That's a lot of what to do out there whether it's on podcast or books as a lot of all you should do this. This is what you can do. In fact, we've never lived in a better time, you know, there's so many options, but potentially with that choice comes paralysis and you see a lot of people not actually doing anything and again, I'm very much informed by my almost two decades now of seeing patients.
Not everyone with the information actually goes and does anything and I thought well, why is that and I've always been fascinated as to which patients can make change and which patients canted. Is there a common factor now, I figured out early on that. Actually there was a couple of tricks you can use to help people make change and transform their lives, but I figured out that you've got to start small with most people and not with everyone and we can get to that.
With most people you gotta start small and you know the actions you take determine your identity often. We have a certain identity based upon the way our life is but until we take action consumption is not always leading to action and you know, you've always said mood for those action, right? This is if this book is actually in many ways trying to prove your points take the action and everything else
follows. That's dr. Rankin Chatterjee.
And this is episode 5 45 of the Rich Roll podcast.
Rich Roll podcast. Hey everybody, what's going on? Welcome to the podcast it is I Rich Roll coming to you from the acrid Tangerine Skies of what was formerly sunny, California now turned some kind of Blade Runner just
copia our state Ablaze in the largest Wildfire season in recorded history indeed as 20/20 continues to unfurl the Earth Humanity seems to remain intent on sending all of us deeper into the anguished abyss of distress and I myself find
that I'm vacillating between this kind of periodic Melancholy and a sense of powerlessness on the one hand and on the other hand gratitude and hope and at times when these darker moments do descend upon me really the only thing that keeps me sane is trying to maintain some adherence to this idea of normalcy continuing to do the podcast letting go of the many
things over which I have no control trying to focus on the things that I can control like my actions my reactions looking for the hidden opportunities spending time in nature spending time with my family moving my body eating right sleeping right meditating and extending myself in service to others. That's all I know how to do and yet like most people I suspect waves of anxiety and sometimes even despair flow over me and it is in those moments that
I've really come to rely on a battery of simple, but generally quite effective contrary actions to jumpstart me out of the funk and get me moving feeling acting behaving reacting and a healthier and more productive and happier Manner and this is really the briefest way in which I can introduce today's conversation which really centers on the theme of practical steps that we can all undertake to not only
- correct those mood swings but actually and ultimately reframe our reality and serve the long-term interests in a sustainable way of our general mental emotional and physical well-being. Our anchor for said exploration is one of the most influential doctors in the UK a Pioneer in the field of progressive functional medicine as well as a good friend. His name is dr. Rangan Chatterjee and he's here today returning for his third.
Third cast his third spin on the RRP flywheel a podcast host himself wrong and prevails over the wildly popular feel better live more podcast. He has appeared on seemingly every prominent media outlet from the BBC to the New York Times his Ted Talk how to make diseases disappear has been viewed almost three million times and he is the author of three number one Sunday Times bestselling books the most recent of which and the focus of today's exchange is
Titled feel better in five today, you're going to hear a lot about the many different ways to take better care of yourself at the core are your daily habits around food and I can assure you that. Dr. Chatterjee would agree that amping up your plant intake is key how to do this how to do it. Right and most importantly how to sustain it is a question that I get a lot. So we created the plant power meal planner and end-to-end state-of-the-art digital platforms. So,
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Here is affordability. Just a dollar ninety a week when you sign up for a year, which is basically nothing for what you get in return. It's just amazing. So to learn more and get rolling visit meals dot Rich Roll.com that's meals dot Rich Roll.com speaking of upping your nutrition game by amping up the plants allow me to pull focus on fungi because today's episode is brought to you by 4 Sigma attic the fine purveyors of all things magic mushrooms not
It in the way you're thinking but magic nonetheless further adapted. Genic Health boosting properties delectably delivered in elixirs devised to Delight the body and soothe the soul on writing days. I generally start the day with their ground mushroom coffee with lion's mane, which really not only wakes me up but amps up my focus and lathers up my creative mind without all the Jitters of normal coffee on workout days their mushroom coffee with chaga and cordyceps.
An immune system boost in an extra endurance enhancing kick is my go to all their stuff is great and forcing Maddox coffees are also all organic fair trade and in case you're wondering they don't taste like mushrooms. They're just like an awesome cup of coffee. That's it to learn more. You can dial up my podcast with four Sig Matic founder Taro Isa kapila, that's episode 320 and then immediately visit for Sig Matic.com / role to receive 10% off your for
Matic order now is the perfect time to try forcing Mattox best-selling mushroom coffee or any of their other delicious products. Just go to for Sigma to.com slash roll or use the promo code role at checkout. That's fo you are SI G. M-- ATI c.com role to receive 10% off your order. Okay rangan, so bottom line fundamentally. This is a conversation about habit change and habit formation if
You enjoyed my podcast with James Clear. I think this one will really resonate with you because it's all about the power of bite-sized actions what James Clear calls Atomic habits to change your health and change your life. It's about the difference between Breaking Bad Habits versus crowding them out with new ones. It's about food addiction and emotional eating with dr. Chatterjee's Progressive personal theory on the root cause we talked generally.
About holistic health and lifestyle medicine and why New Age Wellness really should be accessible to all especially now more than ever and wrong and shares his experience helping patients relieve stress find fulfillment and home peace in these chaotic times, but most importantly more than anything we explore his very simple almost effortless really methods for building new positive habits. So this is me.
And wrong and Chatterjee courtesy of Zoom which you can also watch if you would like if that's your preference at youtube.com forward slash Rich Roll. Enjoy wrong in my friend good to see you back for your third turn on the podcast. My only regret being we're not in the same room, but be it as it may this is the world that we live in right now. So I'll take any opportunity I can to connect with you my
Friend good to
have you today. Yeah, thanks Rich. Yeah me too man. I would have loved to have been with you in person. But this is as good as it gets but I'm sure we're still gonna have a great conversation. Nonetheless.
Yeah, so I want to get into the new book, of course congrats on it just being released in the United States. But before we do that like how's it going in the UK? I talked to a friend of mine who lives in London two days ago, and he said by what he related to me. It sounded like things were a little bit.
More normal there than they are here in Los Angeles. What's the day-to-day?
Yeah. Look. I think the way we're reacting to this is so individual isn't it that you can talk to 10 different people about their perception how they're feeling about the world's and you may get 10 different answers. Certainly, you'll get five or six different answers. And so what's going on here. Well, you know, people are still worried people are still wearing masks out on about there's a there's a big difference.
