yeah, I think and if it was a public discussion, right, like, hey, we have this drug, it’s going to save 95% of cancer patients, but we don’t know if you’re in the 95% or you’re in the 5% that’s just going to make it worse. So then you can go to the person and say, this is a 95% chance of fixing you and 5% chance of killing you, what do you want to do?

MARTIN: Yeah.

SCOTT: Right? But they don’t. They hide it behind, oh, it’s not that. It was some other thing, it was a complication, a comorbidity. And then lie and the result of this is that nobody can make a decision.

MARTIN: Right. And that’s why I get into the car and drive to the store or go drive visit my daughter willingly, because I’m thinking that the odds are in my favor. Yep.

SCOTT: And then you see a car that was smashed, and you go, wow, I’m good to go. There’s the one out of a thousand that was going to crash today.

MARTIN: And there could be a drunk driver that’s going to hit me smack on somewhere in the intersection and make the rest of my life miserable. Yep. Okay. So that, what to do with it, right? Well things will come out a lot more stuff will come out. Provided the new administration does survive, honestly, I think CIA is trying their hardest, putting their best on the job to not let Kennedy and Trump and Musk and the rest of them to actually do what they are expected to do. Because, after all, CIA is responsible for the death of John F Kennedy and Robert F Kennedy, his dad. He knows it.

SCOTT: Yeah.

MARTIN: He said it.

SCOTT: Well, like you were talking about, things are changing, right? And evolution and everything else. And I wouldn’t be surprised if it’s also changing in the CIA, where it’s like, well, we had a good run and this is not working. We need to do something else. I’m sure they were not impressed with President Biden and Vice President Harris and everything that’s going on.

MARTIN: Well, I think they like them very much because they could do anything they wanted. Anyway, we’ll see. Right. As I use the metaphor, the balloon that’s been filled with air has been pricked. The pressure is gone. I don’t know what they’ll do, but I don’t think they’ll go down quietly or without resistance. Expect resistance.

SCOTT: Well, when you threaten to fire 90% of the people in the government. Like he did at X. Uh, and nobody noticed. X got better, right?

MARTIN: Yeah. Well, yeah, that’s that was a fluke, right? Like, he really found something that was just bloated.

SCOTT: Yeah. Well, he’s found a second thing that’s bloated, right?

MARTIN: Yeah. We’ll see.

SCOTT: You know what mean? There’s tons of stories of people that, or government that the governments that just stop working and everything is a lot better when not working than when they are working.

MARTIN: Right. Yeah, I had a philosophical idea, which was that the government people should be instructed to not write new regulations, but instead be working on reducing and refining regulations. I think until it’s down on two stone tablets and it’s ten points, I think we should force them to keep rewriting it and dropping the regulations. I mean, wouldn’t it be nice if we stuck with just do unto others as you wish them to do unto you? Oh, so if you’re going to screw somebody, we’re going to screw you back, right? The biblical eye for an eye.

SCOTT: That’s one of the interesting things about traveling around the world, because I’ve been in Uber’s in a number of different countries, and in some countries a red light is a suggestion. So it’s 2:00 in the afternoon, you come up to a red light, you look one way, you look the other way. There’s nobody for a mile. It’s in this intersection and turns right. It’s like, why not? Right? Well, because too many people go too fast and have bad judgment. But in that environment, they’re used to it. They know where to look. And I mean, I don’t think they’re great drivers. They don’t look they’re great drivers, but they’re also sometimes they’re driving on the dotted line instead of in one of the lanes, like it’s insane. You do see accidents, but you don’t see any more accidents than you see here in Canada right now, right?

MARTIN: I’m not sure. I don’t know what the rate of accident per mile traveled is in various countries. It would be a good study for sure.

SCOTT: Yeah, well, driving here, there was an accident, so.

MARTIN: Right, I don’t know. I would love to see the numbers. Right. For example, we’re recently hearing the numbers from the health statistics, like just last night I watched a piece that was PBD, Patrick Bet David [ https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=N8F5LdARwoQ ] was talking about the outcome of the health care system in the United States. It’s the most expensive thing on the planet. Americans pay twice as much for health care, and their outcomes are in the bottom 20% of the countries. So you pay twice as much as anybody else, and you get results that are marginal. You get results similar to what Cuba gets. Anyway, the whole problem, of course, we already know is the entire healthcare system is based on a lie. The emperor has no clothes. We are treating metabolic disease as if it were a war injury. It’s not.

SCOTT: Right. Okay, going back to our accidents and in Canada in 2019, the number of motor vehicle fatalities was 1762. It was down 9.1% from 2018, where it was 1939, the number of serious injuries decreased from 8900 in 2019, down 5.8% from 9500 in 2018. So before Covid, it was dropped.

MARTIN: 2019 was not Covid. 2020 was Covid.

SCOTT: I said before Covid, it was dropping. After it went back up and the part was because nobody was driving in 2020. There were lockdowns.

MARTIN: There was full shutdowns. Yeah.

SCOTT: So I looked at those numbers and I didn’t want to bring them up because I think they were skewed. But before, it wasn’t a lot, it was going down. So then the question is, is those 2,000 people dying a year in car accidents acceptable? Obviously it is.

MARTIN: Yeah. We’re living with it.

SCOTT: If it was 200,000, then we would probably be banning cars.

MARTIN: Yeah. We’ll see. Unattended cars are available. It maybe coming, I don’t know.

SCOTT: The Jetsons. We used to watch that in the 60s and 70s.

MARTIN: Yeah, right? Well, I tell you this, the electrogravitic technology exists. We don’t need fossil fuels. Well, it’s bullshit anyway. It’s not a fossil. Let’s call it petrochemical. So anyway, we don’t need those fuels, but we also don’t need roads. We honestly could manage it, but we would have to have no personal driving. It would have to be remote control, because there’s just no way that you can manage people 3D 360 degree awareness. We don’t have ability. There’s no way that I can put grandma in a car that flies.

SCOTT: Yeah. But with AI, that’s definitely a problem that’s easily solved.

MARTIN: Yeah AI, internet like, send a packet. It can work. Anyway, I think we’ve said enough, or at least I’ve said enough on the stuff that’s coming in the revolution. Right. Last time we had this revolutionary period of this, Uranus in Gemini was 1941 to 49. We got the transistors. Supersonic flight. Hydraulic fracturing as in fracking. Holography, microwaves, cell phones, tape recorders. That all came in that.

SCOTT: World War two.

MARTIN: Yeah. Yeah, yeah. Gandhi. Nuremberg trials. LSD. All kinds of stuff.

SCOTT: Yes. So we’re in for an exciting 20 years.

MARTIN: Yeah. And the next seven starting in July. Open source technology. Quantum computing. But also deep fakes, right?

SCOTT: Right. Yeah, you’re not going to necessarily be able to believe your eyes anymore, because someone’s going to make something that looks very real and is totally fake.

MARTIN: So I really think that we will see the free energy or decentralized networks. Goodbye, grid.

SCOTT: Well, the grids are falling apart. It just takes a really good shot from the sun. It’s gone.

MARTIN: They are actually the control of the masses by the big business. So yeah, we should fight for saying goodbye to the grids. And strange enough, Mr. Musk is at the focal point of that. His solar technology, his solar tiles for roofs of houses, his battery packs, all of that, all of that technology.

SCOTT: I’m thinking of Starlink too. Right. He’s got these things floating in the sky. And so you don’t need fiber optics.

MARTIN: Yeah. The internet Direct from the satellite. Yeah. Now, that is vulnerable to,

SCOTT: Now all of this stuff going through the air, all these waves. Yeah. That’s going to cause a problem.

MARTIN: Well, here’s a line again from from Jessica Davidson. Thank you very much for your writing. Uranus in Gemini indicates the potential for a massive awakening and shift in how we use our minds. We could see a radical overhaul of our thinking patterns and our understanding of consciousness itself. Uranus may help us break out of the matrix and get back in touch with the power of our real minds. Not minds messed with by technology. There you go.

SCOTT: Wouldn’t that be awesome?

MARTIN: It’s coming. We have the power and we have the stars on our side.

SCOTT: So what goes through my mind before we need to wrap this up, I know, is some people are going to have a hard time with this change, and people are going to embrace it.

MARTIN: Yeah, well, resistance is futile. You will be assimilated. I don’t mean it in the technical form of Borg. I mean it in the form of the reality shift is on the way. You can die fighting it, or you can join it. It’s a lot easier when you join it. And the movement is away from that power and toward the empowerment of the individual. We have a chance.

SCOTT: Awesome. Alright. Well thank you everybody for joining us. I’m Scott Patton. He’s Martin Pytela, coach at www.life-enthusiast.com. We’re here to restore vitality to you and the planet. So join us every Thursday 2:30 eastern for, Jen says thank you guys, merry Christmas. Merry Christmas Jen.

MARTIN: Merry Christmas to you all. Yeah and happy Hanukkah to all of my compatriots.

SCOTT: Right. And 2:30 eastern, 7:30 Pacific, Thursdays where we always go live. Look forward to seeing you then. And we’ll talk to you soon. Bye for now.

The post Podcast 495: 2024 Year in Review and What to Expect in 2025 appeared first on Life Enthusiast.

Podcast 494: The Power of Shilajit

In this episode, Rehmannia Thomas, founder of Supertonic Herbs and author of Shilajit: The Resin of Life, shares his expertise on Shilajit, its origins in ancient ecosystems, its transformative health benefits, and its historical role in Ayurvedic medicine. Together with Martin Pytela, they discuss practical tips for identifying pure, high-quality Shilajit in today’s market, empowering listeners to make informed choices for their health and well-being.

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MARTIN: Greetings. This is Martin Pytela for Life Enthusiast podcast, life-enthusiast.com and with me today is Rehmannia Thomas. Rehmannia is the founder of Supertonic Herbs, a Chinese tonic herbs specialist. You may have heard the previous podcast that I did with Rehmannia. Well, today, a very interesting story. There is a book. Welcome, Rehmannia.

REHMANNIA: Hey there. How you doing, Martin? Good to see you.

MARTIN: Good. I’m really thrilled to know that you actually have put to paper all the research you have done into Shilajit.

REHMANNIA: Yeah, I wrote a book about it.

MARTIN: Yeah. What’s the subtitle there?

REHMANNIA: Shilajit, The Resin Of Life.

MARTIN: Of life.

REHMANNIA: Pretty much straight to the point.

MARTIN: Like, we’re not mincing the words here. We’re going all in.

REHMANNIA: Yeah. Yep. Right to the core.

MARTIN: Yeah. Well, okay, so I guess we don’t want to give it all away. We want people to want to read the whole book. Right.

REHMANNIA: An interesting thing about Shilajit is that I think you can really get it in a nutshell because the discussion is very clear about what it is. Yet, you could study the ramifications and the details forever, and it’s wonderful.

MARTIN: Actually. Maybe we should try and explain, this is a tonic, right? This will lift everyone in every possible way. Right?

REHMANNIA: Yeah. In my lineage of Chinese herbalism, we refer to them as tonic herbs, which means, it’s an old Greek word meaning when you tonify, you’re tuning the strings of your instrument into harmony. So they actually kind of knew about the idea of everything needing to be in harmony. Well, Shilajit comes from the Ayurvedic tradition, not the Chinese, so it’s from India. But it is considered the same. It’s quantified the same. It’s termed, “Rasayan” which means the same thing as a tonic herb. It’s overall uplifting to work holistically on the entire organism, both mind, body and spirit. And this is probably the top rasayan tonic substance in the world.

MARTIN: Yeah. I’m thinking in the terms of, it’s loaded with minerals, the main ingredient being fulvic, which when you look at that, that’s a very complex molecule, but it seems to be expressed as every single element of the entire table of elements. Right?

REHMANNIA: Yeah. The humic acids I refer to are the very, very smallest molecules that occur in soil. They’re broken down to that point through many, many years or maybe eons of microbial activity and other geothermal, everything else that involves… It started out as a forest somewhere. The trees falling, the limbs falling, animals, their bones, the insects, the fungi, everything as it breaks down, we refer to that as detritus falling. And that creates, winds up breaking down a great soil.

MARTIN: So this is just pure leaves. It’s not just, hey, we have the poop and the insect and the animal, the works. It’s all in their entire blueprint of life in some way, right?

REHMANNIA: That’s right. Yeah. I don’t think you could ever really attain a really powerful humic substance just from monocropping farms, like someday a million years from now, when they discover the topsoil of this current day, they’re not likely to find a lot of humic acids in there. And so this came from, we were blessed by the ancient gods of biology to have had a very complete ecosystems that were on this earth for millions of years. And they came and went. Some of it is broken down in peat bogs.

And then when tectonic or earth, there’s floods and earth is covered, soil running cover up though, it becomes layers inside the earth of those ancient peat bogs of all of that forest. But Shilajit is different, it’s kind of a quintessence of that kind of development and outcome. And that’s what we’re going to try and explain, right?

MARTIN: Yeah. This is actually geographically specific, right?

REHMANNIA: Very much so, yes. Geospecific to a very, very limited range of atmospheric and tectonic relationships.

MARTIN: Yeah. Well, of late, Shilajit has been on many people’s lists. Like, I keep getting calls, my Shilajit is the best. We have the pure stuff, I promise you. Others are not that great, but we are.

REHMANNIA: Yeah, you just hit it. I mean, once you know about Shilajit, say online you’re looking, you start getting this plethora of these advertisements from just common people going: “Man, this is the best Shilajit in the world!” This guy’s not an expert or anything. I’ve traced a few of those down. Now, again, briefly we talked about humic acids or fulvic acids. Fulvic acids are, we’re going to discuss this throughout the discussion, but they’re what Shilajit’s standardized to as fulvic acids. They’re the smallest molecules, in soil. 

MARTIN: Right. Yeah. This is sort of like the vitamin C in oranges or orange juice in oranges. You want to know the standard core of it. Right?

REHMANNIA: Yeah. The standardization of the quality of the quantity, really, of vitamin C in an orange. Yeah. Well, we’re looking at that with Shilajit, and that’s how we standardize it. So these guys come online, and here’s the funny thing about it, always going: “Everybody else’s is fake except mine!” Right? You’re like, wait a minute, the other guy is saying the same thing. And he’s saying the same thing, you know? Well, I went to one of them and just said, okay. And he said: “ We got six COAs.” That means a certificate of analysis to determine the quality of it and determine the amount of fulvic acids in particular, you should always look for. And we’ll go back to that in a little bit. But they say we have the highest quality fulvic acid. So I tracked down their website. No COA on there.

Eventually, I see a photograph that shows their COA laying on a table next to the product. Take a screenshot of it and blow it up. And I can see very, very vaguely that it’s like 4.3% fulvic acids in this product.

MARTIN: Okay. So that’s a lot of filler.

REHMANNIA: Yeah. That means that only 4.3% of it is actual Shilajit.

MARTIN: Right? Yeah, and 95% filler.

REHMANNIA: Rock dust and sand and resins and who knows?

MARTIN: Yeah. Well, the Shilajit that I have encountered in the past was very tar-like. Like you would need some kind of a mini scoop to scoop a teeny bit of it. Because, of course, that stuff is so intense, you only need a little bit.

REHMANNIA: Yeah.

MARTIN: But anyway, it was in a little thing that’s like a skin cream jar with a very thick paste in it.

REHMANNIA: Yeah. Very, very dense and intense black paste. So, yeah. Let’s go to the structure of what it is. It does emit from very high mountain ranges. It oozes out in spring when the warm weather occurs and the rocks fissure up there. And it’s a unique phenomenon that we mentioned earlier in geology because it’s only found in new high mountain ranges between about 8 and 10,000 ft.

MARTIN: Okay.

REHMANNIA: And then at that time in spring, when the rocks fissure this black tarry ooze comes out. Now, the way that it was discovered was there were people in India about 2,000 years ago, and they noticed these monkeys and also mountain goats and the monkeys were considered very smart species of monkey. And they would be seen going up and climbing way up in there to eat this stuff. So then eventually people said, well, let’s try that. So they had a little bit and they came to call it ‘Conqueror of Mountains, Destroyer of Weakness.’ That is the long term for Shilajit. But then the Sufis and the Sherpas and the, the more the like, the leaders of the Indian society kind of locked it up. So we only heard about this with the rise of the Internet. I found out about it around 2002 and started researching it then. 

So what it is is this black tarry stuff that comes out of the mountains and the quality of ranges, it varies with different mountain ranges. It’s found primarily in the Himalayan mountains. It’s found in the Altai Mountains of Russia, on the border of Mongolia and China. Right there, a very pristine mountain range is where I get mine. It’s supposedly found in the Grand Tetons.

The Native Americans used it, they called it Medicine Rock. It’s found in the Andes. But the Indians, the people of India, were the primary researchers and users. And in Russia, a lot of research in China as well.

MARTIN: Yeah, I remember actually in Russia it’s called Mumio, Right?

REHMANNIA: Yes, Mumio is its name in Russia.

MARTIN: Yeah, I remember that from back in Europe.

REHMANNIA: That’s right, yeah. Because the Europeans use that name more so about it. Yeah. But it was an obscure substance for people who are really inside of the scientific world somewhat in biology, it is used in soil restoration. And so then it has to be filtered and steamed and broken down to get any, any rock, little piece of rock and sticks and everything out of it. And by the time it’s done being processed, it’s this black tar. And they put it in this little jar and you buy this little bitty, like 2 ounce jar of it for like 100 bucks. But like you were saying, though, it’s difficult to work with. You have to use a little spoon. You get about, you know, the amount it would fit under your pinky nail to use.

MARTIN: Matchbox, I mean, match tip, there you go.

REHMANNIA: And then, and then it’s. It dries hard in there and it’s very hard to get out. And it can, it can also stain the teeth over time.

MARTIN: Yeah, it’s quite intense.

REHMANNIA: So what I did was I came out with a powdered version of it in capsules, which I found is a lot easier to use. But before we go any further with that, let’s look at what it is. Okay, so this stuff comes out of the mountains. Modern research has looked at it and determined that it’s the humic remains of ancient rainforests. All right, so let’s look at the timeline of this and we can get some insights into the age and the origin of Shilajit. Okay, so in regarding the Altai and Himalayan mountains, they were a recent mountain chain that was formed when the subcontinent of India collided with the continent of Asia. And that forced these mountains up. They are still rising today, that continent is still crashing into,

MARTIN: Right. Yeah. I think the initial contact was about 50 million years ago, so it’s probably 35 million that the highest mountains would be. Right?

REHMANNIA: Yeah. Well, the initial contact would be where the Shilajit was ensconced in the rock as well. This would have been happening over tens of thousands or millions of years that the continent kept colliding at something like nine meters a year. Nine meters a century, I think.

MARTIN: Yeah.

REHMANNIA: And then as the mountains began to rise, what appears, and most logically it appears, is that, and I talked about this in my book, I’m really not sure anyone else has, but I used logical deduction here to say that there must have been rainforest on both of those coasts, because here we are in a a tropical equatorial area and a very fertile area for life. And when they crashed into each other, there had to have been indigenous forests on the coast. So then as the mountains started to rise up, some of those forests could have been entombed, enrolled into the stone, to the tectonic. And that would explain why you have within tectonic rock, which is rising, existing sedimentary rock that was on the bottom of the ocean. It’s loaded with seashells and other stuff.

It’s in the top of mountains. This is called tectonic rock, not sedimentary. That’s where the Shilajit is found, which means it was there originally and got pushed up along with that first rock, those first rock formations that went up. This indicates then that we have a pure ancient primordial ecosystem with all of its elements, the water systems, peat bogs, everything rolled in and up in these high mountains where it got preserved. And the method of preservation happens to be with the fulvic acids. So as soil breaks down in any forest or peat bogs in particular through microbial activity and atmospheric and other pressures and water and other, it breaks down into smaller molecules over time until it breaks down to the smallest molecules called humic acids. Once it’s at that phase, it becomes the food for the other microorganisms and plant roots in the entire ecosystem. This is feeding future ecosystems, this stuff. And we are,

MARTIN: Yeah, I know, I find that humic acid in general is beneficial for the digestive system. Like, it supports the microbiome in the gut really, really well.

REHMANNIA: For sure. Absolutely, you’re right. And so we have the breaking down of it into humic acids. Now humic acids are again the small molecules. But then fulvic acids are the very smallest known of that class of humic acids there. Here’s the interesting thing, many interesting things, one of them is that by the time the soil breaks down to the level of humic acids or fulvic acids, it just stays there. It doesn’t continue to break down into any earth.

It doesn’t deteriorate, doesn’t decelerate in anything. It is the quintessence of that forest, like you said earlier, with potentially every single element could be present of all of the 125 elements, except possibly the gaseous elements or whatever, but the mineral, the carbon elements, all that and metallic could be present in these fulvic acids. And they become the food for all the microorganisms that work their way back up the food chain and all the tree roots and everything. And they don’t deteriorate further. They stay preserved at the level of the fulvic acid. So here we have a rainforest that was locked into the mountains inside, preserved from no new detritus falling, no new plant leaves, no animals falling into it. Preserved in its original state, broken down the fulvic acids and then remaining there for possibly 35 million years, because that’s where the mountains had risen from at that time.