Divided as to what people actually think is really going on which is really interesting to observe on an individual level. My children went back to school today. You know, it's well summer, which I don't know what's going on with you guys. But you know my two kids who are 10 and 7 we drop them off at school for the pretty much one of the first times in five months. So it was yeah. It was interesting. Just getting back to what used to be normal more.
Many parents around the country. I tell you what was different this today was quite odd actually after having had the kids around for so long. I really miss them. You know, I really miss them in the day when I knew they weren't here. So yeah, that's kind of a little snapshot as to what's going on.
That's nice. Our kids are doing exactly what we're doing right now. They're on Zoom all day for their school and it's really taken a toll like the mental drain.
Of them having to you know, receive their education through a screen entirely is, you know, as you know, not the healthiest thing in the world and it's been tricky as a parent to help them navigate that the emotional, you know mental turmoil that it causes to have them separated from their friends and have their childhood in certain respects stripped away from them has been really trying it's encouraging to hear that your kids are back in school. I wish that was the case here.
But it's not.
Yeah and you I mean you I think certainly from what we read about what's going on in the US things seem to be quite different there from what I can tell and you know, what you play little bit right a little
bit a little yeah and
it's I don't know it's really tricky Rich because you know in terms of how people see this. I think it really depends on who you are. And what's your situation? So for some people the pandemic on
has he has provided a wonderful opportunity for people to reevaluate their lives reset what's important spend more time with people who are close to whether it's their partner or their family, but for other people they've had the complete opposite experience of worry financial hardship potentially losing their job potentially losing a family member or a close friends to illness, you know, maybe having a funeral that you couldn't go
Because of the regulations so I really feel that this has been one of those times. Where are we action is so individual, you know, I don't think it depends on what media you consume, you know, are you intentionally consuming lots of mainstream media, and I think if you are potentially you may struggle with anxiety or stress with the state of the world. And then if you shut yourself off you can sometimes feel really good in yourself, but potentially starts become detached with what's
Actually going on out there. So I think it's quite a challenging. It's been a challenging time to for people to navigate and you know before our conversations. I was thinking back to when the pandemic started. I was in LA as this was I remember about to until I was about to come to your house just to meet not for a podcast. You know, it's part of what I'm trying to do these days is really trying to prioritize connecting with people who I enjoy connecting with them and it was one of those where it's
Maybe mean Rich could get together and not do a podcast and just now. Yeah,
we hire relationship is oriented around podcast conversations,
but I saw the text message about an hour ago. And it literally it was on a Thursday. You said yeah, we'll touch base tomorrow morning and I thought I'm coming to your place and then literally on that Friday everything changed. Yeah,
you know, yeah. Yeah, it's it's weird. It's strange.
It certainly anxiety depression suicidal ideation loneliness. All of these things are peaking right now certainly in America and across the world. So what are you seeing with your patients? How are they navigating it? What's showing up in your office these days?
Yeah exactly what you said. I think the mental health consequence.
Off this pandemic is not only huge at the moment. I think we're yet to see the impact of it and I really think there is a
You know, so how can I put this you've got the situation where?
You know, the the authorities are making decisions based on what they think is going to save immediate acute lives, right? Mmm, and they're measuring that with daily, you know daily death rates things that are easily measurable from day to day right? But on the other hand You've Got The Chronic consequences of this lack of human contact this lack of face-to-face connection the fact that people aren't
Scanning all the people are feeling isolated resentment is starting to build up in people relationships are under pressure under strain and a lot of those things are more chronic. They're not quite as easy to measure and yes anxiety is going up stress-related problems are going up suicides are going up, you know in the last few weeks had some really horrible stories not just from my patients, but really tragic ones in my friend Network and my family Network as well in terms of nothing to do with actually.
Lee, you know coronavirus per se but actually to do with how we're now living, you know schools I think certainly here in the UK they're open but what is the impact going to be on these children in three four five years time of having a very formative part of their life, they're sort of almost being told whether consciously or not there's subconsciously getting the message that that oh, I must be aweary off the
That you know, I can't get too close. That is one of my big concerns about this is the consequence of this I've spoken to and I think last time I was on your show. We spoke about touch and a lot of Professor Francis mcglone's research on human touch and just how important it is for our emotional brain and the signals we get when we are touched by another human and that is something that many people have missed out on I tell you which
H my mother who's she's going to be 80 and a week's time she lives about five minutes away from me and white at the start of lockdown. She had a fall and I remember it really well because it was probably in the first week or two when nobody quite knew what was going on like it was like what what's happening to the world and I went round and I didn't want her to be admitted. I thought I don't want her going in a hospital right now. So I ended up staying with her for a few nights.
Floor next to her bed just to make sure she was okay just to make sure everything was all right, and she didn't need to go in and you know, so she was quite frail and quite just quite affected by it by a few weeks, but it's with the interesting a few weeks later. She has someone who comes around maybe for you know, an hour a day to help with some cooking and a few things at home. And I remember she phoned me one day and she said you know what I'm over there said what I can't live like this I would rather
and I'm not at all suggesting that anyone else should feel like this. I'm just talking about an individual story. This is my mum. She said, you know, I'd rather take my chances. I'd rather get this virus and if I don't make it, I don't make it but I can't live like this not seeing anyone not seeing my family not seeing my friends and it really struck me early on which that there's two sides to this. There's the acute side and The Chronic side and actually that's that's that's the thing we've spoken about before right whether it's
Health problems the acute problem like the pneumonia which Western medicine does beautifully Weller versus The Chronic consequences that the lifestyles that we leads and you can actually draw the same analogy in the pandemic. There is an acute consequence potentially and there's a chronic one and The Chronic one is the one I don't think is getting factored into decision-making because you know, we can kick the can down the road. It's like, oh we can't quite see that.
Although I think we are starting to see it but we can't quite see it and measure it in the same way as so I'm I'm concerned. I really concerned about children really, you know, I think you know humans are social beings we're designed to be together and to thrive in community and I really I worry about the impact on kids in the future if I'm honest.
Yeah, it's very real. I can see it in my 13 year old daughter when we do venture out into the world, which isn't often.
She's very trepidatious about it. And she's more diligent about mask wearing when she's outside the house then probably anybody else in our house and it's left me reflecting on what the long-term implications of that relationship with how you interact with the world are going to be like what is the half-life of that fear response when you're in the presence of another individual as opposed to embracing the world?
looking forward to those social interactions entering each one of those with that kind of sense of
potential Doom
what does that set in motion for that person's life five years down the line 10 years down the line. If they can't get over it. I think there's going to be a post-traumatic stress response to this that we're going to see, you know amongst mostly young people and what that's going to look like. I think only time will tell but I think it's a very real concern and I think on top of that, you know, this is something that you're well-versed in the health of our immune system is related to the
Which we interface with not just the natural world, but the social world like our immune systems become more robust the more that we're in contact with other human beings that's part of what what it's about in terms of maintaining our immune systems. And now we're being sequestered were prevented from that interface. What does that mean? You know, it's all very confusing and disorienting and that's all exacerbated by this.
Variation in in the kind of information that were receiving these different narratives about what we should and should not be doing that are causing vitriol and strife and really dividing us in a profound
way. Yeah it is and I could hear it in your voice. It's it's weighing, you know, you've it's interesting you mention your 13 year old or sir, my son's tan and I would guess at the jump from 10 to 13 is significant. My son is still in primary school. I
Still feel that he is relatively sheltered from The Wider world. I suspect that when one goes to I don't you call in the state's here secondary school or high school, you know, basically from 11 plus I suspect things are very different and I can't imagine what it's like for a 13 year old because of that age, you know, you're all about your friends and hanging and sort of almost pushing back against your family and actually really trying to get your own tribe.
What does that do? What will that mean for relationships in five? Ten years time. I've you know, I know I think did you had Charles eisenstein on early on didn't you? Yeah, I mean, I remember I still remember reading his essay, you know the coronation that say yeah, which is just a brilliant read when I read it at the time. I've not actually have not revisit it I may do but I remember the thing which really struck me at the end of it was when he said
he said something like
it depends how you see Life as a society. If you value the preservation of Life above everything else then certain measures make sense. If you value the quality of life, then perhaps we need to have a slightly different conversation. And you know, I appreciate that. This is super emotive for people. So I'm not I'm just trying to as a philosophical point. I really I haven't been able to get that out of my head since I read it.
What is the what is the society? What does society look like? How do we want to live? Because
you know that there is an element of risk to being alive, right the way to be completely safe from anything is to well you stay at home. Don't interact that never get anyone ever get in
a car. Never do anything.
Yeah. Don't go running on a trail right you that you know, don't do any of those things where you could potentially run into problems, but then the flip side is what what if we think about the fun things in life if I think about my own, you know the last
Couple years, you know getting into ocean swimming swim running, you know, before that skiing, you know, it's the element of danger but it's almost in so many ways actually basically tells you how much of a buzz you're going to get afterwards, you know, if of course you can have fun without an element of danger but it almost reminds you in that moment. Wow, I am alive what an amazing feeling I am alive.
I've and I just feel that what the thing that frustrates me Rich if I'm honest is I don't feel there's been enough of a public conversation around the long-term consequences. I think we and I gather you know, I get that there's there's this thing which we never seen before we've never seen these sort of lockdowns and there's a short-term Focus, but I really think the time is to say we really need to start thinking about the long-term consequences, but will also not seeing with a mainstream narrative.
We're not seeing a focus on what the immune system is and how we can start supporting it, you know it and I find it bizarre that we've not had more effects in terms of I know you spoke to dr. Be recently and you know, he was talking about the immune system and you know, there are so many things that we can do that will support our immune system, you know, getting seven and a half hours sleep a night compared to 5 hours.
For example has been shown to change the amount of natural killer cells in your body by 50 60 percent. Right? What a natural killer cells. They are the pot if your innate immune system that fight viruses, right? So, of course, it's a novel virus too many people right? That's that's what we're being told but you've got to you've got to say well, why don't we help people boost up support their immune.
Um so that even if they get exposed that more resilient the diet the quality of the food people are eating good they might have different colored plants these things help to educate your immune system. And that's a keyword Rich you match before the education offer immune system the immune system, you know, when we're born we have we're not completely sterile. Actually. We do have a few bugs inside us, but you know, we get our gut microbiome, which is a big part of our immune system. It's very
Interlinked with the immune system from our mothers, but then what happens well living being and I've been exposed to new foods been exposed to things in the environment that helps give your immune system signals and your mucus is very clever. It responds because our okay it tries to figure out when I should respond and when I should actually stay calm and stay quiet and it is very frustrating that we've not been able to have that conversation and people who do speak up about that. What is then?
Inning is that people are jumping on them, which is reflective of the way of the world at the moment and saying you're devaluing the social distancing measures that and it's like well, hold on a minute. It's not either/or. You don't have to choose either you follow the guidelines or you ignore them and look after your immune system. Well, why not do both? Why not say, hey guys, we would recommend this societally, but individually, we know that if you can do these three or four things sleep better.
Is less move your body eat better. You're actually going to support your immune system. Why why is that conversation not happening?
Yeah, because it doesn't feed the mainstream media fear narrative, you know, and it's particularly concerning when what we are coming to understand about this novel virus and the impact the disproportionate negative impact that it has on people with comorbidity factors, like the more unhealthy you are it appears the more
You know at risk you are in terms of the severity of what you're going to endure should you come in contact with the virus? It's been very strange in Los Angeles in the early stages of the quarantine. They closed all the they close the beaches like everybody knows but they also closed like all the trails and I can understand closing certain trails that are heavily trafficked, but they were closing all these tiny little trails that I felt like I only knew about where I would go out running and I'd be the only person out there.
And there'd be yellow police tape around it. All of a sudden and I was thinking this is perhaps one of the healthiest things that I could do right now. I'm socially distant. I'm not going to see anybody and yet I'm being prevented from doing this thing that I think is in the best interest of making sure that I'm in a good healthy position. Should I encounter the
virus? Yeah, and that's you know, that's a wider Point as well which many people have been thinking about Switch and I have as well because you know, we live in a society where
There are certain rules these there's Rules of Engagement to allow Society to function in a certain way, you know, it's not the wild west where anything goes but many people I know myself included if I'm honest a little bit. We're very much like, oh, I can't go in the countryside now. I like I can't go into nature and then you then he starts to think philosophically. Well who owns nature like is it possible to legislate that a human can
Let's go into nature and I look I understand. I'm not saying that aren't reasons for it. I'm just saying that if you extend these arguments to their sort of to their extreme it is it was I thought what - about I feel very frustrated that I can't go here and actually go for a run here or but I understand also the flip side, right? So I'm not sort of saying oh, you know poor wrong and he couldn't do what he wanted to do. Now. I get it that there's a societal issue.