And so it’s possible that we have with pure Shilajit, which we start to get into the quality here in a sec.

MARTIN: Right? Yeah, let’s get to the stuff that you have actually found. Well, you have tested many, right?

REHMANNIA: Pure Shilajit is found in those regions. And it is a very, very powerful substance that provides us with all of the missing elements that we’re not getting in our diet. We’re not getting cobalt and boron and stuff like this in our diet. And they are found, interestingly in some of the research that I looked at, all of those elements are found in miraculously healthy ratios for human health. So for instance, mercury is present, but in a ratio that’s actually healthy, like a very homeopathic ratio. But then if we look at our COA’s and if we see it’s over, as so much of Shilajit is, in the certificates of analysis. If you look at them online, you’ll find the mercury and the cadmium and the iron and the lead are over the ratios that you want. But actually when they’re under those ratios at homeopathic levels, they are beneficial for health, they act as antimicrobials and other stuff. And they are found in those ratios in Shilajit, which is miraculous because we are the result of an ecosystem. And Shilajit is the food of the ecosystem.

MARTIN: Right. Goes to follow that this is actually the ultimate reduction of an entire forest.

REHMANNIA: Yes, absolutely.

MARTIN: And it’s well, 50 million years ago, or give or take a few. The planet was very vigorous. I mean, this is about 15 to 20 million years after the extinction event for the dinosaurs.

REHMANNIA: Right.

MARTIN: So there had to have been a huge amount of renewal on the planet. Things were very different.

MARTIN: I’m speculating that the life force on the world was very strong.

REHMANNIA: Absolutely. Yeah, the plants had a lot, the soil had a lot of what we call diamagnetism, it helped plants grow up. That’s why the trees are so tall. It’s a levitative energy that’s in diamagnetism. It surely contains all that stuff that would assist blood circulation in the body, the distribution of nutrients.

MARTIN: Right. Well, so we take it because we want to increase the overall mineralization of the human body.

REHMANNIA: Yeah.

MARTIN: Which is awesome in the sense that an undermineralized body would be vulnerable to invasion, to parasitic or whatever else, threats from within. When you’re fully mineralized, you’re very resilient. Right?

REHMANNIA: Yes. And those minerals that we mentioned, they’re dangerous. When they reach high levels, they actually become very much friends of the parasites. They all get along because they acidify the blood and the parasites, that’s where they live. They’re all contributing to that acidification of our blood, of our bodies inside. Wow.

MARTIN: Let’s go over some of the chapters you put into the book. Just so we tell people what they’re going to read about once they read it.

REHMANNIA: Well, in the process of writing it, I just came across some fascinating information in the ancient vedas. There seems to be Vedic literature about Shilajit, which I don’t necessarily want to give away as a beautiful part of what that is, but you’ll find out.

MARTIN: No, no, don’t give it away. Give me the chapters.

REHMANNIA: But it appears that the ancient Indian people knew about it and they wrote about it in the Vedas regarding Brahma creating it for the sake of future life and all that. I discovered all that. And then primarily was working with a doctor from India named Siddhnath Gaushala who wrote the original book that was translated to English, which is now out in print, was called Shilajit in Perspective. And he had some fascinating discoveries regarding a particular metabolite that’s found in seashells called dibenzo alpha pyrone. And I don’t want to get too detailed in this discussion and all that, but dibenzo alpha pyrone in the seashells that are found in high rock strata play a role in the unique formation of Shilajit. And that’s in this discussion. It’s fascinating stuff. And then I looked into the benefits. Every single research paper I looked at, which you can verify this too by going to the National Institutes of Health and Medline, and all of these links to all of these studies.

Pretty much every researcher concludes that Shilajit appears to be a panacea that benefits all aspects of our health. And so I laid out some of them in my book. And then, it’s minor discussions on humic acids and other things without getting crazy. This is pretty much a patent. You don’t have to be a scientific scientist to get into this. It’s a biogenic regulator, like you said earlier. It’s a regulator of our homeostasis. Bioavailable mineral source, yes. Premier adaptogen, helping us adapt to stress, replenishing the adrenals, rejuvenation, combating the effects of aging. Anti-ulcerogenic, anti digestive stress effect.

MARTIN: Right. Which means, of course, just about anything that could go wrong will be less wrong when we have this on board.

REHMANNIA: Yeah. Or the brain nervous system function.

MARTIN: Yeah.

REHMANNIA: Look what’s happening to our hormones. I mean, the hormone disrupting chemicals that are everywhere. We need help on this. When our body synthesizes various hormones itself, it will reject the xenoestrogenic molecules that like to act like hormones. This stuff’s getting very important for our future health. Pain relieving, anxiety, anti-anxiety, cognitive function, physical performance for athletes, on and on. This is something that is for everybody. It’s a gift for the world coming to us at a time. And that’s what some of that ancient Vedic literature that I found alluded to that, that it comes to us at a time when we need it, in all nature. We could use Shilajit, I remember one person telling me that if we were used judiciously, which we’ll get into, that you could potentially refertilize our entire planet with Shilajit.

MARTIN: Yeah, that’s what I was thinking. I mean there are these sources of just coarse humic that are packed in 25 pound bags for gardeners, right?

REHMANNIA: Yes.

MARTIN: So at least at that level, it’s a fantastic fertilizer.

REHMANNIA: Absolutely. All humic acids. There’s something called leonardite that you can get is, it’s from an ancient peat bog that was buried under strata and they dig that out and use it in farms. Shilajit is a quintessential version of that and can also be used in very, very small amounts to make your garden bloom, to your animals. And so let’s discuss quality for a little, for a minute.

MARTIN: Yeah. I was just thinking, I mean since you have done this research, you probably have a good handle on what’s good and what’s perhaps best.

REHMANNIA: Okay. So again, going back to those, all of those claims from the other Shilajit purveyors about quality, if you’re looking to buy Shilajit, you can go to those sites and look at their COA. If they’re not, if their COA isn’t, again, it means certificate of analysis of chemistry and the bio product. And it shows you the microbiology and the harmful metals where they’re at. But it should be standardized to fulvic f-u-l-v-i-c acids. That’s the standardization. Now if the website does not readily show that COA, do not buy it.

They’ll say in their stuff they have COAs but don’t buy it. Because sometimes they make you email them and they send it to you. Why don’t they just have it showing on their website, right? And so that’s already a kind of a sign. But when I was researching this book and Dr. Ghoshala and others at that time felt that the average Shilajit, or the highest quality Shilajit usually rate was somewhere between about 27% and about 50%.

MARTIN: Fulvic acids, what I understood about 50% would be high quality, right?

REHMANNIA: Yes, it would be. And the rest were certain kinds of resins from various plants that existed in that area back then. A kind of cactus that produced a resin. So when I got my COA done, my prerequisite for writing this book was to find the best. I said, well, if I’m going to find the best, I have to research it to the point where I can actually write a book about it. In that process, I put out some early versions of this book that are available used online. Don’t buy it. It’s wasn’t complete when I wrote it way back, like 10 years ago, I published an early version. Don’t worry, this is a good one. But when I did that, then people knew that I had written this book. So I started being contacted by purveyors, saying: “I’ve got the best.” I said, okay, show them your COA, they sent it. People try to fool with me. People sent me stuff that looked like salt and clay together. I mean, unbelievable, and of course, their picture shows the black stuff, and you get it, and it’s just gray. And there’s ORMUS and there’s quality in that. And so, I couldn’t be fooled. And eventually I was like, look, I can’t be fooled. If you’re going to play this game with me, you’ve got to send me the purest thing you can get. Eventually these folks from the Altai Russia.

MARTIN: Yeah. I think I would like to point out, just to the listener here, that you’ve been at this now for 25, 30 years now.

REHMANNIA: Distinctly.

MARTIN: Yeah, it’s, you develop a sense or you develop a skill of knowing what is or isn’t good quality. Like, you just work with it. At some point you turn from apprentice to master and so when you say this is the real thing, it’s backed up by 30 years of learning how to tell the thing apart. Right?

REHMANNIA: Yeah. There’s a lot of bits to my answer to you on that, but yes, and even says in my lineage of early Chinese medicine called classical Chinese medicine, it says when you’re going to do pulse reading, you got to do 10,000 before you can really make a decision. You know what you’re doing, and then it even says in formulating herbal combinations that once you’ve reached a certain degree of perfection, you’re invited to start using your intuition as well, because your empirical knowledge is now at a stage where your intuition can start to help you. But you can’t rely on that early on. You’ve got to go with, you know.

MARTIN: Yeah, but the hunches you get are based on solid learning of many years.

REHMANNIA: Yeah, right. So. And then at the same time, I also know how to talk to purveyors, so that to say, look, don’t mess with me, because it won’t get anywhere. Don’t waste your time. And so I eventually found a purveyor from the Altai Mountains of Russia, which for the listeners and watchers here, go on Google satellites and look down at a satellite map. Look at the Altai Mountains. It’s fabulous. There’s almost no one living there.

MARTIN: The Altai is the ultimate in wilderness. Like, it’s just so remote and so undeveloped. It’s just shocking just how untouched that region is.

REHMANNIA: It is. I feel that in this Shilajit, I feel something like, wow, this is coming from a place that’s pure and the people who got it don’t want to mess with that purity. They want to be part of bringing the best of the best. Yeah. And when I received these people’s Shilajit, I tasted it, oh, boy, that’s good. So we sent it to a lab in Sri Lanka. It came back 91% fulvic acids. I was shocked. I was absolutely shocked.

MARTIN: That’s knock your socks off strong.

REHMANNIA: Yeah. It means it’s nine tenths of the entirety of that ancient form.

MARTIN: No adulteration, no mix. Yeah.

REHMANNIA: Yeah.

MARTIN: Fantastic. So that’s what you have available now, right?

REHMANNIA: Yes. And I decided, just because of my own preference, to put it in capsules, I also sell it as a bulk powder in a little jar, so you could take a little thimble worth.

MARTIN: Yeah. It’s so hard to handle. I would just as soon work with the capsule because it’s so much easier to dose.

REHMANNIA: Now that said, and it said in much research, and I believe I said in my book, I did say it in my book too, is that powders are very easily the ones to get corrupted because once someone’s got that Shilajit powder, there could be a lot of temptation to add something to fill it out.

MARTIN: Yeah, true enough. You can hide anything inside a capsule.

REHMANNIA: Yeah. So it does, purveyors would say, don’t buy the capsules. They’re going to be corrupted. And that was where I can come in and say, look, here it is in its purity.

MARTIN: Yeah. If you can trust my other products, maybe you can trust this one.

REHMANNIA: Yeah, yeah.

MARTIN: Okay. So there we are. Well, we have Shilajit. We have it in stock. We have it available. It’s really good. And I will soon be running an experiment because I’m thinking that I need some remineralization, and I’ll be reporting back.

REHMANNIA: Yeah, great. Yeah. That’s beautiful, Martin. And yes, my book, you’ll have copies of the book, too?

MARTIN: Oh, yes, we will definitely be offering the book and,

REHMANNIA: Fantastic.

MARTIN: That’s the gift of meeting people who have done the work and have, I don’t know how else to say it. You want to be doing business with people who have the chops, who have done the work.

REHMANNIA: That’s right.

MARTIN: And Rehmannia is one of them. So we’re so pleased to have this relationship. Take a good, serious look at all the supertonic herbs. There are 16 of the formulas available, each one of them with a specific target, specific goal. Whether you’re needing help with your lungs or your stomach, your heart, your aging, your reproduction, whatever it is that your body needs to shift or the direction, these herbs are phenomenal. And the products are really well made.

REHMANNIA: We also have shilajit in my product called Three Masters, which you’re selling. That’s wonderful.

MARTIN: Oh, sure enough. Yes, that’s ORMUS, Shilajit and?

REHMANNIA: Reishi. 10:1 extract of reishi fruiting body only. Pure. That’s maybe my favorite product in the world. I’m really proud of that. I created it in 2006. It’s like, wow. I don’t know what it came down from the ethers, it seems like.

MARTIN: All right, okay. Well, I think this pretty much explains what we have. And I would like to just thank you for the time you’re spending. First of all, thank you for the time you put into writing the book and looking around the world to find the best of the best. And I feel so proud to be associated with you.

REHMANNIA: Thank you, Martin. Yeah, it’s my pleasure. And it’s my gift. And you and I both have a gift to give people the highest integrity, and that’s why I like working with you, too. I know I can feel that from you as well.

MARTIN: Thank you so very much. This is Rehmannia Thomas, the formulator at SuperTonic Herbs, and Martin Pytela, your health coach at Life Enthusiast. Life-enthusiast.com. Thank you for being here.

REHMANNIA: Thank you.

The post Podcast 494: The Power of Shilajit appeared first on Life Enthusiast.

Podcast 493: Truly Free from Toxicity

Welcome to the Life Enthusiast podcast! In this episode, Martin Pytela sits down with Steven Ezell, CEO of Truly Free, to uncover the hidden dangers that may be lurking in your household products. Steven’s journey began with a health crisis involving his newborn son, igniting a personal awakening that led to the creation of Truly Free — a company dedicated to refillable, plant-powered cleaning solutions. His story will inspire you to take a closer look at what’s hiding under your sink.

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MARTIN: Hello, this is Martin Pytela, the health coach at Life Enthusiast and with me today, Steven Ezell. He is the CEO at Truly Free, and we have been using this product for some time with great deal of pleasure. Steven, welcome!

STEVEN: Martin, I am so excited for this conversation. This is going to be great.

MARTIN: Yeah, well, Life Enthusiast, 25 years of helping people. Our motto, restoring vitality to you and to the planet. Well, this is more about the planet, but the you is also important because the number one problem in our modern industrial world is toxicity.

STEVEN: No doubt, no doubt. And I’ve dedicated my, dedicated my life to solving that.

MARTIN: Yeah, exactly. Could you tell a bit of history? How did we get here?

STEVEN: Sure. Well, I guess my journey on this low tox world started off, geez, almost 17 years ago. I have five kids now, but when my firstborn son was just a couple weeks old, he broke out in this horrific rash. It looked like I literally dunked him in boiling water. He was just a couple weeks old. And I was getting him undressed, getting ready for his bath, and he was screaming and I thought just because he didn’t want, he wanted mom, it wasn’t me. And when I saw he had these, again,  this rash was so bad from his neck all the way down to his ankles. I called over my wife, my wife’s a NICU nurse, so she’s used to working with very, very sick infants in the neonatal unit.

And when I saw my wife freak out, I freaked out. And we bundled them up and straight to the pediatrician. And then the pediatrician was like, wow, this is really bad, and sent us to a pediatric dermatologist specialist. And then they prescribed Amy, my wife, because she was breastfeeding with all these prophylactic antibiotics and steroids, and then him with steroids and antihistamines and all these things. And obviously, we knew no better. So we’re on our way to the pharmacy to fulfill all these prescriptions and a family member who has always been a very naturally minded person heard through mom, this is what’s going on. And she called and asked me a question that changed my life.

And we were just a few blocks away from the pharmacy and she said, what are you using for laundry detergent? I’m like: “Laundry detergent? No, no, liike, my son’s sick. We’ll talk about laundry some other time.” And she’s: “No, no, because this stuff that you get at the store, people and especially children can have an allergic reaction to these chemicals. And I was like: “Are you serious, that’s possible?” She goes: “Well, before you give Amy and the baby all this stuff, why don’t you just wait a day and just strip his clothes.” She gave me this homemade concoction. So we went to the store and got all this vinegar and borax and all this kind of homemade stuff.

And we fill up the bathtub, filled it up with all of his bedding and clothing. And the next day he was fine. And I’m like, wait a second. So laundry detergent made my kid sick. So from that point I became a full blown eco conspiracy theorist, what else is in the laundry room? What’s under the kitchen sink, what’s on top of it? And then I was sent on this mission. So we became very eco, non toxic, organically minded back in 2008. And I was in the restaurant business. I built restaurants for a living. And that was my career path. And then years went by, we moved to Michigan. I didn’t want to do restaurants anymore. And I met this grandma selling laundry soap at the farmer’s market that was really, that was safe and great ingredients. And I want to buy in the company. And one thing led to another, in 2015 pivoted online and now what started off with one refillable laundry jug, a concrete mixer from Harbor Freight I used to deliver the orders to the post office in the back of the car, has now become one of the largest non toxic manufacturers in the country. And we started this movement.

MARTIN: All right, so let’s just back down. You’re throwing these very large concepts straight in. I think what’s really important here is of course, all of us in this industry end up being convinced by some kind of an emotional event that drives us forward. My story, your story is really cool because it saved your kid from a life of misery just by understanding that it was actually the industrial toxins in the laundry product. I mean, what a turn of your life’s journey took a massive turn right there.

STEVEN: Yeah, and ill never look back. And again, we were green before green was cool. And living non toxic and feeding our kids and ourselves organic and local foods way before it was cool. Now it’s cool, but we were doing this way before it was cool to do it.

MARTIN: Yeah. So, okay, so what all do you now do? Like, let’s just say that the premise is let’s get the cleaning products in the house free of toxins. That’s the mission, right? 

STEVEN: Yeah. so Truly Free Home represents a full stable of non toxic and refillable plant powered cleaning products. From laundry to dish soap, to dishwasher soap, to surface cleaning to anything that’s really, laundry room, the kitchen sink, on top of the kitchen sink, the bathroom, anything in the cleaning category, we have seemingly piece by piece, reinvented with a safe alternative.

MARTIN: Right.

STEVEN: And that’s been the mission for trulyfreehome.com for many years. And we also have truly free market.com which is a, an alternative marketplace for great brands. But our main focus of Truly Free Home is to set the world free of toxic chemicals.

MARTIN: Right. This is a big deal. So if anyone listening here now has any conscience will understand that we live in on this planet Earth. And it’s a whole lot like an aquarium in the sense that whatever we ingest, we are ingesting it from the planet, from the aquarium. But when we are finished with it, we drop it in there, right back into the aquarium. Yes, we are pooping into our own nests, so to speak. So it’s really important for all of us to understand that whatever we put out is going to stay with us and it’s going to stay with us for the next generation.

STEVEN: Absolutely. We’re in a closed system. 

MARTIN: That’s a good word, yeah.

STEVEN: Right. And nothing is created from nothing. And most things that come out of the earth return to the earth very easily. It’s when they start getting compiled with other things that are synthesized that things get very, very crazy. And I think Martin, I think we’re in a very interesting time in human history where 50 years ago, 80 years ago, it was all about creating things that work. And I think in the pursuit for efficacy and cost effectiveness consumerism was driven by, I want the cheapest thing that gets the job done. It doesn’t matter what the job is, not just cleaning, but anything. What is the most economical way to accomplish the task at hand?

STEVEN: And I think we’re at this inflection point in consumer behavior where people still want things that work and they still want to get the job done, whatever that is, whether it’s cleaning or getting dressed. Whatever that is, I want the best experience. And yes, I’m also concerned about the economic value. But now I think so many people are waking up to at what cost? And the cost is more than money, right? What cost to my health, what cost to my life, what cost to my local community? At what cost to the planet?

MARTIN: Well, you put in three wonderful and important things. One is the inflection point, right? With each added chemical, with each pound of the toxic stuff added to the planet, it’s geometric. And at some point you hit the hockey stick, the inflection point where stuff starts taking off.

STEVEN: Yeah.

MARTIN: Yeah, we’re living that moment now in our industrialized societies. It’s, upon us, it’s here now. And I think it’s really important that every consumer understands that wherever they put their dollar, their money, that’s what grows. So if you want more toxicity, carry on and buy the stupid products. But if you want the next generation to survive or thrive, then we need to change.

STEVEN: I couldn’t agree more, Martin. I’ve used this analogy on stages all over the world, so I’ll use it again because I think it’s still very pertinent. And that’s this story of spinach. Many years ago, spinach was a leafy vegetable. And then over time in this consumerism driven industrial age, spinach got heavily genetically modified and was ridden with pesticides, herbicides, fungicides, etcetera etcetera in order to get this commodity of spinach. And then what happened was a bunch of hippie granola crunching growers said we’re not going to grow this, we’re going to grow organic heirloom seed based, non genetically modified spinach. And that started to take root in farmers markets and CSAs and co ops and health food stores until there was so much press that was coming out on this genetically modified herbicide, fungicide ridden spinach that market share started shifting from large agro chem agro producers to these very small micro producers of spinach locally. And what happened was large scale producers like Costco and so forth said well wait a second, either we find a way to pivot right to grow at scale organic like heirloom, non GMO spinach, or these hippies are going to kill our market share.

So it wasn’t. So now you go to the store and where spinach, organic spinach used to be two, three, four times the cost of regular conventional spinach. Now it’s even cheaper. The store is mostly organic spinach. And it’s not because farmers became philanthropists. To your point, so many people started voting with their dollars and demanded this product. So then what happened was the industry found a way to scale that product. Right. So now organic spinach is normal. And that’s because a bunch of people voted with their dollars and the industry pivoted. They had to or they would lose. And I think that’s where we are as a society in so many industries, not just the agricultural industries, but in every industry. We’re seeing this major pivot to where entrepreneurs that are finding a better way are either going to take market share from the people that are hurting people or these large scale companies are going to find a way to pivot. And we’re seeing that happening now.

MARTIN: Right? Yeah. Agree. The pivot point is around 20% of the market.

STEVEN: Yeah.

MARTIN: So if collectively we clean thinking granola crunching crowd, well we don’t have to be crunching granola. I wouldn’t touch wheat if you beat me.

STEVEN: Yeah, I don’t like granola and I don’t drive a Subaru. But that’s, I know what the point is.

MARTIN: The point is we care about the planet. There are two modalities. One is called the plunder and the other one’s called the sustainer, or I don’t know what the word would be. But the hunter gatherer society was able to sustain itself without destroying the environment.

STEVEN: Yes.

MARTIN: And then came the industrial modality of plunder where you show up, rape the whole thing, take everything without care. You kill all the bison or you take down all the forests, whatever, after us, the deluge. We don’t care.

STEVEN: Yeah.

MARTIN: That mindset got us rich and toxic. We’re now going to be dying of toxicity unless we change our ways. It’s that dramatic. It’s that important to actually get the message.

STEVEN: You know Martin, many people don’t think about cleaning products, laundry, can these really affect the human genome? You know there was a study done by Mayo and Cleveland Clinic and they showed that, and there’s multiple now peer reviewed studies at scale where the average healthy umbilical cord of a healthy full term child that’s born, they take that cord blood, the umbilical cord blood and it’s tested and the average woman has 400 household chemicals in the cord blood.

MARTIN: Yeah, no surprise there. You touch it, it’s on your skin. You touch it, you handle it, you wear it. This membrane is semipermeable.

STEVEN: So lotions and potions and cosmetics and skin care and laundry care and air fresheners. And the list goes on. The chemicals that we’re breathing straight past the blood brain barrier, perfumes, carcinogens, estrogens, the list goes on, hormone disrupting chemicals. And we’re literally, like you said, ingesting, breathing, bathing in this soup of toxicity. And nobody’s exempt. Nobody.

MARTIN: Yeah. The important point here is if we don’t turn a corner, if we don’t take the fork in the road to the healthy side, we are actually going to end up off the cliff.

STEVEN: No doubt. And it sounds like doom and gloom, Martin, and it is overwhelming when you think about the vastness. But every micro decision that we make, one little decision, right? What produce do you buy? What protein? What farm? What cleaning product, what skincare product? What sunscreen? Every little micro decision impacts you at a very, very large scale. So you don’t be overwhelmed. Like you’re listening to this, you’re like, oh my gosh, this is the first time I’ve ever heard this. Or maybe it’s the hundredth. Like just every little micro decision has a compounding effect.

MARTIN: Right. Yeah. All we need is that you switch your laundry powder. Just that one thing. You can pick up the other products later. We want you to change your entire house. We do. But just take the one thing.

STEVEN: Yeah. And for Truly Free, my advice to people, I want to be here creating value. This isn’t a pitch session. I’m not trying to, but wait, there’s more. And sell you Truly Free. There are some great brands that are doing really cool things. I happen to believe that we’ve always been on the cutting edge of green chemistry and create the best products that work the best in the safest way.

But look at back labels. If a company is not willing to be transparent on the ingredients, don’t support them. We made a business decision years ago. Right. Like we would not that we would be. We would literally disclose every ingredient on our label and not hide behind patent and trademark loopholes and fragrance loopholes that we would just tell people what’s in everything and do your own research. But there’s so many companies that can hide ingredients in these classifications and we just refuse to do so.

MARTIN: Yeah, would you please name some of the ones that are actually contributing to the problem? I mean, we, most of us have heard of phosphates, right?

STEVEN: Yeah, so there’s some ingredients. So phosphates, and phosphates are not necessarily that toxic to the human genome. 

MARTIN: It’s a runoff problem. Right.

STEVEN: It’s a runoff problem. So what phosphates do is they create this really downstream effect in water treatment in well water. They have more of an environmental impact than a human impact. The things that have human impact are the classes of chemicals that are highly synthesized; perfumes, fragrances, ultra UV brighteners, surfactants, those are the bubble things that make bubbles that are ethoxylated. So there’s a process in making cleaning products called ethoxylation. And the byproduct of this process of making these cleaning agents is a main compound called 1,4 dioxane, which is a Class 1 carcinogen. So you have these classifications of chemicals that are estrogenic. So they’re hormone mimicking. So they disrupt people’s hormones, they’re carcinogenic, they’re irritants for breathing in or skin. This is why so many people, when you go through the department store at the mall and what’s the first main department is the perfume aisle because they want to waft you in. And these chemicals, many of them are literally like mimic pheromones that are given off when having intercourse. So it tricks the mind into thinking that it’s very seductive. Well, these chemical compounds are not like the opposite sex having intercourse between husband and wife. We’re literally mimicking these estrogens and these hormones. And it’s really toxic because it passes right through the blood brain barrier. So people get headaches, migraines going in the cleaning aisle at the department at the supermarket because we’re literally tricked into believing that efficacy is through the smell and it’s really not. So things that smell super pungent, the majority of them are very, very toxic. And companies that are making these perfumes and clean, they don’t have to disclose what are their ingredients under patent and trademark law. So they can classify all these ingredients into perfume. That’s why if you look at the main leading perfumes that you can get or colognes at the department store, the ingredient is Parfum.

But there could be 700 chemical compounds that they’ll never, they don’t have to tell you what’s in it. And UV brighteners that, you know. That’s why like the leading laundry detergents and fabric softeners are green or blue because they’re designed to leave this blue or green film on your fabrics to trick your eyes into believing that your fabrics are brighter than they really are. But really all it is is an optical illusion. But these chemicals are designed to stay on your sheets and fabrics. Many that even when you go clothes shopping, never ever, ever wear brand new clothes without washing them in something that. Why? Because they’re literally sprayed at factories in India, in China, overseas where they don’t have regulations. We don’t make many textiles here in the US anymore or in Canada. Most textiles are made overseas and they’re sprayed with fire retardant chemicals with UV brighteners.

MARTIN: Yeah. They fumigate the darn things before because of the tropical fungal problems that they would get because humidity causes fabrics to get mold.

STEVEN: Detoriate. Yeah. So now you know, and people, oh, I got new clothes. No, you need to wash your new clothes more than your dirty clothes. Your dirty clothes that you wore out in the yard or out to the gym that stink are safer to wear than brand new clothes. So people just need to hear this stuff more. That’s why I appreciate the work that you guys do with Life Enthusiasts and educating people

because it’s so important. People never heard of these things before. Right. Like handling receipts when you go to the grocery store or the restaurant. The chemicals that are in receipts. 

MARTIN: Teflon.

STEVEN: Crazy. Right? So we just,

MARTIN: Would you, Steve, would you please name some of the chemicals so that they people can actually look at the label and say “I don’t want that.”

STEVEN: Yeah, so anything. The problem is you can’t do a lot. There’s not a lot of companies that disclose them. But I’ll give you some ideas. When you see ionic or non ionic surfactants as a classification, if the companies are not willing to disclose which surfactants, automatically assume that they’re toxic. Most companies don’t even list that they have UV brighteners on their products. So if you see blue or green, don’t buy it. If you see fragrance, don’t buy it.

If they’re not going to disclose what fragrance oils or perfumes that they are using in their product, if they’re not willing to disclose what perfumes or fragrances, don’t use it a lot. A very large scale, probably the most popular is SLES, Sodium Laurel Ester sulfate or F, ether or ester sulfate. That’s a class, it’s an ethoxylated surfactant. It’s a derivative of SLS Sodium Lauryl sulfate. These are either skin irritants or very dangerous. So I would stay away from afoxylated ingredients, so the problem is Martin, most cleaning products that you read the labels don’t actually list the ingredients.

MARTIN: Ah.

STEVEN: So the biggest one, name the ingredients. I can give you a list of hundreds of them but you’ll never find them out because unless you go to an MSDS sheet and even there they can hide. It’s just really, really challenging. So I would say instead of what to stay away from, just go after and research the brands that do list their ingredients and and make your decision accordingly.

MARTIN: I would go simpler. Smell it. If it has a smell to it, don’t get it.

STEVEN: Yeah, that’s very, very true. And that’s almost all of our products we make unscented for that reason. Some products we do use plant based fragrance oils and essential oils because so many people demand that sensory experience. So we create it for them in the safest way that we possibly can. But even still we still create unscented versions of virtually every one of our products just so that you don’t need anything to smell like anything for it to work. It’s completely vanity.

MARTIN: Right. You don’t need to appreciate the smell of lavender and all of that.

STEVEN: Yeah, but the smell of lavender or eucalyptus or lemon verbena, although very nice smells are not going to get your dishes any cleaner or your clothes any cleaner or your countertops any nicer. It’s strictly only there for a sensory experience. It doesn’t do anything to provide a better experience.

MARTIN: Laundry, we need to get rid of oils, we need to get rid of microbes and probably wash out the proteins that are on it. Right.

STEVEN: Yeah. And that’s like most microbes and germs I would say, in an alkaline environment where there’s soap can’t survive in an aqueous alkaline environment. And that’s what almost all cleaning products do is provide that high alkaline environment. So most things can’t survive in that environment anyway. Right. So that’s why washing your hands with soap is even more efficacious than a sanitizer. Right.

MARTIN: So, let me ask you this. You have actually taken on this size and volume and shipping costs problem. Right. I really like the fact that you are sending the liquid soap, except you’re sending it in powder.

STEVEN: This is honestly, and we pioneered back in 2015. So we’re all, we’re at this for virtually a decade now. It’s only taken us a decade to be an overnight success, I joke around. And this is actually how we’re able to compete with all the chemical giants and how we’ve been able to grow at such a large scale. Because all the mainstream goo that you get at the store, there’s a lot of cost in packaging and these plastic bottles and labels and there’s lots of cost in shipping all this liquid around the planet.

MARTIN: And it’s heavy.

STEVEN: Yeah, it’s heavy. So that’s actuall how we, so when I built my first website in late 2014 and 2015, we’re about to turn the website on and I was curious, how much does it cost to ship 4lbs 50oz of liquid laundry detergent from Northern Michigan around the country? And what we saw was that it averaged around $14 to ship this laundry jug around the country. We planned on selling at the time our laundry soap for $15. So it costs $14 to ship a $15 product. And I said, this is the go out of business strategy.

MARTIN: Yep.

STEVEN:Because people are not going to spend $29 for a jug of laundry soap. And literally, I feel like God gave us this crazy idea and his vision for refillable cleaning products. So when you buy the blue goo at the store, it’s 94, 90% plus water. So we just ask crazy questions, what if we didn’t ship the water? And what if this plastic that was destined to float in the ocean, you know, we gave a lifetime warranty. So that came, that was the genesis of refillable cleaning products. And that was the eureka moment, now this expensive packaging, now the person gets a laundry jug once and they could keep it for life because it doesn’t go bad.

Instead of shipping water, we’ll just ship you the concentrated active Ingredients and you add, whether it’s laundry soap and it’s powder or liquid glass cleaner. So we’ll just ship the concentrated refill. You don’t need to ship water. You already have it in the kitchen sink. So you add a refill, you add water, you shake it up and you’ve got a refillable product. And  it started off with this crazy idea. We’ve now saved tens of millions of pieces of plastic from ever being produced. Because now if you went to the club store and got 250 loads of laundry in this big thing, you’d have to back brace and just lug it to drop it on the counter. You need a pallet jack, yeah, to get laundry soap. Where now, that all fits inside your mailbox.

MARTIN: Right on. Yeah. And of course on our end, we help people make low surface tension water. We sell these little ceramic gadgets that actually help people lower the surface tension and lower the cluster size of the water. So it will be even more effective than just basically,

STEVEN: No doubt. It’s an amplifier for those technologies. Ceramic technology is phenomenal.

MARTIN: Great. Okay. And of the other things. So you have dishwasher soap?

STEVEN: Yeah so dishwasher soap has become one of our top three most popular products. As I made that one, the hardest product for us to create was laundry. And the second hardest was dishwasher. And the reason being is the largest ingredient in your washing machine when you’re washing clothes or doing your dishes is your water. Right? So you’re putting 5, 10, 20 gallons in your washing machine. You’re putting 2, 3 gallons of water in your dishwasher, but you’re only using a cap full of product. So the biggest challenge is to get the job done and treat the water.

So yeah, so our dishwasher soap, man, it’s, it is. And we’ve had this thing tested independently for years. It is the best performing plant based dishwasher soap on the market, period, end of story. We outperform all the toxic little jelly potty type, I have to be very, have to be careful with the words that I use since I’ve not made a lot of friends in the chemical industry, but all of those jelly potty type things outperform the mainstream stuff and gets the job done. And we don’t leave a toxic residue like those other products do.

MARTIN: Fantastic. And what else would you like to highlight?

STEVEN: The biggest thing is if you’ve listened to this podcast for this amount of time, right, you’re one of us, right? You’re one of the weird people. Just continue to swim upstream, vote wisely with your dollars. Support the companies, the brands, the farmers, the growers that are making a difference. And the more you vote with great small businesses that are helping people, the faster that our movement scales and we change the world together.

MARTIN: Couldn’t say it better. Restoring vitality to you and to the planet. That’s our mission, Steven. We are going to include the promotional link right in the notes next to the podcast and we’re going to help people get direct from factory to consumer shipping of these wonderful products.

STEVEN: It’s awesome, Martin. Thank you so much for your work especially, I know you can listen, people have been listening to this podcast for years. You know, we’re headed, we’re recording into the holiday season. Give the gifts to people, your friends and family that are making a difference, right? This is a great opportunity for us to educate our loved ones, people that we work with, our family, our children, our parents, aunts and uncles is to give the gift of whatever that is non toxic or organic or healthy living vitality. This is the opportunity for us to make a big difference. When so many people are buying in this time of year as we’re heading into the holiday season, like making those differences, it’s a really, really big deal.

MARTIN: It truly is. We have to save the world. This is our opportunity. It’s not the save the world the Superman style, but I tell you, one laundry load at a time, you are making a difference.

STEVEN: Amen.

MARTIN: This is Martin Pytela, Life-Enthusiast.com, thank you for listening.

STEVEN: Have a great day.

The post Podcast 493: Truly Free from Toxicity appeared first on Life Enthusiast.

Podcast 492: Psychology and Purpose

In this episode, Martin Pytela sits down with Dr. Kim Chronister, a clinical psychologist with extensive expertise in relationship dynamics and mental health, to discuss the profound effects of personal identity and self-expansion on happiness and well-being. Dr. Chronister offers insights on navigating breakups, coping with depression, and sustaining healthy relationships, particularly in the context of recent societal challenges like lockdowns. She advocates for rediscovering oneself through hobbies and recognizing toxic behaviors, all while maintaining individuality in relationships. Listeners will learn practical strategies for healing, rebuilding, and cultivating fulfilling connections.

Interested in working with Kim? Visit her website at DoctorKimChronister.com to learn more.

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MARTIN: Greetings, everyone. This is Martin Pytela for Life Enthusiast podcast. And with me today, doctor Kim Chronister. I will let her tell her own story. But first and foremost, Kim is an accomplished person. She’s been through the mill. She has her chops. So listen carefully because her knowledge is won through the mill of life. This is not just reading books. Hello, Kim Chronister.

KIM: Hello. Nice to see you again. How are you?

MARTIN: That’s great. Yeah. You know, life always deals me something interesting every time.

KIM: Yeah.

MARTIN: Care to review some of the accomplishments that brought you here so that we know that you have the authority to speak of whatever we’re going to do next?

KIM: Absolutely. So I’m a clinical psychologist, so I have a doctoral in clinical psychology. I’ve worked in inpatient treatment centers, outpatient treatment centers, been a director of rehab settings, worked in substance use, mood disorders. Right now, what I kind of specialize in are relationships, breakup, recovery, and helping people get through kind of arduous times and finding themselves, their identity and getting out of depression. So that’s kind of my wheelhouse right now.

MARTIN: Boy, we’ve done a lot of that these last four years, have pretty much compressed all the things that have been perhaps brewing. Right? And then we have had the shutdowns and lockups and God knows what’s that really, what’s the word? Amplified all the friction that we may have had in relationships. Right.

KIM: Absolutely. Yeah. And that’s why I think the research on what actually makes people feel filled up inside and the relationships that kind of nurture their identity and kind of making sure that people are thinking about self expansion, like people that actually motivate them with their goals if they’re going to be dating them. And then just the prongs of contentment with positive psychology research.

MARTIN: Right. I think reflecting on myself, pursuit of a worthy goal seems to be the method by which I structure my day, as in I wake up wanting to do what I’m about to do. So that I think is reasonably healthy.

KIM: Very much, yes.

MARTIN: If I were to find myself in a relationship that’s unwinding itself or has unwound itself, that would be pretty. What’s the word? I don’t know. Depressing.

KIM: Right? Yeah. I mean, you have hit it on the head there. So the positive psychology research really shows that connection, meaning and purpose and activity and then a sense of identity or what help us become happier or content. So if we have that connection prong messed up there, whether that’s feeling lonely within a relationship, or recovering from a breakup or seeing red flags in a relationship, not feeling like yourself there. Someone may be denying your needs for self expansion or growth. All of that can be really affecting your mood and how you feel about yourself. And then meaning and purpose you hit on, which is really, really excellent.

You going for your goals alone can be a really, really huge motivator and really shift your mood in a positive way. So sometimes people will have a career where it could even be fulfilling. It could not. But just adding a passion project really does huge things for change. I’ve had a client recently that started doing just coaching for their kids soccer team, and that alone shifted so much that we were able to terminate.

MARTIN: Yeah. Just giving of yourself to others. Right?

KIM: Yeah. So that’s really meaning and purpose, and it’s something they can be passionate about. So that’s why I take hobbies and passion projects really seriously with my clients, because we see such a shift in it.

MARTIN: Yeah. I’m thinking of a lot of women who end up, what’s the word? Washed up on the shore because their relationship unwound itself and they invested heavily into defining themselves as a partner in a relationship. Right. So I think you may have a whole bunch of tools to help people who find themselves in that sort of “I don’t know. I was a partner to this person, and I’m not. Who am I? What am I?” Right?

KIM: Yeah. Yeah. Their identity can be easily wrapped up into someone else, and that’s no fault of yours. That could just mean your schedule was so taken up that you didn’t, kind of explore. I call it a sample platter. You’re not always going to think, especially if you’re depressed, you’re not always going to think everything sounds appealing to do that’s extracurricular. But actually just giving yourself a sample platter, you’re committing to trying one new thing every week or a couple things every week, whether that’s a Reiki class or a yoga class or martial arts, these things are incredible for connection, meaning and purpose and activity.

And that’s why one thing, one little shift can really help with contentment and get you to remember who you are, explore who you are, build on your identity, and that is organically taking you away from ruminating simply on that other person.

MARTIN: Yeah. I really like the idea of committing to sampling.

KIM: Yeah. Committing to sampling. Yes. People think, I don’t like that idea. But sometimes they haven’t even made a list, like a brainstorming list of things they’ve never done, their friends doing that maybe they thought was cool. Learning an instrument, a language. I mean, just making a list of that and committing to trying one class for everything.

And there are a lot of free activities, too. It doesn’t have to be expensive, but those type of things start rebuilding your identity when you’ve lost it and when you’ve had that self esteem kick. And then organically, you’re going to be able to heal better from a breakup or tolerate a relationship better, because the focus is more on yourself. And you have to remember, too, is that you’re more attractive in a relationship when you’re going for your own goals and you have these interests. That’s why they were probably attracted to you in the first place. So whether you’re on a team or you’re in a relationship, you really want to be careful on self-neglect because that’s what’s going to make you feel resentful. They’re not going to be so attracted, and the mood’s going to be shifted.

KIM: It’s going to be off. And then we shouldn’t have to have a breakup just to find ourselves. I really encourage that within a relationship. And if the other person isn’t encouraging self expansion, then you want to hold your boundary and just say, well, I have to make time for this. This is really like.

MARTIN: I guess you need to come to the realization whether you’re in a relationship that you want to fight to save or are going to be so much better off getting out of.

KIM: Yeah. And the other thing is this, you want to also be cognizant of encouraging your partner’s self-expansion. So even if you feel jealous or you’re worried that they’re going to meet people, no. They’re going to be more resentful and more depressed within the relationship if they’re not getting out and trying new things. So I know it sounds simplistic, but sometimes it’s hard to get out of that routine of just coming home to your partner and doing nothing else. But that’s really the remedy to a lot of depression, a lot of relationship issues, and a lot of self esteem issues.