You at play but but these like many people make the the a lot of these thoughts have been going round and round my heads and you go one, you know one week you're feeling really good and you feeling totally okay with things and then another week you sort of feeling a little bit tensed up and down and I think maybe four or five months in there was a general feeling of the UK that people just think I've had enough now I've had enough now, I just need to get out and express myself.
And whatever way so I know you mentioned the news narrative as well and it was interesting because that the start of this, you know, I would you know the day I was meant to see you I flew back from La that evening and I think so I got back to the accounts at I think I was on BBC news on the Monday talking about what was going on. I really felt a public service obligation at the start. I thought a lot of people certainly in the UK trust me and want to see what I have to
say about so I really felt responsibility to go on but then after a few weeks, I thought these are all quite negative stories and I won't mention which station it was what I did suggest we do with positive piece around this and there just wasn't that much interest and I saw really started to see okay kind of so, there's a certain story and a narrative that
Set me people all either one thing or media companies are wanting to put us out and Ice II went for a period of two months and I didn't go actually I just thought you know, what I feel that every time I go on you know, and they're taking questions from the audience and the guidance at the time was literally changing every single day. And a lot of the guidance didn't make sense and it was going in Conflict to the previous guidance and I just thought you know what?
My kids are at home. My wife probably was quite anxious at the start. So we have a very different view that I've been pretty relaxed throughout most of this. My wife on the other hand has got quite anxious from time to time and I've learnt that it's not fair of me to expect her to look at the situation like me. It's about to try to understand though. This is real in her heads. This is how she feels and I need to sit there and try and listen to that and be there and support.
And I was finding that I was getting really stressed out about going on the media to talk about a negative story. That's why I just stopped doing it. And you know what? I found I found myself happier Karma having more fun with the children getting more work done and it's been it's been a such an intense period that I think we've experienced so many emotions, but they've been supercharged like the highest of highs and the lowest of lows. I thought it would you say that's the same for you rich? Yeah. Everybody's on Earth.
Hair trigger it's being fueled by the fear narrative and the anxiety and the stress and the economic insecurity. Like all of these things are very real and just to be very clear myself. Like I'm conducting myself like a good citizen. I'm wearing a mask when I go out and you know go inside to any kind of retail establishment. I mean, all I do is go to the grocery store essentially unless I'm home or doing the podcast but I'm respecting the protocols that you know that are being
In terms of social distancing and Cetera. Meanwhile, I'm also taking care of myself and trying to put myself in the best position to manage all of this and I've been also on that sine wave of feeling fine and then having moments of depression and despair that kind of come in waves as a result of the isolation and the inability to kind of plan for the future and have things to look forward to like I'm trying to not
not discount that because I think that those things are very real and you know in what you just related on my mind returns to another theme from eisenstein's essay, which is this forced moment of repose being an opportunity for us to re-evaluate reassess the systems that are broken right now the systems that led to a novel virus appearing to the
and that it did in the first place why you know, we're in a society where there are so many comorbidity factors among too many people what is going on with how we structured our society that has created so many ills that require our redress at the moment and I'm not seeing a lot of discussion about that either and I feel like that's a missed opportunity in you know, if we can identify
A gift in all of this and that was really at the core of what eisenstein was trying to say. It's this opportunity to make some fundamental changes.
Yeah, I couldn't agree more and like I think it depends, you know, what to who you are how you experience this this lockdown this pandemic, but I want to see would say and I've I have worked for much of my career in sort of quite deprived areas with
Log of sort of so-called low socioeconomic status and you know what there is very much this narrative that all it's okay for some right? It's all right for some of us, but I think we've got to be very careful with that line of thought. So let me let me just expand it out for a second and then I'll bring it back in when we talk about let's say lifestyle medicine how we can use lifestyle to help not only prevent getting sick.
But also potentially help treat certain conditions. So we try and improve them. There's this big sort of thing in the UK recently where it's like, oh this is you know, this is classist. It's all right for some, you know, we should be we shouldn't waste our time with this obsession with lifestyle which should be focusing on the real causes which is poverty and actually, you know that they're sort of the problems in society with rich and poor and they're sort of disparities in income levels. And again, it's very much like that.
It's either or you've got to choose and it is just not really reflexive. Sometimes I think people like saying these things when they actually haven't dealt with these communities right when you when you've been in these communities and like I have and of course my experience is very much is very much influenced by my patient population out. It could be completely different in a different area. I accept that but you know even people who are I've seen who are struggling
They're on benefits. They really don't have much disposable income. You know, there's all kinds of pressures on them. Just saying older environment around you needs to change. There's nothing you can do. It's very disempowering. I have found that when you speak with respect to these people when you actually communicate with them when you actually listen so they know you've heard them and you speak to them their opens change their open to rethinking about their
Different way I've done that recently with some people and really help them reframe the pandemic even though they were under Financial pressures because there is a gift that is an opportunity. There's always an opportunity to learn from anything in life. They're ready for all of us no matter how bad and I really feel strongly about that something I'll be thinking a lot about over the summer when this big lifestyle medicine thing blew up in the UK and I thought it's just reflective everything that's device from the world at the moment is either or is black and white. It's like well
You can have both you can try and improve the social situation for certain communities, but you can also Empower them and I really feel you know, once you lose agency. Once you feel you have no Aid say over what happens to you doesn't matter what your income level is its downhill you have to and and I've been thinking about the word Empower literally in the last couple of days. I was chatting to my video guide Gareth. We were just talkin about
Empower and I thought oh to give power to I can oh it's so obvious but it depended drop for me are to give power. Of course. That's why I love to empower people no matter who they are because you're giving someone power no matter how small you're giving them an opportunity to know that. Hey I can make a change. And so I said I'd go why did I bring it back? And I don't know where I went. But essentially I really feel that for all of us. There is something
that we can take from this, you know, and I think really we should all be looking for that and I've been encouraging people from the start on my Instagram stories and on my platforms to say guys do a bit of journaling, you know, you won't remember how you felt now when things return, you know in inverted commas, you know, whatever normal or normality or you know, whatever whatever that ends up being and looking like said, maybe do some journaling and write down how you feel. So when you are back in your
You kind of remember some of those insights that you had when you could hear the birds singing and you could hear and you could have Birds on a way you've never heard before and the way you could cycle with your children down a busy street. And actually there was no one on the roads and you weren't worried about safety and anything. So I think if people have Journal they will have some very interesting Reflections to look back on.
We'll be back in a Flash but first, can we talk about shaving?
Now let's talk about shaving but Rich you're looking like Wim Hof these days with that most glorious and mostly Gray beard. Yes. This is true. Some love it. My wife loves it others think I look like I'm a hundred years old and are asking me to shave it either way. It's here to stay for a beat. But look, I still got to shave that neck and wait for it my legs because you know cycling swimming Triathlon all that good stuff, which
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segue into the new book
feel better and five which is all about empowerment and
you know, it's in the vein of your other books, but I think that
what you've done
with this book and what I love about it is that it's so action-driven, you know, and I think if you have a particular superpower that defines who you are in the work that you do, it's your ability to distill rather complicated and confusing Concepts that are related to diet and health and fitness and stress reduction and
Hurry and sleep by drilling down to very basic doable Common Sense tasks and to do it with like a bit of a plum and and Charisma so that people can digest it and receive it and most importantly implement it into their lives. And I think you've accomplished that with this book, which is really about fundamentally habit change.
Yeah, I mean, thanks Rich this
Is you know, it's my third book and I remember when I sat down to write it. It's I was like, well, what do you want another book for? What's the purpose? Say? What what are you going to contribute that's different from the first two and what I feel or so, although I feel the first two were very actionable what I really felt strongly about is that
That's a lot of there's a lot of what to do out there whether it's on podcast or books as a lot of all you should do this. This is what you can do. In fact, we've never lived in a better time for learning what to do. There's just you know, there's so many options, but potentially with that choice comes paralysis and you see a lot of people not actually doing anything and I again, I'm very much informed by my almost two decades now of seeing patients.
Not everyone with the information actually goes and does anything and I thought well, why is that I've always I've always been fascinated as to which patients can make change and which patients can turn. Is there a common factor now, I figured out early on that. Actually there was a couple of tricks you can use to help people make change and transform their lives, but I figured out that you've got to start small with most people now not with everyone and we can
To that, but with most people you got to start small and you know that I think the best example to illustrate it it was this patient who 42 year old chap that I saw in my surgery. He's got he had a lot of problems that actually many people listening to this right now. I probably also facing he was a little bit overweight. He was struggling with his mood and he was low in energy very very common problems and Rich. I remember sitting down with him and it was quite clear to me.
Me that there were various aspects in his lifestyle that were probably at play. We discussed a number of options the option he worthy lights with strength training and he was like get doc. I love it strength training. I get it. It's going to help me with my mood is gonna help you feel better. It's going to help me lose weight. And then I'm not done it since I was a teenager brilliant and he goes, what do you want me to do 40 minutes three times a week.
I said hey, look don't be amazing. If you can do that and he goes off right? So this is the key. He's got the motivation at that point. He's ready to go. He's like got a smile. I'm going to do this one month later when he comes back in for follow-up why he walks in like a different person. So he's he's you know his shoulders of world around a little bit. He's a bit sheepish and I said, hey look how you getting on how was the gym, you know what's been going on and I said doc look, you know what? I've not have not.
Really been Works been super busy super stressful. The Jim's not really that close to me. I've just not ended up going and Rich why that why that is such an influential consultation for me. It's because I remember sitting there thinking I didn't think as many people expect me to have thought why is he not done? What I've asked him to do. I just thought wrong and you've clearly not giving him advice that he feels is relevant for him in the context of his life.
And so I took off my my jacket and I said what I'm going to teach you a workout right now, so I taught him this 5 bodyweight exercises modified them for his ability. And I said, can you do them because yeah, no problem. I said, okay. Can you do this a way to do this five minutes twice a week? And he looked at me and he said what 10 minutes a week I said, yeah. Can you manage that? Because ye course I can find I can I can manage that. That's okay. I'll see you in four weeks. He goes off for weeks later. He comes back rich
Each and he Wharton big smile on his face chest puffed out I said how you doing? And I said doc. I feel amazing. Like you said do farm that's twice a week. I found it. So easy. I do that work out for 10 minutes every evening before I had my evening meal and he that was 70 minutes of strength training a week, but he couldn't do 40 minutes three times a week by making it super easy. He feels good. He increases it not because
I asked him to but because he wanted to and then he was doing that for a good five years white send him into the strength training for five years and that led to what I've written about that. I called the Ripple effects from there. He was eating better sleeping better and now he gets up each morning and does a breath work practice. This stuff was not on his radar six seven years ago, right? It just wasn't but by making it small by making it achievable. Not only can he do it his identity.
Changes along the way and I think that's why I think this book has proved so successful and popular with certainly people here in the UK. It's because it works it's based on 20 years of clinical experience that I've got. But also when I when I think last time I saw you actually I'd maybe just come back from seeing BJ for in up in Santa Rosa on his boot camp and BJ who's arguably one of the world's leading experts in human.
Yeah, certainly. I feel that he is he said it was such a beautiful meeting because he looked at the book and a he said some really nice things about it. He said it's one of the best habit change programs. He's ever come across deceptively simple, but remarkably effective which was so humbling to get that from someone like that. But what was with the interesting I've come to see patients and habit change from Clinical experience that I've come to it. Not from research. I'm not a researcher.
Searcher I've come to it from what I have seen work with real people with busy people with busy lives. BJ's come to it from scientific research. And then this beautiful meeting which is why we hit it off so much. He's like our your clinical experience is replicating exactly what my scientific research is saying and it was it was lovely to sort of see that and I'm really passionate that I'm not a researcher. I keep abreast of the research but as we've spoken about before Rich, I'm a bat results. I'm about
Helping the person in front of me if I'm not able to help them. I'm like, well, you've got to do better wrong and you've got to find another way of connecting and you've got to find another way of making them feel that they want to do
this. I had forgotten that you did the boot camp with BJ and we were going to talk about that when you were on your way over and I've since been going back and forth with BJ trying to get them on the podcast. I think his work is incredible and it's impossible to read your book and not think about
about the work of BJ Fogg the work of Charles duhigg the work of James Clear like these people who have really pushed the boundaries in terms of helping us understand how we form habits how we break them how we create new ones and if there's an overarching kind of theme and all of their work, it's that you have to distill these things down into very tiny actionable changes that fit within the construct of your life and the way you kind of articulated
Book is is by using this idea of bending like don't bend life around the demands of your program create it such that it bends around the way that your life is constructed. And when you share that example of the the guy who wanted to start a strength training program, I'm sure when he said, oh, I'm going to go to the gym a couple times a week a couple times a week. It doesn't sound daunting. He's not conscious of the fact that his environment and the
Strength of his job are not as conducive to making that happen as reality ends up dictating. Right? So the only way to get them to form the new habit is to break it down into a bite-sized chunk. That's so preposterously small that it doesn't feel like it moves the needle at all, but it creates this a starting point and then an emotional attachment to the behavior and then ultimately momentum which almost
Has like this ethereal spiritual energy like once you have momentum these habits become self-perpetuating and I don't know what that's about precisely but I've seen it in my own life. Like it's so hard to begin something but once you kind of begin that process and become more and more invested in it, it becomes easy. So why is it easy when you have momentum and so hard to begin?