MARTIN: Yeah, I’ve seen that in a lot of our clients. Because they arrive at the end of children in the house. Right. Kids are the emptiness syndrome, where all of us, you’re looking around and say, now what?

KIM: Yeah, that’s right. I’m glad you brought that up. I wanted to bring that up earlier. That’s very good. So you’re losing your identity because your identity was really attached to parenting. And once you feel like you’re not needed anymore, that’s when you want to rebuild. I really want to just emphasize that sample platter because we think, like, okay, like, I have to just go back to my old hobbies or I have to go to the gym. It can look a lot different than that.

It can look like different classes every day. It can be colorful. It can be things that are in nature. It could be water sports. I mean, you really want to be creative with what you want to do because we don’t want to make more work for you. Building your identity should be fun and pleasurable. And social exercise, everything that you’re leaning into at this point in your life would want to be pleasurable. That way it’s sustained.

KIM: It actually has the motivation intrinsically to keep going for it. So being playful, thinking about things you’d want to do on vacation, you can do those things when you’re at home. We just get in that mindset that we’re only going to do water sports or parasailing or hiking on vacation. No, that stuff, if you build it into your life, it is remarkably impactful.

MARTIN: Yeah, that’s really interesting because, yes, when we put ourselves into a new environment, we have new perceptions and we see ourselves differently. And many avenues seem to open up and usually do that by traveling. But you can do that locally just by going into a new setting. Right?

KIM: Big time. Big time. You get new hobbies and interests. That way you can inspire your partner, too. And then most people know this, but when you’re doing novel activities with your partner, meaning new activities or someone you’re just dating, you’re more likely to have more dopamine and be more attracted to them when you’re doing new things together. So novel activities, different restaurants, different places, different activities, those adventures are going to make them more attracted to you because they’re novel. So we have to be careful not to stay in a routine too much. It really can be very dangerous.

MARTIN: Yeah, you’re so right on that one.

KIM: So there are. Obviously, we wanted to talk about some darker traits of people. And a lot of people can hold darker traits when it comes to personality disorders or,

MARTIN: Yeah, yeah. You want to definitely evaluate whether you’re in the right relationship or not, right? You should probably make a list. Kim, why don’t you just start the list? If you hit this, this, this and this. You might want to try something else.

KIM: Yeah. I think to piggyback on the trait of having a partner that’s not into you self expanding, because maybe they are possessive or insecure or worried or even just codependent. You want to look at that if they’re isolating you too much. But I will say this. Even if they’re possessive and jealous and all of that, don’t think, don’t fall into the trap that they’re going to be attracted to you just because you stay home all day and do everything they say. No, just because they say they want that, truly, even with people like that, they’re still wanting you to be your own person.

And that’s one of the dangerous things, is just letting that, allowing that isolation to happen and being influenced to isolate to please a partner. And it can be little things. It can be like them just complaining. Why do you have to be gone another hour? You really have to not feel bad about it, as hard as that is. But once that isolation starts, you become more vulnerable to feeling less attractive, losing yourself, and not having as much support system on the outside if something does fall apart.

MARTIN: Yeah.

KIM: Yeah.

MARTIN: Good. Okay, so let’s just go psychologist. What is the so called dark triad?

KIM: Right, the dark triad. This is really when it comes to personality traits that can be on the darker side, things that can affect other people. So interpersonally, they might affect you in a negative way. So you want to be really aware of these things. So there’s a dark triad. And the triad involves three different categories. One is sociopathy, another one is machiavellianism, and another one is narcissism. So narcissism, there can be kind of some grandiosity, thinking that they’re better than others.

Deep down below, they might feel like they’re not as good as others, so they overcompensate by being grandiose and feeling like they’re better than others. They might put people down, being too self-involved. Sociopathy, psychopathy. More on the psychopathy. With the dark triad, it involves impulsivity. So doing things without thinking, risk taking, lack of regard for other people, it’s all about them and what they can get out, and then machiavellianism on that triad. That other category is really about manipulation. So, there are certain things that people do, interestingly enough, like people that ghost other people.

Studies show that they might be more apt to be on that dark triad. It could just be someone that’s very avoidant also. So you have to be careful. They could be avoided or they could have one of those dark triad traits, but you want to look for empathy, you know, and the superficial charm, that’s not enough that just because someone’s charming, that doesn’t mean they have empathy. So I think really trying to dig into what people’s values are what they’re,

MARTIN: That’s a really good one. Once you can fake sincerity, you really got it made.

KIM: That’s true. And usually people get sloppy with that because they kind of almost want the truth to come out when they have the dark triad. The key really is to not ignore those signs of manipulation, self centeredness, lack of regard for others. If you hear that they’re saying things that you would never say, that’s a little red flag for you. Really think about and journal things that are red flags for you. Is that aligned with your value system? Is that something you would say? Is that something you would want your family members to hear? Because you don’t want to be keeping secrets like this. And if they’re leaking out some dark traits, it could affect you very badly in the long run.

MARTIN: Yeah.

KIM: Yeah, go ahead.

MARTIN: I read a study about the psychological traits and differences between criminals and CEO’s of large companies and that they were very close with the single difference that the criminals had no compunction to do violence or to just do brutal, ugly things.

KIM: Oh, the CEO’s?

MARTIN: No, the criminals would project personal violence, whereas the CEO’s had the same personality but had the brakes on that.

KIM: Exactly. Yeah, that’s right. That’s right. And these people like they can get ahead in life very well. Some of these traits make them very successful. There’s certain categories of professions, they’re more likely to be that. But yes, CEO’s are one of them. So they can use manipulation tactics. They feel like they’re normal. They don’t feel like a lot of times they might have to fake empathy because they know that that’s normative. But for the most part, they think it’s normal to try to play a game to win.

MARTIN: When you have a long game, when you’re thinking, say five year, ten year horizon, when you’re building something big, you have to manipulate. No, you don’t have to. But you get to thinking that you should manipulate your way through the environment and move the chess pieces in such way so that the goal is met.

KIM: Right. When you look at you know, and that those people can be very fun, very exciting, very stimulating. So they can be pretty hard to get away from it. If you’re in a romantic relationship, there could be a lot of benefits. Like this person might be really mentally stimulating, very smart, very successful, very adventurous. If they’re impulsive, they’re going to be doing different things all the time. And like we talked about before, new adventures and exciting things are going to make you more in love, more stimulated. It can be hard to get away.

KIM: But I think that what’s important is to, like I said before, journal about the things that really look like red flags and review those journals. And then you want to think about, project into the future more. Unfortunately, when you’re with someone that’s throwing these red flags, you’re going to have to think about the future more. And that means, that does mean worrying. It does mean thinking about if you got sick, if you were vulnerable, if you were older, what kind of person do you want around you? It could feel very cold and very alone, very lonely and very cold. If you’re with someone that doesn’t have regard for other people, that is more manipulative. So if you’re more of a person that lives in the moment and isn’t worried about the future, it’s not so scary.

But if you’re someone that you really want to plan for the future and be around, someone that has more of a nurturing side, you want to try not to be in denial, and that can be really hard.

MARTIN: Yeah. Yeah. I guess, to put it simply, is that when you’re young, it’s easy because you have all the attractions for the other. For the partner.

KIM: Yeah.

MARTIN: But will they be there for you when that youth layer goes away?

KIM: That’s right. I think that. I love that you brought that up because I do think a lot of times in process with my clients. Okay, so they’re physically your type. Okay, so you have a lot of fun with them. Okay, so what happens when we’re stripped away from the fun or the looks? What are you going to be left with? And you really want to sit with that, to see what kind of partner you need for your future.

MARTIN: Yeah, I see that especially difficult for women because some men will develop finance, power, status, whatever. They can end up with arm ornaments, as they call them. They can just keep changing them because they can hoard them, right?

KIM: Yes, absolutely. So you’re talking about so a woman that’s being left by a man for a younger woman.

MARTIN: Sure.

KIM: Yeah, that does happen. And so again, that’s why we want to look at people with really, really strong value systems if you have that as well, and people that have a really high empathy level, because research also shows that relationships stay together when people have high empathy. So that means we really care about others feelings because our interests in other people, they wane, they vary. Like one month, one month or one year, you could be really into your partner. The next year, you could really just feel checked out. Now, that year that you’re checked out, that could change the next year. So the year you’re checked out, if you have empathy for the other person, you’re going to be more likely to try to work it through. Find yourself again, find ways to be into the partner again.

Do you see how empathy is so important for sustaining a relationship? Because interest can wane, big time. Depending on what we’re going through in life, how we’re treating ourselves, if we’re doing our self care, if we’re not. And people change, too. Why should it have to take a breakup for you to get in shape? We don’t want to lose ourselves. We don’t want to lose ourselves while we’re in it. Because a partner is going to get, someone else is going to get a better version of you. When you still love that partner within the relationship, you really want that for yourself.

MARTIN: Yeah. So, you want to work hard to keep what you’ve got because you spent a lot of energy building whatever you have.

KIM: Yeah. And I think it’s true, like with women, I do notice that they’ll feel: “Well, I should just be loved unconditionally.” And I get that. But I do see with my male clients, they are very visual. It’s just something that’s just kind of in them. They’re very visual.

MARTIN: There’s statistics to that. I think it’s about 60% of people are visual, 30% auditory and 10% kinesthetic or something like that.

KIM: Yeah.

MARTIN: I don’t remember off the top of my mind.

KIM: I just know that the majority of my clients, one of the issues they run into is that they can get tempted with different looks and they are very visual and they don’t like it about themselves all the time. They don’t. It’s not that they love that. It’s not that they want to feel pulled in different directions. So that’s it. That doesn’t mean they don’t have empathy, and it doesn’t mean that they don’t love you because you’re not the preferred.

MARTIN: I guess you don’t want to have the relationship built on the looks because that’ll go away. Both sides.

KIM: That’s true. That will go away. And that’s, again, why we talk about wanting someone that has great values and good and a lot of empathy, which is not easy. But if you want to find that, then that would mean not necessarily committing to the first person you date, and a lot of women do that, too.

MARTIN: Okay.

KIM: This guy’s giving me attention. So now I’m going to jump in and be loyal. You’re being loyal to someone you don’t even know anything about. So actually playing the numbers game, as long as you’re going according to your value system with what you’re doing on these dates. Right. Playing the numbers game and dating more, but dating with intention and integrity, that can be better for you because then you can actually assess what their personality is, what their value system is, and not. You don’t have to just be loyal to first person that you’re dating. I think it’s really unfortunate.

Like, it’s great for men that they want to, but a lot of these women, particularly with your audience, with the demographic, with your audience, people will get into it where they just start falling and they don’t even assess their personality, unfortunately. Especially if there’s love bombing, a lot of messaging, it’s hard. It’s hard to not fall quickly.

MARTIN: I watched that. That is amazing how you can completely break somebody’s defenses. I was working in an office, and I watched one guy go after one specific co worker. He would just, I mean, this is before texting, he would shower her with stuff.

KIM: Yeah.

MARTIN: Just arrive over and over and over. And she was confiding in me, saying, I don’t like the guy. What am I to do? Relentless.

KIM: Relentless. And that for some people can be really attractive. It depends on the woman. But some people will do so much love bombing. They’re really good at it. And, to go from barely any attention within a relationship or with being single and just working a lot or attending to your kids and not being used to that, that can be highly dopaminergically satisfying. So it’s like being on a drug.

Yeah. Especially if they fall off one day and stop doing it as much. Now you’re like, where is this? Where’s my high? And now you get more addicted.

MARTIN: Where’s my like button?

KIM: Exactly. So the most dangerous thing is to have a lot of attention. Then it leans a little bit, then it goes back, and now it varies. So now it’s almost like you’re a gambling addict, right?

MARTIN: Yeah. You keep pushing the button, hoping to win.

KIM: That’s why gambling is so addictive, because it varies so much. So you get a really high spike and then it’s here and there, here and there. Random. And that’s the most addicting type of behavioral addiction or substance addiction, you don’t know when you’re going to get that high and usually that’s with something like gambling and love.

MARTIN: So let’s explain how you actually work with people. When somebody comes to you, what sort of circumstance do you get people in and how do you work with it? Like, what should they expect when they go to your website? By the way, what is your website?

KIM: https://doctorkimchronister.com/

MARTIN: So the doctor is spelled out all six letters?

KIM: Yeah.

MARTIN: All right.

KIM: So yes, they come to me. Well, we’re going to do exploration. It only takes about one or two sessions to figure out what the direction really should be. I do like to find out if they’ve been in therapy before. That’s kind of the first thing I do. What worked, what didn’t work. So across the board lately, I’ve been finding out that people are liking more direct feedback and I definitely have that style if that’s what’s needed. Because of my treatment experience with substance abusers, they prefer that direct treatment and the evidence based treatment.

So if you need direct feedback, then I know that, then I know that’s kind of how we’re going to go. If you need more homework, we’re going to go in that direction. If you want to process the past and trauma, obviously I have the skills for that. But typically we try to get you more grounded at first with cognitive therapy, dialectical behavioral therapy, and motivational interviewing to get you in a really good place first. That’s kind of my style. I’m very strength based. Try to see what’s working more than what’s not working and then add. If you look at like someone that I’ll give an example of, I had a retired NFL player come in and he felt very lost because he got an injury and he no longer could work the job of his dreams. Right.

MARTIN: So he was 30 something or,

KIM: Yeah, he was late thirties. And after an injury he came in because he was abusing pain pills and he really lost his identity. And his schedule was what? There was barely anything on his schedule. Right. I mean, now he’s just got a totally different life. And he started becoming very co-dependent with his family, which, that’s fine to a certain extent, but he was really losing himself. So first things first, we actually developed a Google calendar and started filling it up with things that he might just be willing to try. And it ended up being where he was actually really into meditation. He was really into reading. I mean, he just put everything on that Google calendar.

MARTIN: All right.

KIM: Yeah. By the time he left treatment, he had a full Google calendar of what to expect throughout the day, set intentions in the morning, yoga, stretching. He had his workouts, but his workouts were varied, so he wouldn’t get bored. He started working on a new business. So part of that, every day, he’d be working on that business. I’m not too extreme, but just enough. And then reading, reflection at night, just everything was on there.

MARTIN: So you actually put it on the schedule. On a Google calendar, you would get a beep, beep. Do this. Yeah?

KIM: Yeah. And you’d be surprised. It seems so simplistic, but rebuilding your life, having a visual of it there, too. And then what happens? We have new passion activities on that calendar. You slowly start rebuilding your identity. It’s like you have new passions, new interests, new activities, and you don’t feel bad about it because guess what? Do you think your family wants you to abuse pain pills, or do you think they want you to have new activities and be gone a little bit more? Obviously, they’d want you to be gone a little more and have your passionate activities. So people have to realize this can be life or death. Whether you go to the gym or you have passionate activities or you don’t, it can be life or death, and it can be marriage for long term or divorce.

And that’s why we have, and it could be depression and it could be happiness. So that’s why we take this very seriously. Passions and meeting a purpose, activities and connection, make sure that we’re not isolating.

MARTIN: That’s great. Yeah. Good. Good example.

KIM: Yeah. So then, sometimes people are going back into dating, and I like it when they want to take their time to kind of rebuild themselves first because they’re going on dates, and all of a sudden they’re more attractive because they have so many things they’re excited about. And you’re not supposed to be excited at first. You’re actually just supposed to be open and doing your sample platter. Right. And then, so once you get to the point where something you blow them off is something different.

MARTIN: Yeah.

KIM: Oh, you’re just lit up when you go on these dates.

MARTIN: So much, so much better when you sit there saying, I don’t really need you. But tell me about yourself, it’s so much better.

KIM: And then, yeah, you’re not. So you’re not glomming on to someone that could be an abuser, we don’t even know because you don’t need them as much. It’s more like you’re filled up inside and then if you do match, then you’re both adding value to each other and people are more attuned than you think. They really know when you feel secure and you feel filled up inside and then they get excited because it’s like they know that you’re a challenge. You like them because you like them, not because you need them.

MARTIN: Yeah. I was thinking I should have asked you this much earlier, but I don’t know if everybody who’s listening to this knows the difference between psychology and psychiatry.

KIM: Oh, yeah. People commonly misunderstand. So I’m a psychologist, so I’m doctoral level therapist. Basically, a psychiatrist has to go to medical school and they do prescribe medications. Clinical psychologists like myself in a few states are allowed to prescribe. They just do a little bit extra schooling. I believe New Mexico is one of them.

So, yeah, psychiatrists typically do meds, psychologists do therapy, and they’re the highest level as far as education for therapy.

MARTIN: Right on.

KIM: But there’s all kinds of amazing therapists that do marriage, family therapy, MFT’s, social workers that I’ve worked with. Incredible. They’re different styles, very stimulating.

MARTIN: These are skills that are developed. I mean, you can school about it, but you need to actually practice it because being good at being a good therapist is not something that you can pick up just by reading a book. You need to practice it.

KIM: Yeah, yeah. And I think the most important thing is, fit is very important that we know from research. But just having empathy, like most therapists I’ve worked with have a lot of empathy and they know that they should make it about the client, not themselves. Yeah. And sometimes that’s hard to do for certain people, but if that’s the case and then you feel like it’s a fit. And by the way, you can shop for therapists, you can have three on the phone and see which one you’re fit with before you jump in. You’re definitely allowed to shop and just get a little consultation to see if there’s a fit on the phone. And people forget they can because fit is so important, and then that’s called rapport. And then the next thing is important is their style, their intervention.

Maybe you like someone that just sits back and listens all the time and only gives you feedback every few sessions. Or maybe you like someone very animated or very directive in their approach or someone that really is clinical and srict about their homework, and they put you on a regimen. Only you know what’s going to work for you. Or maybe you just try it out. And also you can tell your therapist what you want, because usually we can kind of be chameleons and fit your style because we’ve seen so much.

MARTIN: Right, good. So do you have any examples with some female clients that you had worked with lately?

KIM: I do. So I have one client recently. I’m extremely successful. In an urban are, urban city. I don’t want to say too much, but urban city, very successful. Cultural background, a little bit more strict. A lot of pressure to get married. Wasn’t having an easy time with dating. And this is a beautiful, successful woman. So I think this is good that we’re bringing this up. Beautiful, successful woman was on the dating apps quite a while, a couple of,

MARTIN: Years, and still not landing anything useful.

KIM: Recently had a boyfriend. Over thought it though. The whole time was doing a lot of overthinking. Is this person serious? Do they want marriage? Do they not? And instead of asking questions, she actually just tried to keep the peace in her head, right? So she wasn’t asking questions. And looking back, she’s saying, I wish I would have. I wasn’t working with her at the time, but she’s wishing that she would have asked more questions so she wouldn’t just be ruminating, worrying all the time.

So it’s okay to ask what their intentions are,  what they see their future is. If that’s pressure, then there’s someone else that wants to build a family sooner, you know? I think we are wasting time that way. Just because you have chemistry, you guys are fit,  people’s value systems, and what they see for their future are really important. So we can’t just be compatible.

MARTIN: Yeah. Where do you see yourself five years from now? Tell me. Right?

KIM: It’s okay to do that, especially unless you’re the person that’s in the moment and you don’t necessarily need kids or marriage, then fine, enjoy them. But if you do I think it’s better to ask questions because then you can enjoy the moment more and know what you’re dealing with.

MARTIN: Right.

KIM: Yeah.

MARTIN: And so. So how did you work with this lady?

KIM: Just finding levity because overthinking was one of her biggest challenges. And there’s something called cognitive behavioral therapy, where you do some homework on reframing your thoughts. But interestingly enough, if someone’s on the more neurotic side or, like, more serious or rigid side, and they judge themselves or even others a lot, I notice,

MARTIN: Perfectionist in some way, right?

KIM: Yeah. Very perfectionistic. I notice that using a little humor about it, taking ourselves out of it, looking at the thoughts separately from the person, they can see how it’s not really working for them and how it is a bit irrational. Right. So there’s a lot of levity when I work with people that are very rigid in their thinking or judgmental. Get you to loosen up more about yourself, about life, think about the things that actually matter, because there’s a lot of time wasted with these worry thoughts. We’re stealing our joy when we do that. And sometimes it’s because you’re very intellectual and your brain just wants to keep working, and that’s fine.

But there’s other things. We could be playing with more passion projects or more educational videos on YouTube or feed your brain rather than worry because. Or be very solution focused.

MARTIN: I found imagining the worst possible outcome. So you’re concerned about this? Well, let’s take it all the way to its most absurd possible way. What could really happen?

KIM: What’s the worst that happens?

MARTIN: How bad could it get? Oh, nobody died. We’re fine.