That's a great question. Uh, you know that the sort of the magic of momentum what is going on there. Look I think is how we're wired as humans rights. It's it's as BJ talks about and as I've seen it's not the repetition that wise in the behavior. It's the emotion right? We're human beings. Basically what we were talking about right at the start. We are social beings. We've got feelings. We like to connect with others and when our
When we feel good, right we want to feel that again, which is why a big part is, how do you how do you help yourself? Feel good after you've done something that's a really important part of behavior change and actually you do talk about momentum. I even if you talk about something like the calm meditation app and lots of Wellness apps. They've got streaks, you know, they know that we Thrive a momentum and I remember what I was using calm religiously last year for a period of time when I got to like 40 days or 41 days off.
Like oh man. I don't want to break my streak like at that. I don't want to start at 0 again. I'm gonna have to keep going. We know that that's how we're wired as humans. So, I think I think momentum is is very very important. But I think also on that theme Rich I'd say that
It's also the way we look at these good habits, but we don't look at them in the same way as bad habit. So in a bad habits in inverted commas bad, right? I'm sort of moving away from corn things good or bad. You know, they all these behaviors serve a purpose in some way. Right? Let's say you've got something let's say for five minutes a day can tick consecutively I asked you to get a full fat software Inc of your
Choice like, you know, let's say it's a cola brand and for 5 consecutive minutes is used to drink that.
You know, you wouldn't surprise you what it if after a few days your teeth start to feel a little bit a little bit. It's all you, you know, you don't sleep as well. You're a bit moody or if I actually just smoked a cigarette for five continuous minutes every day. It wouldn't surprise you there for a few days. You'd be coughing a little bit your mouth won't feel great. Okay. So we we know with bad habits. We see how quickly they can add up to causing problems.
But when we flip it and we look at you know, so-called good habits or the habits that we're trying to bring in. Well, we look at it completely different way. We think it's got to be really hard. It's got to be punishing got a deprive myself. I've got a I've got a really push and hit it hard in the gym or it doesn't count and we completely bias the way we look at it. But you know toothbrushing is a great example, you know, we brush our teeth for two minutes in the morning team. It's like 4 minutes a day. We know that's going to look after our
Health by and large the life that we don't do the the the
hour-and-a-half brush on the weekend. Exactly. No, that's why I often say I say, you know, you
don't not brush and then we can go. Hey, you know what? I'm going all in on Sunday. I'm having the one-hour deep clean today, right? You know, we don't do it. We know a little bit regular makes the difference and you know, what's really interesting is if we you can look at other Industries outside health and see how they've got this down so business am
Has on white Amazon, you know, I think certainly now must be one of the world's biggest companies right that that they estimate say about five years ago Rich one in mood to one-click ordering Reports. Say their profits went up by 300 million dollars a year.
I want to thought it would have been even higher than that.
Maybe yeah, maybe it was Yeah, the more seamless you make
it. Yeah, except a point
exactly they get it they
And if you make something easy, if you don't have four or five steps to make a decision with each step is a decision is it Opposite is a reason to back out of making that decision. You make it easy people buy more Netflix YouTube. They all do the same thing. They roll one video into the neck. So it's easy. So before you have a chance to think I need to stop I need to go to sleep. You're into the next episode right? I'm not criticizing those companies. I get it there. They've got an understanding of behavior science and they
is it for their industry and I'm saying when it's Health, we don't apply the same rules. We think when it comes to our health, we've got to make it
hard. Hmm, but our environments are not always optimally conducive to making the healthy choice if you're walking past soda machine after soda machine and when you're driving your car, you're constantly passing fast food restaurants. There's a Temptation in that inherent environment. That is leading people.
Towards the easy unhealthy choice and in terms of creating the healthy environment. I'm thinking about what Dan buettner does with his blue zones project going to the cities and getting them to create bike lanes and getting rid of the vending machines and and and changing the environment. So the environment is conducive to the healthy behaviors in the healthy choices because his whole thesis which is not dissimilar from your own is that unless the environment is conducive to back.
Kind of, you know, productive positive change human beings because of their psychological malfunctioning or whatever. It is the way that we're wired we're going to we're going to repeat the unhealthy Behavior like we have to make it so that it's easier and more accessible for you know, just like the example of the guy you just use like the gym was out of the way on it's not on the way to or from work. So his environment was not conducive to him going there. So you have to craft a new solution.
It in the home. So it's easier. It's at hands reach.
Hey, I agree. You know, I love Downs work and I agree. What if our environments made the Healthy Choice the Easy Choice, we wouldn't need this conversation. Right if I write people would generally be as they have done in the blue zones for many years. They would by default be making healthy choices because that's what you know, the environment supports around them. So I support
That work and I think yes, or you know governments councils which schools workplaces should all be seeking to change the environments to support healthy choices, which would actually make people much more productive as well, you know in workplaces, for example, yes, they they would actually be much more productive. So there's a business case as well as a health case to do that. But again going back to one of the themes early on we've got to also deal with the environment the way it currently is, right.
Noun and the ideal of changing these environments. I think we should be advocating for I think what Dan's doing going into schools changing them creating these new blue zones. I am all for that but I don't think it also means we don't need to empower individuals as well because frankly much of the world is living in a challenging environment particularly now, and actually here's the thing I would say to people control the environment you can control. Okay, so you can't control the environment outside your front door.
Or you can make you can take a few steps to try and limit or reduce the likelihood is that you're going to get tempted but you can't control that you can control your home environments. You can control what you do in your home. You can control whether you do some of these 5-minute Health snacks a day and I have seen that if you do those things because of the change in identity that they cause you then are much more likely to make better choices outside, even when
Faced with the Temptation and I think that comes down to momentum as well. It's kind of you're doing these three firemen a house snacks a day and you're feeling calm where you've got more energy. You're sleeping better you feel better about yourself, which I think is really important. But I think that starts to translate into the choices you make outside when the environment is challenging and so I don't as I say you can do short term you can do long term or you can do
both.
Mmm, you know, yeah, I like how you phrase it as as health snacks. Basically the book is broken up into these three sections mind body and heart and within each section, you kind of break down a variety of different practices that all can be applied in 5 minute intervals three times a day, but you call them snacks, right? So they're almost like treats treats to
yourself.
Yeah, and it has a bit of a play on words. Of course, they're you know, only one of the health snacks is actually a real snack. Everything else is is not food related, but you know interests and Rich, even though food isn't a big part of this. This book has helped so many people lose weights right at the map messages. I've got from people saying this program and you've read it. You might be thinking how is this helping people lose weight?
But the reason is and I think why it is so effective and this is not for weight loss as for anything basically this for any one of us to help us thrive in our lives, but the whole conversation around weights is often about food choices. And of course food choices are important, but what are we seeing in this pandemic? We're seeing a huge amount of weight gain, right huge amounts of weight gain. Now if you if you look into the research, it is very clear. You know, there was a US study which showed that 79
Science and nearly 80% of people change their eating behavior in response to stress about 45% will eat more about 35% will eat less. So what just gone on for the last four or five months probably one of the most stressful times in your lifetime and in my lifetime so many people are facing unprecedented levels of stress. So, of course a certain section of that those 45% are going to be eating more of probably
unhelpful foods to help them cope with the stress. So therefore it stands to reason if you help people cope with their emotional health with their mental health, which is what my program helps people do. Well, of course, it's going to lead to a lot less stress eating and I feel strongly that in the weight loss conversation the book after this that I'm writing at. The moment is on weight loss because I feel the whole thing that we're missing in the weight loss conversation. There's lots of what we eat what we eat. What does
Should be what we should be saying it's not okay fine. There's some principles about what we should be eating that, you know, there can be debates about but I think 85 90 % of the principles are pretty well established in terms of what people should be doing. But why we still struggling with weight gain what we're not addressing why we eating we're not addressing the fact that we used to use food to address a hole in our stomach, but now we're using food to address a hole in our
Hearts, you know when we're stress we eat when we're lonely we eat when we're bored. We when we eat when we have discomfort that we don't want to pay attention to we eat and again I get it. I understand why people did I will if I'm feeling low sometimes or feeling a bit stressed. I may go to Something Sweet. That is that's not because I'm weak that's because I'm a human being who has who uses food as a way of coping so I find it. So interesting. I knew this program would because
I seen it with patience, but it's interesting to see the public response sir. Oh, this is helping me lose weight and it's not addressing my
diet Mmm Yeah, I mean there's food addiction and that's a certain category of people who have extremely unhealthy relationship with what they're putting in their in their mouths, but most people perhaps all people use food to regulate their emotional state and I think most of us are completely unaware
We're of the extent to which that's true. Whether it's a chocolate bar or ice cream or what have you there's the examples of you know, feeling depressed and trying to self-medicate but I think that we do it much more rampantly, then we're aware and a lot of these tools the snacks that you relate in the book are really related to bringing you more into the present being more mindful paying attention to not just your environment, but
Self your body your emotional state and I feel like I don't just feel like I know that the more present that you can be in your life. The more self aware that you are then you become like these unconscious urges that you're doing compulsively without even being aware. You're suddenly aware of them and the more awareness you bring to that the more you realize that it's an unhealthy habit. That's worthy of
redress. Yeah many people attend.
Too busy for that a wet as the rushing around they getting up there on the emails and one the social they're sort of rushing around get taken their kids somewhere, you know, there's never any Solitude. There's never any silence that consuming the news and then they're worrying about what's going to happen in the world and you mentioned environment but it's really interesting is when you do these Health snacks, once you start paying attention what you start to understand how you're feeling you just tap in you just get a little window as to what it can.
feel like that then translates your more it's you know, it's that mindfulness actually permeates into your life so that when you're out and about later and you are tempted you like. Ah, oh I'm of course, you know, I'm feeling stressed. I've not really had. I've not been for my morning walk today. That's why I'm craving that chocolate bar. And again, it's about then you can make a choice with the awareness what one?
Patient who slightly unrelated but just to show you when you get that awareness. I had this sort of like, I don't know how old she was probably sort of late 40s. She was she was married. She had three children. She had these awful migraines and she having them for years and she didn't really tight like taking migraine tablets that she had been prescribed before the bad side effects didn't really work very well. And I remember the first few consultations. I really felt there's a
Huge stress components here. You know. She I think she was a lawyer actually rich and sort of shocking shocking. Yeah exactly. She was rushing around and I was trying to sort of suggest. Hey, look, let's look at some ways to manage this and she goes are you going to tell me about yoga? Right? You've tried yoga. I'm not interested. I don't have time for yoga. I thought okay,
let's might very well not just a lawyer a very British lawyer.
I've
recommended exactly and it was so interesting that actually what we agreed on ultimately is that we tried a few things. They wouldn't work. She kept coming back saying I told you nothing's going to work. You know, this is just the way my life is and then it turned out that she really liked adult coloring books which are a huge rage here in the UK because it's default mindfulness, right? And she goes we had a long conversation. Has she agreed? She said okay that
Sounds interesting. She has one I'm going to have time and again, I started to apply with us some of the rules of habit change Behavior change that I sort of summarize and outlined in the book and I said to her I said look, okay. Tell me about your morning just as okay. Look I wake up about 6:30. There's Mayhem the children are running around. I need to get them ready for school. This was obviously pre-pandemic and you know, but I'll go down and make myself a cup of tea and you know, we're of course we're in England. She
would make myself a cup of tea and I said, okay, that sounds perfect. What you do then she goes, well, I just sort of posture around I sort of try and get the kids ready. I said look do you need motivation to make yourself a cup of tea just like no I'm going to do that. I said, okay. So this is one of those rules. Let's stick on this new behavior on Two and a behavior. That's you're already doing without thinking about it. So onto an existing habit basically, so she said, okay, so I said, okay what you got to do?