KIM: Nobody died. Exactly. It can be even just radical acceptance. I know that I don’t have control over the situation. I’m just going to radically accept and be in the moment and control the things I can control and enjoy the moment with other things. And this person in particular would not feel pleasure in looking forward to things because there was so much worrying and catastrophizing. If you’re not looking forward to dates, how are you enjoying this relationship? There’s a lot of other components to a relationship, especially long term, but for her.

MARTIN: You know what’s funny? I just see the nutritional Metabolic Typing component to this.

KIM: Right. Okay.

MARTIN: This person is stuck in being overly acidic, overly fight flight. She needs to find her parasympathizing nutrition and eat more of that, which will make her more relaxed. It’s actually modifiable with food.

KIM: I love that so much. Yeah. The brain chemistry for her and playing with food would be remarkable. And then what we recently did was we really got her to find ways to feel stimulated while being in the moment. Because a lot of times, people that are easily bored won’t want to meditate. Right. So there’s ways to meditate without just sitting there. You can actually be working out and be meditating, because if you’re just in the moment.

MARTIN: Yep. Wash, dish.

KIM: All your senses. Yeah. What does it smell like? What are you seeing? What does it feel like in your body? How’s the air hitting you? Really taking deep breaths? That’s being in the moment. That’s a mindful exercise. You could do that in a sauna, steam room, working out, mindful walks, being in the garden, and just gauging all your senses. But, yes, you’re right. Her just calming down and just being grounded in the moment rather than the future really helps her a lot. So that and humor about the rational thinking and really just realizing that she needs to ask more questions and really figure out what’s what. If she wants to be a scientist about the relationship, she can, but you can’t do that on your own, in your brain.

MARTIN:  I think it’s destructive, really.

KIM: Yeah. Yeah. And then you sell, you sabotage the relationship because any little thing they do wrong, you’re like, well, this isn’t going to work. They don’t even know what you’re worried about to begin with. Yeah, they don’t. And so she didn’t give the tools to the guy to know how to treat her.

MARTIN: Okay, so that was a fail. Right?

KIM: She owned it. She knew what she didn’t do right.

MARTIN: But the relationship was a fail.

KIM Yeah, no, it didn’t work out. No, she could make it work if she wanted to, but it ended up being long distance, so.

MARTIN: Yeah, yeah.

KIM: But it’s good to know a gorgeous, successful woman was on the apps for a while and finally got a hit in a really good way for material. It’s just that she didn’t know where it was going because she never asked.

MARTIN: Okay. Yeah. All right, so what else can we tell the world that they should learn or know about psychology and doctor Kim Chronister?  This is the world’s opportunity to, I don’t know who’s going to click on this and take time to listen, but let’s just tell them the best of you.

KIM: I think that because connection is so important, I think it’s important to just foster the ones that are really working for you. If someone’s giving you energy, rather than pulling, I think to text them more, to call them more. If you’re going to feel like that support system, don’t be hesitant, whether you’re a guy or a girl, to actually reach out more often.

MARTIN: I remember being a young man before I got married. I was so worried. I was so afraid to step out and just say: “Hey, look, I like you. Can we talk?” I couldn’t dream of doing that. Right? And then, of course, after I got married, I stopped looking. But it couldn’t be easier than anything to just say, hey, you want to have a cup of coffee? Right?

KIM: That’s right. And that. Yeah. And that goes for guys and girls. Like, why can’t you just try to form a friendship first and get to know someone? That way you’re avoiding potentially dealing with people that are in the dark triad or that are more selfish or don’t have your values. And then they might know someone that that might be more of a fit for you. So a big part of dating and connection and happiness, because connection, whether that’s friendship, family, or dating, is a huge component of contentment.

So if you can get yourself an environment, whether it’s like a meetup group or a new class in the gym or a class, an educational class, a writing class, and you’re starting to ask these questions,, they might go and have coffee with you. They’re new, too, to the class, probably. So you think it’s hard, but little by little, you just do it and just let yourself be uncomfortable. I just think it’s huge. Just kind of expand your circle, because sometimes you’ll find that you have a friend circle that’s just not doing it for you anymore. And that’s normative, by the way. It’s normative to revive your friendship circles. And you want that, whether you’re in a relationship or not.

MARTIN: Go to a different church, so to speak.

KIM: Exactly. Yeah. Yeah.

MARTIN: Or even really a different church.

KIM: And I want to add the meaning purpose thing with that, it also applies to a sample platter. So you think about all the things you’ve wanted to do in life that you haven’t done, and you just take little baby steps toward it. Maybe you wanted to write a book and what would you do for that? Maybe you’re going to write, you’re going to watch YouTube videos about that. Or you want a new career, then you’d want to watch TikTok or YouTube videos about a day in the life of that career. Or maybe you’re at a desk job and you’re like, okay, I want to do a job where I’m walking and in nature. Then Google that and just start making brainstorming lists.

And don’t be forced to commit to anything. Just literally sample it. Whether it’s watching videos or talking to people that do the job or the volunteering or that hobby, really be playful with your life. Again, people are not playful with their lives. And positive psychology shows us that the more playful we are, the happier we are.

MARTIN: Yeah. The thing that really hit me the most in this conversation was this Smorgasbord idea. The saying yes to ideas. I remember already,  mean, I’m fairly old now. That the regrets I have are things I’ve not done. I can get over myself doing something that I shouldn’t have done. I can get over that, but I’m having a real hard time reconciling with the things I’ve not done.

KIM: Not done. Yes. That is poignant. That is huge and significant.

MARTIN: Yeah, yeah.

KIM: I’m really glad you said that. What we haven’t done. So having sample platters and being adventurous, it’s a win win with relationships and as individuals.

MARTIN: Yeah. What I see here is that whether you are already in a relationship or not, start doing new things. Expand your life because you’ll be more attractive to the person you’re with or you’ll attract the one you should be with.

KIM: That’s right. And you’d be surprised what people like. I have a client that’s like, hey, will you do yoga? And he’s like, oh, I have an app for that at my house. And he starts doing it, and now his life feels a little bit more easy breezy because there’s a calming activity. You don’t assume that you won’t like something. You might actually enjoy it. Yeah, it could be huge. And then you get excited about it. You start talking about other people, and that’s contagious. It’s hard to try new things, but it’s really, really beautiful on the other side of it.

MARTIN: Well, I guess that’s about that for today.

KIM: It’s great talking to you.

MARTIN: It’s a real pleasure. So go look at DoctorKimChronister.com, you’ll see it in the show notes, so you don’t have to spell it out. Thank you so much, Kim, for taking the time to share your wisdom. And until next time, thank you so much. This is Martin Pytela, life-enthusiast.com. If you want to phone, it’s 866-54-3388 thank you, Kim.

KIM: Thank you.

The post Podcast 492: Psychology and Purpose appeared first on Life Enthusiast.

In this Life Enthusiast podcast episode, Martin Pytela speaks with Patrick Buehl, CEO of Enzyme Experts, formerly known as Generation Plus, about serrapeptase, an enzyme known for its anti-inflammatory and healing properties. Patrick, who developed a range of enzyme-based health products, shares his journey about creating high-quality products that address modern health challenges like inflammation and scar tissue. Martin and Patrick share numerous success stories that highlight the transformative impact of these innovative solutions.

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MARTIN: Hi, everyone. Martin Pytela here for Life Enthusiast podcast. Today, it’s my honor and a pleasure to be talking to someone I’ve known for over 20 years, Patrick Buehl, a formulator of enzymes, CEO of Enzyme Experts, and also inventor of other brands. Patrick, hi!

PATRICK: Hi, Martin. How are you today? Thanks for having me.

MARTIN: Oh, cheerful. You know, talking to old friends is a good thing.

PATRICK: Yes, absolutely.

MARTIN: Today, I feel we have a mission to make people supremely aware of serrapeptase, why they need it, how they need it, and why your product is actually better than the rest of them out there. But before we get to that, I would like to say, well, so I’ve known you for over 20 years. Could you talk about some early days when you were inventing enzymes? How did you get into this?

PATRICK: Well, I’ll make a quick story of that. I pull my earlier interest and knowledge about enzymes from growing up in a feed store. From the tender age of 10. For 18 years, I found out what it really meant to catalyze events and to help animals properly assimilate the foods they consume into their most usable forms. And fast forward a couple years later, I was given the opportunity to manage the sales for the world’s very first systemic enzyme product, and I saw some flaws immediately in that formula. Everything was animal drive. They operated a much narrower pH and temperature range. I offered a vegetarian alternative. The company didn’t want that, so I began formulating products on our own, and that’s how serrapeptase and all of our other products were born.

MARTIN: Awesome. Well, there’s a ton of research on serrapeptase itself, right?

PATRICK: Yes. Serrapeptase is loaded with research. It’s derived from the enterobacterium Serratia E-15, and it’s been produced, Martin, and the reason we use it is to mimic the enzyme that silkworms use to escape the cocoon. So it has a number of different effects.

MARTIN: Yeah, actually, remembering silk, I mean, it’s stronger than steel. Weight for weight, right?

PATRICK: Yes, absolutely. Nature has developed something that we borrowed from to help the body recover from things like inflammation and scar tissue and just generally clean the whole human system up and help it heal itself.

MARTIN: I’m thinking of the word fibrinolytic, as in dissolves fibrin. Fibrin being the scar tissue. I have so many stories from customers and friends and myself using this to deal with injuries and what not. But let’s put some science ahead of it first. Yeah?

PATRICK: Yeah. Well, there’s a ton of clinical evidence that involves Serrapeptase. I want to throw a personal experience in, real quick as well.

MARTIN: Sure.

PATRICK: And this kind of turns the science into a personal story for me. It was about 15 years ago, I was diagnosed with nine massive pulmonary embolisms, and the medical community’s answer to that was to put me in ICU right away and load me up with anticoagulants, which western medicine likes to refer to as blood thinners.

MARTIN: Is it like Heparin or something like that?

PATRICK: Heparin or Warfarin. The talk was, yeah, listen, you’re going to need to be on Warfarin for the rest of your life. And I mentioned briefly about my growing up in a feed store and farmers and that type of thing. Well, Warfarin was the active ingredient in those days in rat bait, and that’s what we used to use.

MARTIN: Still, it’s interesting, Patrick, I just want to stop on this point. A farmer will spend money on learning how to feed his animals so they perform better, right. So they will actually fine tune the feed to get performance, whatever they target.

PATRICK: Yeah, super important. And that happens. That happens unfortunately, not as much as it should with human beings. Our system’s not set up for cures. It’s set up for spending more money. We treat our animals a lot better than we treat ourselves, and that’s one of the platforms that I developed this brand on, is making sure that we’re providing answers to modern day health challenges. And those have changed, Martin, over a couple decades, the modern day health challenges have certainly changed and evolved, and we just try to stay on top of that with products like Serralone that contains serrapeptase. That’s the only enzyme in Serralone.

MARTIN: You’ve made some pretty complex products, too, right? Where the serrapeptase perhaps provides some of the lifting weight or some of the main lifting power. But,

PATRICK: It does. Serrapeptase is defined as a proteolytic enzyme, Martin. So it will help break down anomalous proteins all throughout the entire human system. It will not, however, degrade any live tissue. It works on dead cellular material and proteins that just should not be in the system, and that’s what makes it so effective. So it is a cornerstone in a couple of our product formulas like Naticor and Zymitol. But as a standalone, it’s an incredible ingredient and product to help people rid their system of inflammation.

MARTIN: All right, so let’s talk about the specifics. So there you were with pulmonary embolisms. And?

PATRICK: Well, so I used serrapeptase. I used Serralone. We had loads of anecdotal evidence, Martin, all over the place and clinical evidence to support that it could help break these clots down. What we didn’t expect however, on the third day, the hospital tagged me AMA or “Against Medical Advice” because I refused anticoagulants or blood thinners. I knew we had the cure right in our hands, and Serralone was one of those. And what had happened was on the third day, they wanted in ICU, they wanted to do a CAT scan with contrast to show me that I was probably going to meet my demise right there in the hospital if I didn’t take action with anticoagulants fast.

PATRICK: Martin the only thing that they learned was this, that on the third day, those nine massive clots that were blocking four quadrants in my pulmonary system were already 75% degraded. And following that, the next day, I was released. In a two-week follow-up, I had 100% clearance, Martin, with no pharmaceuticals whatsoever. They touted me as a medical miracle. And I know what the miracle was. It was the awareness that natural products do the healing and help your body recover and heal on its own.

MARTIN: Yeah. But I remember this friend of mine who at age 55, was told, you have emphysema. He was having trouble. I mean, two flights upstairs, he had to stop after two flights of stairs, let’s put it this way. And went to the doctor, was told that he had emphysema and to expect that in one year he’ll be dragging an oxygen bottle around because it’s going to be a quick trip to hell. And he was using Zymitol, which is primarily serrapeptase. And the next year, instead, he was skiing with people half his age in the Alps.

PATRICK: Yeah, thank goodness. Thank goodness, and I’m glad. I love to hear stories like that, Martin.

MARTIN: And I remember there were multiple doctors using your products, writing all these testimonials. Louise Hamilton was one of them, right? Remember?

PATRICK: Yes. We’ve had just so many different testimonials come in. Another remarkable one that comes to mind is a gentleman from Kenosha, Wisconsin, that had a blocked right carotid artery. He was due for surgery in three days, a colleague recommended he call us, and I had the opportunity to speak with him, and here’s a guy that wouldn’t, he absolutely refused to believe that anything outside of Western medicine could help him. But his friend convinced him to speak to me. He bought into the protocol and said, listen, it can’t hurt.

The surgery was to take arteries out of his leg and replace the blocked arteries and his carotid. And it’s a risky surgery, and the percentages are high that something could go wrong. He took the product for three weeks, went in for his pre-op check and imagery, only to learn that 98% blockage was reduced to a 6, to a 13%, which is normal for any adult. No longer a candidate for surgery. Took him right off the surgery list. So that cardiologist started recommending the same protocol for all his surgery patients and candidates. 50 patients in a row no longer needed surgery because of this.

MARTIN: Yeah, this poor surgeon was putting himself out of business.

PATRICK: Yeah. And thankfully, there are open minded individuals like him that really put the emphasis on patient care instead of a status quo.

MARTIN: And so what dosage would this guy take?

PATRICK: Well, so with these enzymes, depending. So what he took, he was up to, so serrapeptase in Serralone, 48,000 units of activity level per capsule. He was taking ten capsules three times a day for two weeks. We started off at one capsule three times a day, Martin, and each, every fourth day, increased it by one TID (Three times a day) till we hit ten, and we remain there for two weeks.

MARTIN: Yeah. That’s awesome. And, yeah, there’s actually, you just threw in the number. That’s kind of interesting about enzymes and serrapeptase, too, where you actually need to understand how many units you’re getting in a capsule, because I remember I can buy serrapeptase that’s 10,000 units per milligram or 100,000 units per milligram or numbers like that. Right?

PATRICK: Right. I think what a lot of companies like to do, and I’m familiar with just about every single one of them. Prior to our initial work, Martin, there really wasn’t a good vegetarian alternative to that very first product. And now the landscape has a lot of options. The one thing that people should pay attention to, as you’re mentioning, is activity level. If you have 100 grams of serrapeptase and it only has one unit of activity level per gram, it’s not going to do the justice you need. But higher activity levels, 48,000 units of activity per capsular doses, is really going to get you where you need to be. So that’s what you can look out for, is activity level and proper disclosure of that on the label.

MARTIN: Right. Yeah. Some companies just say, I’m sending you 200 milligrams of Serrapeptase per capsule.

PATRICK: Which may not have any,

MARTIN: Yeah, that’s sort of like saying I’m sending you a gallon of water without telling you how many minerals are in that water.

PATRICK: Right, right. Is it acidic water? Is it pH stable? Is it alkaline water? Sure. You’re going to have some questions, right? I think the same can be said for any type of supplement or complementary or integrated products we want to take. What I learned a long time ago is I wanted this company to be a lot more than a company that sells products. We’ve really gotten pretty good and resourceful at educating the people that we serve, and it brings us great joy to be able to do that and then find all these incredible results that just keep coming in day after day.

MARTIN: Yeah. Okay, so here we are talking about Serralone, which is serrapeptase on its own. So if somebody is already on serrapeptase or a proteolytic enzyme, I guess Serralone would be the most affordable way to lift the enzymatic power, the lysing power. Right?

PATRICK: Yeah. This is probably right now the best value in serrapeptase at that activity level on the American market or anywhere on a global scale.

MARTIN: You’re so right. Because I remember I was thinking, well, am I with the right brand? So I started looking at prices, and a lot of companies cost exactly twice the amount per unit as compared to yours.

PATRICK: Yeah, I think you’re right. And a lot of that, listen, we weathered price increases and supply chain issues through the pandemic. We haven’t had a price increase in twelve years, Martin. So that puts us in a unique position to be able to offer these products at an incredible value.

MATRIN: Yeah. Okay, so what do we have here? Serralone is a serrapeptase of a known potency. But that’s not the whole story, right? Not only is it an enzyme, but you, I think, are the only company in the enzymes that I know of anyway, that actually does energetics or vibrationals with an infusion process, right?

PATRICK: Right. Yes, yes. Thanks for bringing that up. When we created our first product, when I formulated the first product, Zymitol, I had a conversation with a theoretical physicist, Doctor Yuri Krohn, and we talked about the ability of subtle energy to help improve the health challenges of anybody that they come in contact with. So in an agreement in partnership, that way, we created frequencies specific to each and every one of our formulas that would help them enhance the goal of why ever the formula was created in the first place. We did a little test. We sent a bunch of bottles out to people to test the infused product and the uninfused product, and by a landslide, without any doubt or hesitation, the infused product really captured more health challenges than the uninfused. And I was very confident, Martin, and the formulas to begin with, that they were the best in their class period at the time. But the subtle energy process took them to an entirely different and very distinct level of being able to heal people.

MARTIN: Yeah. It’s quite something, we are usually not aware of it, right? But the difference between a meal cooked by grandma with love and the fast food something, cooked by a pimple-faced teenager who just as soon be somewhere else. It’s quite remarkable just how much nicer it is to be eating food cooked with love. Yes, there goes the subtle vibration of just that, right? Just the reverence of the act of cooking with love. And here we have this technological equivalency, at least that’s how I think of it, where we are able to take the highest intention that we have for this product, put it into a vibrational frequency, and then beat it into it. Right?

PATRICK: That’s exactly what it is. I think that we’ve always tried to operate on three different pillars. One would be authenticity. We want to be authentic in everything that we do, but another one is love, if we can literally, or figuratively add love and authenticity to our products and everything that we do, and also gratitude for the ability to be able to help people. That’s what really makes this brand a lot stronger. We infuse that in the most literal method into the products with an energy chamber, which helps every single enzyme or every ingredient do its job a lot better. It’s kind of like maybe driving a car down the road and the road itself is the journey to better health. We’re going to want to be in that Lamborghini rather than a Ford Pinto to get to the end goal of perfect health. And that’s what the subtle energy does for us.

MARTIN Speaking of racing, it just came to my mind. There was this motocross champion in the Czech Republic and a friend of mine, I come from there, right? So I have a friend, and he contacted me and said, this fellow fell off his bike three weeks before the world championship and mangled his ankle. We sent him a bottle, a large bottle. I think he was on 30 capsules a day. The doctor told him there’s zero chance he’ll be functional in less than six weeks. This guy was on his bike in the world championship and won. Three weeks.

PATRICK: Wow, that’s an incredible story.

MARTIN: It’s just but witness to the possibility of speeding up healing.

PATRICK: Yes. I think a lot of times people get stuck in the belief that I am sick or I can’t get better or whatever the dilemma may be that’s challenging them from recovering fully. These products with the energy infusion help bridge that gap. I think, Martin, we all have the innate ability to heal ourselves within. It’s that inner light that connects us all full of healing energies and wisdom. If we can’t quite get there, our products and the energy infusion bridge that gap so you can still get to your goal without having to really be in that awareness completely. Think of it this way, without subtle energy, serrapeptase is already super powerful, but with the infusion, it’s like fine tuning the engine of that high performance car we were talking about. It just works better and faster for sure. And like you mentioned, it’s not something you’re going to see in any other typical enzyme formula. This sets Serralone apart from any other serrapeptase product on the market, period.

MARTIN: Yeah, I don’t know if there are studies to confirm it, but I remember this woman was buying 600 capsules a month from me. And so next time she called, like the third or fourth month or whatever, she called, and I said: “What are you doing with it?” And she says: “Well, I’m taking 600 a month.” And I said: “Well, what?” And she says: “Well, look, I’m in the entertainment industry, and this product is adding about ten years to my career.” Now, I don’t know what entertainment. I speculate she might have been a stripper or Las Vegas dancer or I don’t know what. But she was able to have the physical appearance and movement ability to keep up with people ten years younger.

PATRICK: Yeah, that’s incredible. I mean, just the base of enzymes, right? What do they do? What does any enzyme do? Enzymes catalyze every single event that makes any action fast enough to sustain human life. And it’s not just human life, we find them in every living thing. But by the time we reach our late twenties, Martin, our metabolic enzyme stores that we were gifted with at birth really deplete. So that’s when we begin to see the signs of aging, wounds start to heal slowly.

MARTIN: That’s why most professional football players, hockey players and whatever fade out by 33.

PATRICK: Absolutely. Your body just can’t keep up. Those actions are so slow that it really makes you age. Wounds heal slower. Injuries heal much slower, if at all, the older we get. When we supplement or reintegrate enzymes back into the system, it helps to speed all those reactions up to a level that creates healing and longevity. The original thought with this line was an anti aging line, and that’s always been the backbone of every single formula. But we’ve contoured the individual formulas to give rapid results for people and certain health conditions or challenges.

MARTIN: Yeah, reminds me, a woman called me back three months after she started. Again, 600 capsules a month, we’re pushing it. This is an important point. You do much better taking a large amount for a short amount of time than a small amount for a long amount of time. You really need the wave. But anyway, so this woman was taking it because of a fibroid tumor. She had something the size of her fist that was reduced or completely cleared in three months, and she called and she says, you know what? All of my stretch marks are gone. You should be selling it for that.

PATRICK: Oh, nice. Absolutely. I think that every time, almost every time that someone takes the product for a particular indication, there are off-label things that happen. That’s the beauty of enzymes. They sustain life. We may have things going on. We all live with pain, right? We all live with certain pains and we don’t even notice them. But once they’re gone, at some point you’re going to say, wow, I certainly feel better. Or maybe you don’t even know why but you have more energy, you’re not fatigued. That’s the power of enzymes. And yeah, you’re so right.

I started to talk about Malan’s protocol. The gentleman from Kenosha with the blocked carotid. And everybody is at a different pace depending upon the condition that we’re trying to address for them. But we will gladly, Martin, design an individual protocol for any health challenge that anybody has, and we can work through you to help people with that. I think that we’re one of the companies that stand by what we believe in. So everybody’s cousins.

MARTIN: Yeah, I guess to me, the main rule would be don’t be afraid to go high with this.

PATRICK: Right. There is no LD50 or toxic dose on any of the enzymes that we use. That means they’re safe to take at any dose, whether it’s a gram or 25 pounds a day. You’ll never have any side effects with enzymes, with properly formulated enzymes. If you get too many and you’re a little toxic, you may have toxic overload, end up with some die-off that causes things like a loose stool or maybe nausea. But outside of that, you’re never going to have a problem.

And if you haven’t had enzymes in your system for a while, we have to build them back up. We get into a loading phase to replenish your system, titrate back down eventually to a regular daily dose. And I think the changes for everybody vary, but there’s always significant change as long as people participate actively in their own health. And I’m sure that anybody listening to your podcast is already there, Martin. People are interested in better health naturally, and as long as we can get that participation, you simply cannot fail with enzymes.

MARTIN: Okay. So I’m thinking this serrapeptase will deal with fibrin or scar tissue. So any hardening. So I’m thinking that would be the hardening of the arteries. Would it work on hardening of the joints, too?

PATRICK: Well, what serrapeptase and Serralone will do for the joints is remove dead cellular material that’s blocking your joint capsule, not allowing for proper synovial fluid movement through that joint capsule. It gets in there, clears the pathway, so your body can heal itself. It has a very direct approach on joint health. You will end up in a situation where the direct and indirect results of a product like Serralone become evident in joints, because you can all of a sudden, I think back to a story, you may remember this, Martin, where we had a gentleman with rheumatoid arthritis. His hands were frozen shut into a fist by taking the product for just three days, he had full fluid movement and zero pain. It just went away like that. And there’s so many more.

MARTIN: Astounding, right? So that must mean that also all the other inflammatory conditions, like soft tissue problems, fibromyalgia comes to mind, or.

PATRICK: We can take a look at indications just like that. Rheumatoid arthritis, osteoarthritis, sports injuries, sprains, strains, any other type of autoimmune disease. Like you said, fibromyalgia, MS, lupus.

MARTIN: I guess it’s time for us to put a disclaimer on this. So this is not medical advice. We’re not prescribing, and we’re not healing a specific illness. What we’re dealing with now is the physiology, the underlying physiology at the cellular level.

PATRICK: Absolutely.

MARTIN: Don’t be calling us on this saying, well, you told me that you’ll heal my x condition. That will happen by the fact that your body can repair at the cellular level.

PATRICK: Yes, agreed. We are wellness experts, Martin, and I think it is important to disclaim this. To some degree, we are consultants and we stand by everything we talk about, but we’re not licensed medical doctors. So I encourage people, have conversations with your providers. It’s okay to get them involved. They should be open to anything as far as an integrated approach is concerned, to help get you back on your feet, whatever that looks like and whatever health challenges that you’re facing.

MARTIN: I remember printing this report. I’m trying to remember the fellow’s name. Was it Hofstadter or something like that? There was a report about the gift from the worm, about Serrapeptase. Right? Like it’s a serrapeptase story.

PATRICK: It might have been Ralph Holsworth.

MARTIN: There you go. That’s the name.

PATRICK: Yeah.

MARTIN: How do you spell the last name?

PATRICK: It’s h-o-l-s w-o-r-t-h. Holsworth.

MARTIN: Yeah.

PATRICK: Doctor Ralph Holsworth.

MARTIN: I remember that came back, what, 40, 50 years ago, right?

PATRICK: Yeah, it was a while ago. Well, that one wasn’t that long ago. This was probably right at the turn of the millennium, late nineties. He was actually part of cabinet member Tommy Thompson, who was the head then of health and human services. He was part of his team and trying to straighten out the health crisis in this country.

MARTIN: Right. So anyway, they put out these reports that every doctor should read but probably doesn’t because it’s not a pharmaceutical.

PATRICK: Yeah. I think that’s what’s important for us, is to be a part of the solution and not a part of the problem. We do our research and we just encourage everybody, don’t even take our word for it, just experience the products, because they truly speak for themselves.

MARTIN: Yeah, yeah, that’ll do it. I remember the words coming back with, I poop better, I sleep better, I stress less. I mean, the stories go, right, all kinds of symptomology that’s associated with the fight or flight side of reactions in the autonomic nervous system. Most of that seems to be lowered as soon as the serrapeptase comes into the picture.

PATRICK: Absolutely. It affects everything that we do as a proteolytic enzyme, and sometimes it can get to be a pretty broad category. But I think for the most part for your listeners that are focusing on how can this product help me? Inflammation, scar tissue, advanced fibrin. There’s a lot of challenges that we can really get into, but sticking with anomaly proteins and healthy blood are certainly two big ones.

MARTIN: So I guess we can say that we have two bottles. We have 180 count and 300 count bottles available. The productions, well, we have them available. Who knows what the next batch will cost. But right now we have this available. So the 180 is an excellent way of starting because that will prove the point. The 300 is probably the bottle you’ll want to be on for maybe three or four bottles to burn through all of that, whatever buildup of unwellness you’ve packed on. If you don’t feel like Tom Brady, you’re probably lacking some enzymes.

PATRICK: Yeah, absolutely. I think that the 300 count. Listen, if we haven’t been taking or supplementing with any type of systemic enzymes, then it’s going to take a couple more doses to get through that. So the 300 count would be the best bet. If someone is currently taking a systemic enzyme protocol, we can get away with the 180 and supplementing with whatever they’re doing to get that extra proteolytic stick.

MARTIN: I don’t know what else to be said?

PATRICK: What else?

MARTIN: The products were made with a good deal of care. The ingredients were selected with years and years of testing and practice. We have 25 years of history with this.

PATRICK: 25 years. It’s a brand that continues to thrive. Do you want to touch on inflammation a little bit?

MARTIN: Sure. You go ahead and let’s just talk about. I mean, I can say this, right, inflammation is the body’s response to an injury.

PATRICK: Absolutely.

MARTIN: Something broke you and your body’s trying to repair you, but sometimes it’s really unpleasant because inflammation comes with redness, heat, swelling, pain, and loss of function. Anyway, take it over.

PATRICK: Yeah, it is absolutely a natural response. It’s super necessary to protect the body from any type of foreign invader or injury or whatever’s going on. And I think that sometimes, especially in the way of autoimmune diseases, right. Sometimes that stuff just goes astray and you need a reset. And the only way to do that is to catalyze that with the proper enzymes. And remember, enzymes catalyze every single event in the human body that makes life possible. So with the integrative approach of enzymes, we’re going to live longer, we’re going to be healthier and just be stronger. It’s really, really something that we’ve built decades worth of business on. And we’re filled with gratitude for the opportunity to be able to help people through these health challenges, no matter what they are, Martin.

MARTIN: Yes, that’s the interesting part, just being here and being able to offer the alternative to the, well, let me explain. So you twist your ankle and you’re told, Tylenol or Advil, ice it, and just suffer through it. With the enzymes, you will be able to be on your feet way sooner with much less pain and no residual post injury loss of function, which is a big deal. Like when you break something, where you injure something, the body repairs it with the fibrous tissue, the scar tissue, and that actually is not as functional as the original stuff that was there. So when you fix something by bailing wire and chewing gum, so to speak, the fibrosis, it’s not going to be nearly as well functioning as the original design. This is where the fibrinolytic enzyme shines.

PATRICK: Yeah, absolutely. And this is where it all happens. Enzymes are the alpha and the omega for health. They’re the beginning of good health and the end of it.

MARTIN: Yeah, I remember reading a story which was something like, we’re not sure if we know that enzymes are high in young people, we know that enzymes are low in old people. We are not sure that it’s the time or it’s the decline of enzymes that causes what we know as aging. So if we put the enzymes back into the old guy, will he function like he was young?

PATRICK: Well, I think the answer to that question is yes. And it may not be just a direct path to that. To really understand the impact of aging on metabolic enzymes, the ones that were gifted with at birth and supplementation, there are some physiological processes and implications. I think the origin and production of metabolic enzymes we could touch on from a genetic information standpoint. The blueprint for metabolic enzymes is found right within our DNA. Our DNA holds so much information. I can’t remember this study, Martin, but it goes something like this, and I’m paraphrasing all over the place, but there was a study done on DNA and the amount of capacity it has to carry information. One strand, 1 gram of human DNA. And the researchers were able to download a copy of one of the researchers’ books onto this strand of DNA. And they did that, I believe, over a billion times and never reached capacity for the amount of information that DNA can hold. And your DNA holds the answers. And when we add enzymes back in to help recatalyze these events, that’s the missing key on so many different situations.

MARTIN: Well, I think we should end it on this.

PATRICK: Perfect.

MARTIN: I think that if you’ve been listening to us carefully, you will have heard a bunch of stories that talk about faster recoveries. I have been taking these enzymes as part of my daily regimen, but I’m thinking, hmm, I’m probably not taking enough, because even though I’m holding on, I’m not feeling as youthful as I was 25 years ago. I’ve been taking something like four a day. Maybe I need to take twelve for my maintenance and see what happens. What do you think?

PATRICK: Well, listen, I can tell you that I take six capsules daily. I can also tell you that I’ll be 60 in March. And I don’t have any attachment to any pharmaceuticals. I haven’t taken a pharmaceutical medication in years and years and years. I’m super healthy, and I put that all in the hands of the enzymes that we produce and that I take. So six a day for me, is enough, is fantastic. But every six months, I’ll go through a steep loading phase and a titration back down to a maintenance dose, like two, three times a day. And real quickly, I think it’s important to note that enzymes have a pretty short half life, Martin. It’s much better to take one capsule three times a day than it is to take ten capsules once a day. Not that you’re not going to get the same type of result, but what’s going to happen is you can increase the value of the product that you take with a properly formulated systemic enzyme product. Twice a day is pretty, pretty darn good. Three times a day is better. Once a day, it’s going to cost you more product to get the same results. So splitting up the doses 1 hour prior to or after any meal. And I generally tell people, Martin, right before you go to bed with some water, and then as soon as you wake up, the last thing you do at night, the first thing you do in the morning, and wait an hour to eat after you take them in the morning, and certainly don’t eat an hour before you go to bed. And that’s where you’re going to find your very, very best results.

MARTIN: Yeah. You want to get these enzymes to pass through your stomach into the small intestine for absorption.

PATRICK: Absolutely. Pass through that stomach lining, like you said, in the small intestine, where they become systemic.

MARTIN: People told me that when they take it with food, they digest better. Many of their digestive problems have gone away. So I guess you’re using a systemic enzyme for a digestive function, but what the hey.

PATRICK: I think we can make a quick distinction there. What is the difference between a digestive enzyme and a systemic enzyme? Well, there are a couple main things. And really, in a systemic enzyme formula, the activity level that we spoke about earlier, Martin, is going to be dramatically increased in a systemic product because we’re making that pass, like you said, through the stomach lining into the small intestine, where it’s absorbed into the blood, and now it’s passed through the entire human system at a cellular level. Digestive enzymes generally have a little bit broader array of enzymes because we want to capture each type of food that we consume, whether it be a protein, a carbohydrate, or a fat. The proteins are the proteolytic enzymes, like serrapeptase. For digestion, the amylolytic enzymes break down carbohydrates. And to break down fats, we need the lipolytic enzyme. So generally, you’re going to have all three categories in a digestive enzyme and many different variations of those types of categorical enzymes at much lower activity levels, because you don’t need increased activity level to break down food. When you take them systemically at higher activity levels, we get them through the entire system. They make their last pass through the pancreas, where they’re excreted back out into pancreatic juices, and that’s when we utilize them as digestive enzymes. But yes, like you mentioned, certainly people do take them with meals along with systemic they act as a digestive and a systemic enzyme, and it works amazing. But for better value, we suggest taking them around meals. So the energy that they have to deliver to the human system is reserved for the health challenges and not just breaking down the food we consume. We want that to be the last thing they do instead of the first thing, so that energy is used for the health challenge.

MARTIN: Right on. Okay, well, Patrick. Patrick Buehl, the formulator of enzymes, the brand that’s on the serrapeptase is Generation Plus. 

PATRICK: Yes.

MARTIN: Patrick has started another company called Enzyme Experts, and we will be offering those products when they become available. The Generation Plus products have been with us for 20 years and are awesome. So come and visit us at Life Enthusiast, life-enthusiast.com. Patrick, thank you very much for being with us today.

PATRICK: Thank you so much for the invitation, Martin. It’s greatly appreciated.

MARTIN: Thank you. Bye bye for now.

PATRICK: Bye.

The post Podcast 491: Unlocking the Power of Enzymes appeared first on Life Enthusiast.

Podcast 490: Million Dollar Body

This week, Nate Palmer, author of The Million Dollar Body Method joins Martin Pytela to share his approach to fitness. Nate introduces his 28-day plan for fat loss and energy enhancement, emphasizing practical habits such as morning routines, hydration, and simple exercises. Together, they discuss the importance of automating early-day actions to minimize decision fatigue, the connection between physical and mental health, and the power of protein-rich breakfasts for lasting energy. We hope this episode inspires you to make small, consistent changes that lead to long-term health and positive community impact.

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MARTIN: Greetings. This is Martin Pytela for Life Enthusiast podcast. And today with me, Nate Palmer, the man who has written a book called the “Million Dollar Body”. And you do want to hear about that. Nate Palmer, welcome to Life Enthusiast.

NATE: Thanks for having me on, Martin. I’m really excited to get a chance to chat with you about this.

MARTIN: Yeah, for sure. The thing that impresses me about you, is that you understand the principle of reciprocity. You just let people have so much value. Let’s start with that.

NATE: Thank you for saying so. I appreciate that.

MARTIN: Yeah, no, let’s start with that. The giveaway. Let’s just tell people what it is that you’re actually letting them have for free.

NATE: Oh, yeah, sure. Yeah, I like, yeah, let’s kick it off with that. So my book is called the Million Dollar Body Method. I’ve been in coaching and fitness and nutrition since 2008. I basically wanted at some point to combine all of the things that I found that have been very effective in working for people from a nutrient standpoint into a one place where you could read through it, have a, not just some information that’s like, hey, now, book a sales call, but literally could pick it up and then have a 28 day plan to follow, to do a personal experiment to see how much fat you can lose and how much energy you can gain, right off the bat. Because I feel like I see a lot of coaches and people like that who write books, but they’re just a glorified sales pitch. And I didn’t want to do that because I wanted to leave something that was, even if I’m not doing this particular brand of work in the next decade or two, I want people to be able to pick something else up and have good results from it. So you mentioned the norm of reciprocity, and I think that there’s something to that for sure.

I love the idea that givers gain. But also, Martin, we’re in a serious health crisis right now. You and I, we are doing our best in the ways that we know how to help people live more enriched, fulfilled, healthier lives, which is not just a selfish pursuit of people trying to get skinny and have good muscles. It’s being leaders. It’s setting a legacy for our kids. It’s setting an example for our families, and that is so, so important. And I don’t even think I realized how important this work was until I had my own kids. So, yes, it’s great.

I would love if someone called me up and was like, hey, I want to work with you. That’d be fantastic. But I don’t care about that as much as I care about people becoming the leaders that their families need, because everyone’s always looking at you. Someone is watching you right now and seeing what you do and they are inspired by you. And so when someone could pick up from there and use some of these tools to get good results, I think the cascade effect from that is just so powerful. And that’s what I want to see in our communities, our neighborhoods, and our society as a whole.

MARTIN: Yeah. I’m well reminded as you’re speaking, of the thing that says: “Strong men tend to raise weak sons and weak sons will create a bad economy and bad economy will create hardship, and hardship will form strong men, and the strong men will raise weak sons and they will wreck the economy.” And so this is the cycles, right? And it’s interesting that multi generational wealth, for example, is pretty rare. Like, there are very, very few companies, not companies, families, names that have lasted that have made it into generation 3, 4 is rarer, and 5 is super rare. There are only very few that have actually made something of the inheritance that has been handed to them.

NATE: It’s just what you said. If it’s handed to you, it’s something you don’t value quite as much. So I think that you have to be the Rockefellers of the world who have so much money that you can’t possibly spend in five generations, or you have to raise a generation of kids who are strong, smart, wise, and are able to take what you’ve given them and build upon it in their own way. And that’s the future. I didn’t come from money. We ate mayonnaise sandwiches when I was growing up and we liked it. I didn’t know we were poor. But if I can build a little bit and then have my kids build a little bit, too, my daughter cracks me up. She’s so inspiring. I love her.

She just turned six and she got a couple bracelet-making sets for her birthday. And so she’s been just at work making bracelets and she’s learning to write, too. So she’s now making bracelets and writing signs for a bracelet stand she’s going to have. So she skipped the lemonade stand phase andshe’s now like selling bracelets and she’s like, I’m like, how much are these going to be, baby? And she sys $10.25. I was like, “That’s a good price. Lets see if the market tolerates it.

MARTIN: I’ll give you the discount. Keep the change. Okay. That’s awesome. Yeah, it’s great to see the message that I was trying to put forward with the little monologue was we need to try and figure out how we’re going to raise strong people. Because I’m now 70 something, it’s very conceivable that my last years will be less productive than up to now, and somebody’s going to have to carry the ball. So if I’ve raised successful kids who are actually able to produce, there will be an economy that can afford to float me along when I’m less productive. But if I raise unproductive, sickly people, we’re going to be in trouble. And I see that all around me. There is so much weakness, ill health that-

NATE: And entitlement.

MARTIN: Okay, that’s a different. That’s another story. Yes, there are a whole lot of people who feel that they have been victimized by society and they somehow feel that it owes them.

NATE: Yeah, but I mean, it’s a symptom of weak health, right?

MARTIN: Yeah.

NATE: I think as your health declines, like the physical and mental health are inexorably linked. And if you don’t have that physical health and like, okay, so can I share a little bit of my backstory?

MARTIN: Oh, please. Yeah, that’s what I would like to hear.

NATE: So when I, the reason I got into health and fitness back in like 2008, 2005 really was when I was 13 years old, I was at home by myself and my mom was dropping my two younger sisters off at their elementary school and someone came to my front door and knocked on it. I didn’t let him in, and he came around the back. I was like, that’s a little weird, maybe he’s a contractor or something. I don’t know. He breaks a window in my house. I was like, that’s not normal contractor behavior.

So I grab a steak knife out of the knife block and then I go into my bedroom and I hide under my bed and I lock the door and I hear this man come down my wooden hall, like the wooden floors of my hallway with his work boots on. And just like, I can still remember the noise of his feet on the floor, and then he pounds on my door. And I thought to myself like, this is, I’m about to die. And it was such a terrifying, traumatic experience for me at that age that my brain instantly shifted to, if I am bigger and I am stronger and I have a big enough beard and enough tattoos, no one’s going to ever be able to mess with me ever again. And so that’s been such a driving force for me as a young man. And I think that that idea, that philosophy is very prevalent in gyms today. You can see a lot of guys in the gym who are just completely, like, just monsters. So big, so strong. But inside, they’re hurt little boys like I was. And they had never been able to take the power that they’ve received from weight training and transmute that into something healthy. I feel like it took me years, but eventually I found that I did not like running from that fear anymore. And instead, I was able to figure out a way to move towards the positives and the benefits and the additional enthusiasm and energy and vibrancy for life that I got from training.

And the thing that I think that was the real big win. Because I was able to gain… I graduated high school at six four and 155 pounds. So I was real rail skinny. And throughout the course of the last 20 years of weight training I gained some muscle, sure. But I also started to understand that I can do anything that I set my mind to. I can do hard things. I can do hard things consistently. And if I just keep working at something long enough, I’m going to be successful. Thus the “inevitable” tattoo. It doesn’t matter how long it’s going to take me, because I’m going to be lapping the people on the couches. I’m not going to be the smartest or the sharpest or the most athletic, but I’m going to continue to do it until I succeed. And I think that mental strength that you get from understanding that you’re a person who can achieve what they set their mind to is so much better than the physical strength you get from lifting weights. And I want that for other people.

I want people to start understanding that even if you don’t love working out, even if you don’t love some of these aspects of things, if you’re a person that does what they say they’re going to do and does it for a long enough period of time, your physical strength is going to increase, for sure, but your mental strength is going to increase, and you become a person without limits. And that is such a fun place to be, I think.

MARTIN: Right. Yeah, this is really important, getting everyone to understand the value of commitment and consistency and showing up and doing it even when it’s raining and too hot and too cold and everything, just doing the work. And you hear this all over. Elon Musk will tell you that ideas are easy to come by, execution is the tough part. And developing a prototype is the easy part. Producing it at scale is the hard part. In other areas of life, that will be, is that you actually need to show up, do the work. There’s no shortcut. And if you think that somehow the world will give you for free the results, you have been seduced by the easy button. The medical system loves to tell you that there is a silver bullet, that there is the thing you can take that will take away your pain and solve your dysfunction.

NATE: Absolutely.

MARTIN: It’s a seduction, and it’s a lie.

NATE: I think a lot of marketing is like that. Food, coaching, like business coaching, fitness coaching. Like a lot of people tell you. Oh, it’s not your fault. If you just knew this one secret, you would be able to do better. Hey, it’s not your fault. It’s society’s fault. But if you take this ozempic,  you’ll do better.

MARTIN: You just put a dagger into me by saying the word. No, no, no, it’s okay. You know, this ozempic got itself such a reputation. Thank you, Oprah Winfrey, for being the advertising billboard for it. And there will be so many people with destroyed stomachs and thyroid cancers that will come at the back end of this. It’s not even funny.

NATE: But like you mentioned, it’s like the medical industry wants to tell you it’s a silver bullet, obviously, that’s false. But I think if you can transform your mentality from looking for a silver bullet to looking for thousands of brass bb’s, then you can start actually eliciting changes.

MARTIN: Yeah. When hunting, starlings come with a shotgun, not with a rifle.

NATE: I like that.

MARTIN: You want a thousand little things. Yeah. As in a journey, right? A thousand mile journey begins with the first step, and you take the steps. Or another beautiful metaphor. How do you eat a ten pound salami? One slice at a time.

NATE: 100%.

MARTIN: Right. So anyway, awesome. So there is the book “The Million Dollar Body.” You probably say all of that in that book, huh?

NATE: I talk about some of those pieces. I think I give a little bit of my background as well. But in reality, what I’m trying to do is I’m trying to give people a reason to do certain things. Like, for example, an a.m. routine is one of my seven pillars, my seven daily investments in this book. I always talk about this in terms of investments, number one, because a lot of my clients end up in that business entrepreneurial space. So I feel like they like that language around money. So I want you to think about your day in terms of where are you investing? Rather than, oh, I just want to eat this food. But no, if you eat your lunch in a specific way, it’s going to be an investment in your future energy and health. How are you investing? So one of my investments is the daily a.m. routine. And there’s a million people talking about am routines. And some of them are talking about very expensive smoothies with rare ingredients that you have to do, and journaling for 90 minutes and then a red light sauna and all these different things that are fairly elusive to a lot of us who are nothing deeply embedded in the health space. So I wanted to give people very concrete, small things. My morning routine consists of two things. It is 32oz of water and 60 seconds of exercise. That’s all it is for the morning. Because I believe a morning routine has two components.

And it’s not journaling and meditation. It’s not breath work and working out. It is casting a vote for the person that you are becoming. If you want to become a more health-conscious individual, then some part of your morning needs to incorporate something healthy in it. If you want to become a better parent, some part of your morning should incorporate listening to a podcast, reading a book, being intentional about improving your parenting skills, and then eliminating decision fatigue. We make 30 plus thousand decisions every single day. From the color of the t-shirt we’re going to wear, to what we’re eating for breakfast, to whether I should say yes or no or respond to this email. And most of us have limited bandwidth for that.

It’s like a muscle, right? So you spend all your time deciding on the flavor of oatmeal in the morning. Then when it comes time to the afternoon, you have less energy around decision making. So let’s just automate the first hour of your day. You wake up, you know exactly what you’re going to eat, you know exactly what you’re going to wear. Last time, last time we talked, I was wearing this shirt. I have six of them. It’s a black shirt, I wear them all the time.

And if you have those pieces in place, then you’ve set yourself up for a much more enjoyable day. And that doesn’t mean a morning routine can’t have some of those pieces. Bruce Lee said, absorb what is useful, reject what is not, and add what is uniquely your own. So try my methodology with the water and the exercise, which are designed to get your metabolism moving quicker, giving you hydration. After you’ve not been hydrating for the last 8 hours and then just get your body moving a little bit to improve that fat metabolism and put you in a better energetic position than if you wake up and just pound a cup of coffee. So my goal is to give you, here’s a small tidbit that you can start implementing right away. And here are three really good reasons why you should be doing it. So, not making it overly scientific or complicated, but simple things that very busy people can do consistently for years.

MARTIN: Yeah. The word that has been rattling in my brain about this is activate. When you flush. When you put in that water you are activating the process. Things will move. You need to be able to move nutrients in and toxins out and if you have a dry riverbed you will not have any boats floating on it. It will just not happen. And the second thing, this energy business, when you activate your metabolism by actually physical movement, that’s a phenomenal act. You just told your body to kick in gear as opposed to conserving energy.

NATE: And it doesn’t even need to be, it doesn’t need to be a long workout. 60 seconds of jumping jacks is a great way to kick you up and get out of the bed.

MARTIN: Yeah. And it doesn’t have to be the first 20 seconds. Take your time. Come up. Right? Yeah. Awesome. Yes. Raising a healthy nation. You know, just these two things alone, if they were done by millions, we would probably change the course of history.

NATE: I mean like it’s kind of, it’s cool to think about that, but it’s also slightly depressing. Think that we can’t get people to do 1 minute of something in the morning that is going to change the course of their life over years or decades. Because this is like, it’s not revolutionary, it’s not sexy, it’s not this, take this cool supplement. It’s not do this magical exercise that is going to do all these things. It’s something so small, but it really has that compound effect like investing. Right? So I think if you can just make those daily deposits, you start seeing it not today, not tomorrow, but three months from now, two years from now, everything starts feeling way, way better. And you’re like, wow, I’m so glad I started back then.

MARTIN: All right. Okay. 60 seconds. High aerobic activity. Why not?

NATE: Jumping jacks? Great. I would say you could do burpees if you’re sadistic. I don’t ever have my clients ever do burpees because that’s the worst exercise. But sometimes I’ll just do some shadow boxing. Maybe I’ll just, like, dance a little bit. That’s embarrassing. My wife catches me. But you know what? It’s all, that’s all good. Sometimes if I’m feeling kind of low or like a little bit creaky, I’ll just do band pull aparts or something. Just keep my shoulders and upper back engaged, but it doesn’t have to be anything crazy.

MARTIN: Yeah. You know what I do? What? I use a mini trampoline.

NATE: Oh, that’s the best.

MARTIN: It’s called a rebounder. And I use small weights. I use two three pound, nothing too serious and just dance and box and throw my arms around and run and do stuff. I only do really, like two minutes.

NATE: And the rebounder is so great.

MARTIN: A longer one later.

NATE: But, yeah, for flushing out all the lymph and all the stagnation that you accumulate overnight, too. So, yeah, if you have a rebounder or your kids are jumping on a trampoline at home, that’s an awesome option.

MARTIN:  Yeah. Okay, well, what else am I missing here.

NATE: Well, you want to talk a little about nutrition? Kind of like the basic framework.

MARTIN: For what I consider what you’ve learned.

NATE: Okay, so when I was working as a personal trainer, personal trainers are the worst because people are going to be like, people always ask personal trainers, what should I be eating? And they say rice and chicken. They’re like, how much? And they’re like every meal all the time. And so when I first started training, I was like, what should I be eating, you guys? And they’re like rice and chicken. So I burned myself out on chicken breast, white rice and sriracha hot sauce. I ate that stuff every meal for like a year and a half. And then by the time I was done with that, I was like. I’m done with this. I don’t ever want to see Sriracha ever again.

But the thing that kept coming up for me was, every time I would eat the rice and the chicken, I would have like a 90 minute lull in my day where I was like, I need a nap. I need to lay down. I’m tired. And as a trainer, I would work from like 06:00 a.m. to like 11:00 a.m. then have like a two or three hour window in the middle of the day with no clients. And then work from like 02:00 p.m. until 07:00 p.m.

NATE: So I had these really long days and I just, I didn’t like the fact that I was showing up to my four, 5, 6 appointments, a lot lower energy than I was for my morning appointments. So I went back to the drawing board in terms of my nutrition to figure out what can I do that’s going to actually improve my energy? How am I going to feel really good all day long? What I found was that eliminating carbohydrates, especially in the morning, the oatmeal, the bagels, the cereals, all the typical breakfast foods that we see on the supermarket shelves, was a great way to start the day. One of my key tenets, one of my investments, is a protein and fat breakfast. This can be as simple as whipping up five eggs, have a little bit of avocado, maybe some cheese on there. So very simple, nothing crazy at all. I tend to do a protein shake because I’m out of the house pretty early and it’s just fast and easy. I don’t need to turn anything on or cook anything, but I’ll do two scoops of a whey protein. I will do two tablespoons of a peanut or almond butter.

I’ll do some liquid, some ice. And then the secret for a great shake is you take some salt and you grind some salt into there. It’s much better. Plus I live in Arizona. I need all the electrolytes I can get.

MARTIN: Well, as soon as you start sweating, perspiration will be dumping sodium out of your system. So you do need to salt your food. You know what’s really interesting is you have described the ideal diet for the thyroid dominant endocrine. Okay, there are three major, thyroid, adrenal and pituitary. And you describe the thyroid diet to the T. And what’s interesting, of course, the thyroid types tend to be lean and tall. They tend to be longer rather than not. They tend to be built smaller bones, like you could usually put your hand around your wrist, whereas if you’re the adrenal dominant, you’ll be built with bigger bones, bigger ankles. I mean, the typical adrenal calf is the size of my thigh, just naturally. And they find it really easy to put on muscle mass, whereas the thyroid type, like you or me, will have to really work at it. And we never really go big. We just go okay, as opposed to mister Atlas. Doesn’t happen.

NATE: Yeah.

MARTIN: Anyway, the adrenal types are different. They like to take no breakfast at all, maybe a cup of coffee, small, light lunch, maybe a salad and just eat a big dinner. That’s their story. And interestingly enough, they gain weight with fat. Unlike the thyroid, you and I, we lose weight on fat, so we stay lean eating fat, we put on blubber eating starch. So this chicken thing that you were describing, it’s the rice that was putting the weight on and was giving you the excess energy. Here’s how it works. The energy is used up first in the circulating glucose, then in the stored glycogen, then the circulating fats, and finally then the stored fats. So if there’s always circulating glucose, you never get to using up your stored fat.

NATE: And that’s across the board, no matter what type.

MARTIN: It’s everyone. But the way you get the circulating glucose in is you put in starch in your diet, the rice, bread, potato, porridge, oatmeal, all of those are instant starch hits, which turns into blood glucose spikes. It’s great if you’re trying to outrun something, like if you need to go row 3 miles, by all means carb up.

NATE: But that’s, that’s so, so few and far between. There’s very few people that I talked to that are running ultra marathons or training for triathlons or even who are outside working with their hands physically. Most people are sitting at desks, most people work from home, they see the fridge and they don’t give their body a chance to ever rid themselves of that blood glucose. And so it’s kind of, with this strategy, it’s a sneaky way of keeping your blood sugar level so you don’t have these peaks and valleys where you’re having hunger pangs and then getting tired afterwards, as well as giving your body a chance to burn through blood glucose and then refilling those stores in the PM, which is kind of how I promote it.

MARTIN: Right on. Yes.

NATE: And so I’ve also found that,

MARTIN; Be careful about your lunch. If you spike your lunch with carbohydrates, you’re going to be falling asleep 2 hours later.

NATE: So one of our other investments is a protein and veggie lunch. So one of the easiest ways to do that, I found, is that if you make a big batch of meat or protein in the PM, then you can eat some of it for dinner and then save some of it. So you have a batch of protein, for example, everything I do is geared towards busy people. So on Monday night, we might make chicken and potatoes, we have a little more time Tuesday night, I know we don’t have time. I’m taking the kids places, we’re shuttling them around. My wife is working, so I know I need to have a faster dinner ready.

NATE: So I cook a bunch of chicken thighs. I love chicken thighs way more than chicken breasts on the grill on Monday night. And then the next night, I just chop those up and I turn them into tacos. Or I put them in a pan with some tikki masala sauce, or I put them in with some fried rice. And so now I have a couple meals that I can use based off of the previous batch of prepped protein I’ve used. So in that vein, I’ll grab two chicken thighs and then a half of a bag of baby carrots. It’s filling, it’s nutrient dense, it’s a lot of protein, and you feel great the rest of the day. You don’t feel like you’re crashing out.

And I think one of the things that I’ve learned is that when your body metabolizes carbohydrates, proteins and fats are a lot slower to be digested. Carbohydrates digest faster, which means you need more blood flow to digest them because of the oxygen requirements of digestion. So it’s gonna pull blood from your extremities, your arms, your legs, your brain, and pull it all into your gut. So these are like the rules of the human body, of human physiology. So if you know these rules, you can decide to follow them or you can decide to break them, but I don’t want people to not understand what the score is. So if you want to have pancake breakfast with your kids and you’ve got a lull in your day until noon on the weekends, by all means, enjoy that pancake breakfast, and do your thing. But because you know what’s going to happen, you’re going to be tired, you’re going to be sitting around, you’re not going to need to pop up and do something really, really active after eating a bunch of pancakes. So understanding how the body works and then putting that to use to benefit you, I think, is one of the best things you can do, and it puts you back in control.

MARTIN: Yes. Not disagreeing, but at the same time, I would say have your pancakes when you know that you’re going for a hike, because remember this, this stuff is hitting your bloodstream about 30 to 50 minutes later. So as soon as you finish eating, start putting your shoes on and go for the hike, you will burn it off.

NATE: True.

MARTIN: Which is okay, but if you’re going to sit with it, then what you’re going to do is you’re going to make a spike of glucose, followed by a spike of insulin, followed by a spike of triglycerides, and it will convert very successfully into lipids, white fat around your belly.

NATE: Yeah. I think that’s so important for people to understand. What is the score? What happens when I put this food into my body? When I put in the proteins and fats in the morning, I get energy and I don’t crash. When I put in the pancakes in the morning, I get a big spike and then I crash and I feel like I need to take a nap. So if you understand that, you can make your decisions accordingly. And I love the idea of walking or taking a hike or moving around.

There’s this ayurvedic principle called ‘shatpavali’ which just essentially means 100 steps. And their idea is that after you eat a meal, you just walk 100 steps. So for me, I think like a ten minute walk after each meal is a great way to improve digestion, improve lipid management, make sure that you’re not getting a gigantic glucose spike. Improve  your metabolism, and it’s free. You just go walk. I’m in Arizona, it’s 120 degrees right now, but I can still walk around my house.

MARTIN: All right. Yes.

NATE: No hikes in the near future for me, unfortunately. They’re always air evacuating people off mountains around here. Yeah. Like two people will come to town, stay at a resort, and then try to go hiking at noon, and then they end up getting heat stroke or whatever, and having to get air evacuated out.

MARTIN: Oh, this is actually a thing that goes on? Yeah.

NATE: Oh, yeah. It’s super frequent here.

MARTIN: My, my, yeah, of course, 120. Anything above 90 is you’re no longer able to cool yourself. So, you know, at 100, you’re as hot as your inner temperature and you’re producing energy. So if you’re doing anything moving, even digesting, you need to have some external cooling, and there isn’t any. So you’re going to overheat, your core temperature goes up and it lights out.

NATE: Yep.

MARTIN: Okay. Well, Arizona, you sure have to work hard at choosing anything less convenient for exercise outdoors.

NATE: Well, I still. I have a garage gym and so I train in the summer. Still in the garage. And what I’ve noticed from that is that it’s very uncomfortable the first couple times you do it, the first three or four times. You’re hot. You just don’t feel as good. You can’t lift as much weight, but then it feels like your body acclimates to it after a couple of workouts, and it no longer is as impactful in terms of crushing my energy and making me want to take a nap.

MARTIN: Okay.

NATE: And then when I’m going and just wandering around or walking from here to here, I don’t feel the heat takes as much out of me in real life as if I’ve been training in the heat.

MARTIN: Yeah. Okay. You’re hardening yourself.

NATE: Yeah, it feels like it. I don’t have any science to back that up, but that’s  what I’ve noticed from personal experience.

MARTIN: Right. Okay, well, very good points on the nutrition side. I already take it for granted, but it’s good that you’re remembering to just repeat it. Right?

NATE: Yeah. And then once you do it for a long time, it just becomes this lifestyle. So, I try to give people frameworks. I always think about when I go bowling with my kids, they’re not very good at bowling, so I put up the bumpers. Right. Well, a lot of us aren’t very good at nutrition, so how can we put up bumpers for ourselves and our nutrition? And I think that if you just have the idea of proteins and fat for breakfast, proteins and vegetables for lunch, protein, a carb and a veggie for dinner. Great.

Now you can go out to a restaurant, and you don’t have to worry about being on a meal plan. You can just, restaurants have a lot of food in the back. You can be like, I want a steak, I want a potato, and I want some broccoli. You just ask them for the food that you want, and they’ll make it for you. It’s a great thing about restaurants.

MARTIN: Yes. They want to serve you.

NATE: Yep.

MARTIN: All right. Okay, Nate. Let’s just tell people how they can find you. Let’s just put it out there.

NATE: Yeah. So one of the places I’m most active is on Instagram right now. If you want to find me there at ‘_milliondollarbody.’ If you just search for a million dollar body I’ll come up. I’m the best one. You can also check out my YouTube channel, which is, again, YouTube.com/milliondollarbody. And then if you wanted to check out that book, you just go to GetNatesbook.com and I’ll send you an ebook for a Kindle, or I’ll send you a PDF, whatever one you prefer. And if you like it, you want to have a hard copy, it’s on Amazon, it’s on Audible. You can listen to it, but get it for free. Check it out.

MARTIN: GetNatesbook.com. Awesome. Nate, think this was worth close to a million bucks.

NATE: I hope so. I want us to be like, fitness is fun. We get the opportunity to do fitness, right? I don’t want it to be this big thing where like, oh, my gosh, have to do another diet, have to do another exercise routine. We get to move our bodies. We don’t have to. Every time I get injured or feel like I’m laid up a little bit, it just reinforces for me how blessed I am and we are, to be able to do some of these things and move around. So I want people to understand and experience that same level of joy when it comes to the ability to feed ourselves good food and to move ourselves around and to train ourselves and to showcase what that looks like to our friends, family and community.

NATE: And so I just want this to be like a fun process. I don’t like people suffering through a fitness journey when it should be this uplifting, really just core element of personal development. You know, I think you can skip all the podcasts and all the good books and stuff like that, because fitness should really be the cornerstone. And if you can master this, then there’s nothing that you can’t do. It’s. And I think that’s a wonderful aspect of what this is like.

MARTIN: You know, these podcasts, they’re very listenable, and all you need is some sort of a headset and a device that will play it back to you and go out there and walk.

NATE: Absolutely. That’s perfect. Feed your body. Feed your mind.

MARTIN: Interestingly, I want to make one more point, which is you can start with minimal. Even if your fitness level is pretty atrocious, you start to move from. It’s hard to overcome inertia, it’s hard to overcome sitting still. So the first moves may be quite small and may feel pretty silly, but when you do them, the progression will build on itself. It’s not linear, it’s geometric. So start. If you find yourself not doing a fitness program, this should be the beginning of you doing one.

NATE: I’ve got clients who start with me and just, we just start walking. We just start walking for 30 minutes a day and it doesn’t have to be a big deal. I don’t have to get really insane with our workouts and do a bunch of hard crossfit exercises or anything like that. But you need to build that routine and build that chunk into your day where you can be like, all right, this 30 minutes belongs to me. It is an important meeting between me and me and it impacts everything else I do. And then once you have that routine built, then we can add stuff to it and mobility and core training and all sorts of cool and fun stuff. You gotta have that space really created. So if you don’t know what to do yet, just get out and walk. 30 minutes a day is all you need. 60 minutes is amazing. 30 minutes is fantastic. Start somewhere.

MARTIN: Awesome. Nate, you are such a bright light for me. Thank you. Thank you for being here. Nate Palmer. You can look at this website at Nate.fit. This is Martin Pytela for Life Enthusiast, life-enthusiast.com and by phone at 866-543-3388. Thank you.

The post Podcast 490: Million Dollar Body appeared first on Life Enthusiast.

Welcome to another episode of the Life Enthusiast podcast! On today’s episode,  Martin Pytela chats with Belinda Whelan, the Healthy Celiac Coach, about the complexities of celiac disease. Belinda shares her personal journey, emphasizing the importance of proper testing and diagnosis, which is often missed or mistaken for other conditions. She explains the genetic factors and how life events can trigger symptoms.

Belinda also highlights the wide range of symptoms beyond digestive issues, including brain fog and fatigue, and discusses her coaching services and online program to support those managing the disease. Tune in to learn more about the proactive steps needed to live well with celiac disease and improve your quality of life.

To find out about Belinda’s coaching program, you can check out her website: Belindawhelan.com

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MARTIN: Greetings. This is Martin Pytela for Life Enthusiast podcast. And today with me, Belinda Whelan. She is the Healthy Celiac Coach. We’ll ask Belinda to explain, but welcome.

BELINDA: Thanks, Martin. Thank you so much for having me on your show. It’s great to be here.

MARTIN: Yeah, I appreciate the fact that you bring yourself a different continent, different accent, different experience, all of that. That’s just awesome. I love that.

BELINDA: Yeah, yeah. It’s always great to connect with people on the other side of the world. I’m in Australia, so. Yeah, we were just saying earlier, winter here and summer for you. So, yeah, it’s great to connect.

MARTIN: And it’s great that, of course, now it’s possible for us to consult with people using the same tool that you and I are using right now, talking over the Internet as if we were in each other’s face.

BELINDA: Yeah, it is wonderful isn’t it?

MARTIN: Yeah, great.

BELINDA: Love it.

MARTIN: So you come to it with Celiac in your business title. Most of the people that come to Life Enthusiast website come here looking for a solution to a problem that they may not necessarily understand. And I think that there are way more celiacs out there than what meets the eye or than what people think. They think, oh, I have just a little bit of indigestion, or I have a little bit of brain fog, or I have a little bit of immune challenge. Turns out, and I’m telling you, the world, that if you have a leaky gut, you also have a leaky brain and you also have a leaky immune system.

BELINDA: Yes.

MARTIN: What can you say to that?

BELINDA: Yeah, I mean, celiac disease is one of those autoimmune diseases that I guess is becoming more and more known, whether that’s to do with more awareness or more people getting diagnosed, but it is, when we look at it, it’s not uncommon. Around 1 in 100 people do have celiac disease, and unfortunately, so many people are undiagnosed or misdiagnosed, and this is a big one. So they go to their medical practitioner and they’re being diagnosed with something else. So whether that be IBS or something along those lines, because it’s not being picked up. And my story is very similar. It took me over a year to get a diagnosis, which sounds like a long time, but for some people, they don’t get diagnosed for 10, 20, 30 years and they struggle with the symptoms. So it is something that it’s important for people to have more of an awareness of so that they can get a diagnosis. But, yeah, It is very undiagnosed and misdiagnosed, unfortunately.

MARTIN: So what do you rely on with diagnosing?

BELINDA: So the key way to get a diagnosis is first through a blood test. So you need to go to your medical practitioner. They will do a blood test for the gene. So they are looking for two genes. So it’s either HlADQ2 or HLADQ8. So most celiacs will carry one of those genes or two of those genes, and you get them from your parents. Some people have been diagnosed without those genes, so having said that. But generally they are looking for those genes.

If you have that gene, it doesn’t mean you’ve got celiac disease. Something has to actually trigger the gene to kind of turn it on, and that can be a number of factors. So for me, it was childbirth. I never had any symptoms whatsoever before I had my daughter, and childbirth was the trigger for me. And so many people say that different things have triggered their celiac gene. So things like the loss of a loved one, a car accident, illness, there’s so many different things. I’ve asked people what they believe triggered their celiac disease and the answer varies.

My audience is mainly women, and the most common answer has been childbirth. Something triggers that and then you have this immune response. Basically what happens is you consume gluten, which is in a lot of foods, and your body sees that as a foreign body and it starts to attack its own tissues and cells. So the body starts to break down and does further damage. And you can get very, very sick and it can cause more problems and more ongoing issues later on in life if you don’t get on top of it. So this is why it’s important to look at these different signs and symptoms that can relate to celiac disease and go and get tested for it.

MARTIN: You’re essentially naming high stressors, whether it’s loss of a loved one, moving, getting to school or not getting to school, giving birth, especially. I mean, this is the hormonal change that goes from being in a regular cycle to being pregnant for x nine months and then all of a sudden back out of it. Right. That’s a major restoration. And of course, the pregnancy itself is a major stressor on the body.

BELINDA: That’s right. Yeah.

MARTIN: So no surprise there. I always like to think of it as the load on something. The thresholds and the triggers, right?

BELINDA: Yes.

MARTIN: The threshold is what’s our resilience, and triggers are piling on until all of a sudden the triggers are above the threshold and flood.

BELINDA: Yes. And then the body’s like, no more, can’t cope. And you get given all of these issues and a lot of people that are aware of celiac disease think of it as just a gastro issue, it’s a problem with the gut and it’s diarrhea and it’s feeling unwell and fatigue. But there’s so many more symptoms. There’s hundreds of known symptoms linked to celiac disease and some of the most ridiculous things that you wouldn’t go to your doctor and think you’re going to walk out with a celiac disease diagnosis, one of them being a cough that will not go away. So some people have reported that the only symptom that they had was this ongoing cough for months and months and months, and then they got a celiac disease diagnosis, started eating gluten free, and the cough went away.

MARTIN: Right, so the solution was to stop the input of this irritant that is causing all this inflammation, right?

BELINDA: Yeah, that’s right, yeah.

MARTIN: Okay, so what about Doctor Marsh and his Marsh one through to five, doing the biopsy and taking a look how worn the villi are, is that part of what you need or doesn’t really matter?

BELINDA: So what they call the gold standard is you get a blood test that sees if you have the gene initially, then they’re looking at your blood levels to see whether the gluten is causing you issues. From there, then they will go and do a biopsy. So some countries will bypass that and not even bother. So I was diagnosed 15 years ago, I was not given a biopsy because I’d already gone gluten free and my gastroenterologist didn’t want to put me on the gluten. My blood was through the chart off the show that it was like they could tell without a shadow of a doubt that it was celiac disease. Some children, they don’t want to put them through that extra trauma. It is being put under and having things put down your throat. It is traumatic for some people, so in some instances, they don’t need to do it, but they do say the gold standard is to do that and look at how much damage is happening, so.

MARTIN: Right, okay, so how far down you are on the journey from healthy to completely unrepairable, yeah? So transglutaminase, is that the test that you’re talking about?

BELINDA: Yes. So they’ll check that in your blood and they can see from there, and that’s where they can make a decision. It will depend completely on that blood level and then from there, whether they send you off to get that endoscopy. So some people will get an endoscopy and a colonoscopy. I did have a colonoscopy. Years after my diagnosis, I had gluten sneaking back into my diet. Accidentally my butcher had changed his bacon, and the bacon had a wheat liquid injected into it. So it’s just crazy where gluten is.

BELINDA: So I was getting ill again, and they just wanted to check that my villi was okay.

MARTIN: You just threw in the most crazy notion. Can you believe that somebody could betray you so much and put wheat inside your bacon.

BELINDA: Yeah, right. Like, we shouldn’t even have to think about that. It’s meat. And, I’d been going to this butcher for a very, very long time. Had always bought my bacon from there. And I do look at it now and go, I did get complacent because I always bought my bacon from there. I didn’t continue to check, I probably went there once a week, once every two weeks. It’s not like every time I was like, oh, is your bacon still gluten-free? Is your bacon still gluten-free? I did get complacent. So that was a massive lesson. But who would think that they’re injecting bacon with a wheat liquid? They are. They do it. It’s common. It’s in ham. So processed ham, they will put wheat liquid into it as well. It plumps it up. It makes it cheaper. So, yeah. interesting.

MARTIN: You do not have to be checking all the time. It’s just a betrayal of the society. Perhaps in a sense, right, they don’t think twice of it. I mean, my grandfather was a butcher. He made wieners, and he made it with wheat soup. Right? They were wheat wieners.

BELINDA: Yep.

MARTIN: Now, it’s hard to get a gluten-free wiener, isn’t it?

BELINDA: Yeah. I haven’t looked, but I’ll take your word for it.

MARTIN: I don’t know. So, interestingly, I lost my oral tolerance for wheat at about age 55. Like, it was undeniable. I was able to eat spaghetti back in my thirties without breaking out or having horrendous symptoms. I just had some, right? Like, I had a swollen belly, but didn’t think much of it. Right.

BELINDA: Yeah. So you weren’t ever tested for celiac disease.

MARTIN: Yeah, it just wore off. I tried to explain it to people saying, well, it’s sort of like a new set of tires. When you have a new car, it’s all good. And then at 50,000 miles or whatever it is, that’s the rate at which you’re driving, riding on slicks on a dry summer day, that’s all good. But if it rains, you’re in the ditch.

BELINDA: Makes sense. Yeah. And a lot of people do go gluten-free and just feel better. Like, they don’t go and get tested for celiac disease. They just make that decision to eat gluten-free. And this is where I like people to go get tested. If they do suspect that it is gluten that’s causing them issues because they will take it more seriously and look into it deeper. And there’s so much more than just eating gluten-free. It’s making sure there’s no cross-contact with crumbs in your kitchen or when you eat out and things like that. So, yeah, there’s a lot that goes into it. That’s for sure.

MARTIN: Yeah. Okay. So to get practical in this conversation, I know that you do both one on one sessions and group sessions. So somebody on this end who thinks I have these, who knows what problems that have been protracted. It’s just not getting better. I wonder, maybe I should talk to Belinda.

BELINDA: Yeah, sure. If someone wants to get in contact with me, they can certainly do so by my website, which is belindaweland.com, and we can have a chat there. But the first step is definitely to get a diagnosis that’s out of my hands. That’s not what I do. My expertise is supporting people after they get a diagnosis and helping them get back to being healthy and on their journey to wellness.

MARTIN: So we should put a pin in it and say, hey, go get yourself a diagnosis, because if you have it, you will need help. I promise you. I have a fairly close member in my family who’s been through this journey. I’ve watched it. It can be very, very arduous. Yes, you want to have help. This is not something that’s easily done on your own.

BELINDA: That’s exactly right. I mean, I got my diagnosis. My doctor said to me, Belinda, you’ve got celiac disease and you just need to eat gluten-free. I can still hear his words. You just need to eat gluten-free. So I went off and I tried to figure it out. I made sure all the food in my kitchen was safe, but I didn’t realize that I had to change my toaster or use separate chopping boards or be careful when I ate out. I didn’t realize it was that intense. No one ever told me that.

I went to a dietitian who literally sat on the Internet and googled, what is celiac disease? And printed me a booklet that he found online. And I could have sat at home and done that myself and kept my $150. So, he wasn’t an expert. And this is why I wanted to help people with celiac disease, because I didn’t get the help that I needed. And this is not uncommon these days. This is 15 years ago, and even today, I get people come to me and tell me that my story is their story and the same thing has happened to them. They were told to just eat gluten-free, and it’s not that easy. So, not much has changed in the 15 years since my diagnosis.

MARTIN: Yeah. The detective skills that you have to acquire are daunting, and also the assertiveness that you must learn to display. That’s not easy because you need to be a bit of an abrasive person in order to get your way.

BELINDA: Yes, it’s definitely a big part of having confidence. So, in my course, the ultimate celiac system, I take newly diagnosed celiacs all the way from the beginning, to the end of what they need to do to live with celiac disease. And it’s also designed for people that have had celiac disease but are struggling. And in that program, I teach people that they do need to be confident when they’re ordering out. They do need to ask the right questions. There’s a process to go through when you are ordering food, because so many people tell me they go out and they get glutened and they get angry, and they feel so annoyed at their servers because they got glutened. But then when I asked them, did you say this? Did you check this? Did you do all of the things that you needed to? Oh, no, I didn’t. It’s like, well, if you do these things, you have less chance of getting sick, and you have that time.

BELINDA: I’ve traveled the world since I got my celiac disease diagnosis, and not once have I been glutened. I’ve been to multiple countries, and most of them, English is not their first language. So it’s learning these little tricks and techniques of making sure that the food you get is safe and that they’re looking after you.

MARTIN: As you’re describing, I’m thinking of dating. Visualize yourself as a teenager or whatever age you want to be, and you’re in on the dating scene, and you are, especially a woman, so vulnerable. Right? I mean, you could end up pregnant, but you could end up with STD. You could end up with a person who’s going to be violent with you. You could just be in all manner of trouble. And it’s like that. You’re taking your life in your hands, really.

BELINDA: Yeah.

MARTIN: Right.

BELINDA: That is a really good way of putting it, actually, Martin. So it’s having that trust initially, definitely. But having your wits about you. There are red flags when you’re dating, and there are red flags when you’re eating out. So you’ve got to look out for those red flags. You’ve got to be on top of the way people are reacting to you. So I always say to my students and my clients as well, if you’re ordering a gluten-free meal and someone is a bit blasé in their answers or they’re not confident, that’s a red flag right there. You need to send that person to the chef and get the answers that you need.

MARTIN: Okay, so can you be a little bit of celiac, sort of like a little bit pregnant, or is it all in?

BELINDA: No. So the thing with celiac disease is you’ve either got celiac disease or you don’t. It’ll never go away. So once you’ve got celiac disease, that’s it. You’ve got it for life. Until they get a cure, if they come up with a cure. But everybody is different. So my mom has celiac disease, my brother has celiac disease.

We are all very different. So for me, one of my symptoms is chronic diarrhea if I accidentally consume gluten, whereas my mom is the opposite, she gets constipation. So you can’t kind of look at it and go, everyone’s the same. But then there’s some people that have celiac disease that are asymptomatic, which means they have no symptoms whatsoever, which is really hard, because those people tell me that they find it the hardest to be strict because they don’t feel rubbish. So for me, I would never consume gluten on purpose. I would never, ever go “oh, I just really feel like having this delicious chocolate doughnut because I miss them.”

BELINDA: I wouldn’t do that because the pain would not be worth it. Whereas people that don’t have any symptoms, like, what have I got to lose? So they have to really know in their head that, hey, this might cause further issues down the track. So, yeah, we’re all different. And that’s where some people do get a fluke diagnosis. So it’s an interesting one.

MARTIN: How do we sort out the people that are listening to it from “I think I need it”, or, “no, that’s not me”. What do you think? I would like to help deliver some sort of a tool here that says, pay attention. This is not something to pass.

BELINDA: I think the biggest thing is if you are living with symptoms that you’ve never been able to pinpoint, you’ve never been able to get answers for, maybe you’ve seeked the help of a naturopath or a doctor, or you’ve spoken to someone, and no one can really pinpoint what it is that’s causing your issues. You can just request a test for getting a celiac disease test, and it’s as simple as that, and then you can at least rule it out. Because if you can rule it out, you know it’s not that. But if it is celiac disease, then you can start to eat gluten-free and feel better. And it’s one of those things that we were talking about earlier, Martin, where we get used to feeling a certain way. So, for me, my symptoms started very slowly, and over time, they got worse and worse, and I just got used to it. And it wasn’t until my family members pointed out to me that I didn’t look well. I didn’t look healthy. I wasn’t really coping, and I wasn’t my normal, healthy self. We kind of live in pain and get used to it. So if you are living an unhealthy kind of way, you might have brain fog, you might have lethargy, you might feel fatigued all the time. You might have this heaviness or an unexplained cough. If you’ve got a child that is failing to thrive, I was talking to a lady the other day, and her daughter got diagnosed with celiac disease six months ago. She goes, I can’t believe how much she’s growing now, she’s just shot up. And it’s because her body is absorbing the nutrients that she needs to grow now, whereas she wasn’t before.

BELINDA: So you might get sick all the time, you know, your body’s not absorbing the nutrients you need to be healthy.

MARTIN: Yeah. So how old was this child?

BELINDA: I think she was about nine. So she’d suffered for a little while with symptoms, but she wasn’t growing. So that’s a big sign in children if they’re quite little. So, people go “oh, they’re just little” or “oh, they don’t grow much.” That can be a major sign of celiac disease because the body is not absorbing the nutrients from the food that they’re eating. They may be hungry all the time, constantly wanting to eat because their body is starving for nutrients. So that can be a symptom as well.

MARTIN: Yes. I’m thinking of the more common things like osteoporosis. Of course, you’ll be losing minerals because of it. All the inflammatory diseases, whether it’s cardiovascular or joints or you name it, all of that can be indeed pushed from there.

BELINDA: Yeah. Joint pain is a big one. That’s always a lot of people’s symptoms, if they accidentally get gluten, they’ll tell me as well that they feel that achiness. It’s almost like the way I look at it with my symptoms, I go, it’s like being pregnant and having the flu and also food poisoning all rolled into one. Just throw all those into one. And that’s how I feel. So it’s awful. I wouldn’t wish it on anyone.

MARTIN: No, we don’t. Okay, so the story is, if you have problems that are not being solved, get diagnosed, check your blood for transglutaminase, and right next after that, get your genetic diagnosis. If you have already done the 23 or me or ancestry or something like that, it will be in that file. It’ll be buried inside it.

BELINDA: Yeah. And if you’ve got a direct relative that has got celiac disease, so whether that’s a parent, child, or a sibling, you should definitely be getting tested anyway. There are many people that have got a direct relative and they just go, no, I’m not getting tested because I don’t want to know about it. But then someone like my brother, who struggled for years with symptoms, and I said to him constantly, you need to get tested for celiac disease. No, no, no, no. And then it got to a point he couldn’t handle it anymore and he went and got a diagnosis.

MARTIN: Yeah, this is the famous “ostrich method of healthcare.”

BELINDA: Yep.

MARTIN: Head in the sand.

BELINDA: Yeah, exactly.

MARTIN: Okay. All right. I’m looking at your website here on the side here. So you have a six month program to take somebody from. I don’t know what to do. Right. The reason people want to talk to you is when they are dumped into this world of, well, you are celiac.

BELINDA: Yeah.

MARTIN: And it’s not going to be simple.

BELINDA: Yes, that’s right.

MARTIN: The world is conspiring against you in ways you have no idea how hard it is.

BELINDA: Yeah, you’re exactly right. Yeah. And what’s making it hard as well is some people are eating gluten-free because it’s trendy or they think it’s a diet and it makes it look bad for those of us that legitimately need a real safe, celiac safe meal. So those people do make it a little bit trickier. Yes. We have more options for eating out, but they make it a little bit trickier for those of us with celiac. So I always say to my students, make sure when you’re ordering, you tell your server that you have got celiac disease so that people take you more seriously as well. So there’s all these little steps and little tricks that we need up our sleeve.

MARTIN: Okay, sounds good. Belinda, where do we send people on your website? And what is the website?

BELINDA: So. Belindawhelan.com.

MARTIN: So, okay, I’ll put it in the show notes.

BELINDA: Yep. Pop that in the show notes. That’d be great. So, yeah, if anyone wants to connect with me, that’s the best place to head to. It’s got links to my podcast, which is the ‘Healthy Celiac Podcast’, Instagram, on all the socials and that type of thing. So, yeah, that’d be great to connect with people there. And if they want to have a chat with me, they’re more than welcome to send me a DM over on Instagram as well.

MARTIN: Wonderful. It’s such a pleasure to meet you, and I’m really happy to be able to introduce you to our audience. Many of them will need you.

BELINDA: Yeah, I’m sure there’ll be some brains ticking over and people thinking about these symptoms and whether it could be affecting them. So I appreciate you allowing me to share with your audience, Martin. I really appreciate it.

MARTIN: Thank you for taking the time.

BELINDA: Thank you.

MARTIN: This is Martin Pytela, life-enthusiast.com. You can phone us, too, at 866-543-3388. Thank you.

The post Podcast 489: Healthy Celiac Coach appeared first on Life Enthusiast.