We want to leave the coloring pad and we want to leave the pens next to the kettle in the kitchen and we can die set why these things are so important but it sounds pretty basic but it's so so important. So in a nutshell, she would come down. She would make her a cup of tea and for five minutes while she was drinking her cup of tea. She would do adult coloring in and she started to tap into what it felt like when the noise just shut down and
Her mind, she wasn't accessing that at all rich and within about four or five days, her migraines had gone down by sort of 4050 percent or so and a couple of months later. She was hardly getting them anymore. Now. I'm not saying that happens with every migraine sufferer. But the point is it was stressed that was driving a huge part of her migraines. She needed a way to access a state where she could switch off her stress State at an activator sort of
Survive and we luxation States and the first her it was coloring books right for someone else. It might be something different but for her it was that and by applying some simple rules of habit change number one the most important one. You got to make it easy number to stick it onto a behavior that you are already doing people ignore this stuff, right? They hear it and they go. Yeah, but I don't need to follow those rules. I you know, I can fit in at other times no know if people are listening to this now and they think back to behaviors they've tried to
Incorporate into their lives in the past and ask them selves did they follow both of those rules? And I bet for most people if they if they hadn't managed to make it stick one of those things wasn't at play and so for her, it was transformative and again in terms of making it easy. You got to leave the coloring book that you've got to leave the Crayons there because if you come down in the morning and put the kettle on and that's not there. It's like, you know what I don't have time today. Anyway, forget it. I'll do it.
Morrow and again you talked about momentum. This is momentum the other way before, you know, it's three four five days before you've done it and it's something you used to do more than something you're still doing and again, I just I'm just sharing that to show you just how versatile this approach is and how it literally works for everyone. And again what was important there Rich she chose what she wants to do. I didn't shove meditation or yoga down her face, right? That wasn't for her.
At that time and that's what I've done in the book. I've given people 40 or 55 minute Health snack options and I say all you got to do is choose three. That's it. You just choose three and do them and it's I think it you know, which this was the hardest book for me to write like, I don't know if you can tell that from reading it because the challenge I set myself Richmond writing this was
How do you reach more people? How do you get people who didn't pick out your first two books to access this more rounded holistic approach to health that is clearly working for so many people and that you've got to make it simpler and it was hard because I thought I'd already made it simple. I thought after I finished my first book a second book. Yeah, you've super simplified it but I thought no so the challenge was if in the first and second, but I'd work up an idea over 10 to 12 pages in this what?
I challenge was wrong. And can you put all the fats in one page? Can you distill the absolute essence of what a person at home needs to know in order to do that behavior. And you know it Simplicity is the hardest thing. Of course, we know that trying to keep things simple. I found the other books easier to write you get lost in your own thoughts go down on a bit of a, you know, go on a little sidewalk with it and I thought
- on a personal level which is a bit of it's a bit of addressing your own ego about trying to say look wrong and the book is about action. The book is about helping people. What do they need to know? The book is not about you showing off how much you know, it's not about you shoving study after study after study down people's throat. I'm not against that I like writing books like that. I like reading books like that. But the purpose of this is this is not a what you should do, but this is a how you should do it.
It
mmm, I'm still trying to get over the fact that there are adult coloring books. You should try it. That was
writing. It's not for me right identify the female thing right now. And the reason I'm saying that is because my wife loves doing it one of her friends loves doing it and I've got to see my
dish. I never even heard of that. I never even heard of that. That's cool. Check it out. But yeah, I mean we listen we the last time you were on the show we talked about this like I told you I was like, you know, I know you're a smart guy. I know you know the
Send you spent a lot of time immersed in the studies and the research and the book very much reflects this intentionality around simplifying everything and I wasn't sure that you could simplify these Concepts any further than you already had like the stress solution, but you managed to definitely do it in this book. I mean, it's very, you know, it's extremely practical like you've stripped out any of you know, kind of the scientific mumbo-jumbo that you would typically find in a book like that and it is a
A healthy exercise in ego reduction and in humility because it would be very easy to hide behind a bunch of studies and you know establish your kind of social proof and Bona fides by saying, oh there's this study and I read that study but how helpful is that to the end user to the reader who's just like tell me what to do.
Yeah, I think in this conversation, we've just we've stumbled on the essence.
Off one of the big problems. I see how they're the kind of inertia to do things the timer which we're living is wonderful we get so much information, right we can listen to podcasts we can read blogs we can read books we can listen to audio books, you know, we don't have to sit with our own thoughts anymore. We can constantly be consuming and I know this is something you have spoken about before but consumption is not always leading to action and you know, you've always
always said mood for those action, right? This is if this book is actually in many ways trying to prove your points that actually take the action and everything else follows, you know, I became a doctor Rich to help people, right? So now that's the most cliched thing to say a doctor, you know, what's the help people but it's the truth and I couldn't have written a book like this five years ago not because I didn't know it but because I don't I don't think I felt comfortable enough in who I was, you know, I
He felt a need to oh, I need to I need to prove my point. I need to show all these studies. I've done that like I don't feel I need to do that, you know 20 years in with the experiencing tens of thousands of patients. I know what works. I've seen it time and time again, I've seen human beings with busy lives make change and not make change and I've seen a certain level of consistency with what those things are.
And so the goal has been write a book that helps people take action and I've been blown away by the impact Rich because this book now not only is it being the most successful of all my books, but it's getting into all different walks of life. So, you know, like I've done lots of well being taught us online over lock down to big companies like Facebook in Europe and all kinds of who are using this program with their employees what I've got schools so many schools have approached me since the book came out in
They're implementing this in that in in schools, which is so gratifying for me to see as a parent of two young children. And what are the obstacles what what a most obstacles for most well-being programs or for most schools. What would they say? The two biggest obstacles are to make change number one time? We don't have time. We don't tell me the curriculum number 2 money. Well, I've taken them all off the table Rich because everything takes five minutes.
And pretty much everything in the book is free right at again. That's something I'm super passionate about. We want to talk about Wellness being accessible to everybody not just the affluent. Well, actually I challenge anyone to say that this is a classic book. I've used these same principles one. I was in an inner-city practice at all Dem when people run benefits were huge immigrant population with loads of pressures and they work I've used those 5 minute workout.
At them obvious ties 5-minute breathing exercises with them after I've used those five minute yoga flows with them. They work those people will do them, even though they don't have much money, but I've got busy, you know CEOs running companies who are also using it it is it is universal because there are so many options that but when if you really keep in your head as an orbit really in that book Rich and feel passion five of every time I was writing I was like does that need to go in is all
Are you indulging yourself a little bit here? And I was being harsh only as a discipline says go. I want this book to feel different. I want it to be. Oh, wow. I can do this and I didn't realize when I wrote it actually rich it as a doctor. You would think this is a health book, but it's only in the last few weeks as I've been reflecting cuz I had three weeks off social media during August actually where I had a lot of insights and a lot of I sort of went
With a bit and really start to think about all kinds of things and I thought this is actually an identity change book because the actions you take determine your identity often. We have a certain identity based upon the way our life is but until we take action, you know that patient I mentioned at the start of this conversation why it's he initially comes in one month later having been unable to go to the gym.
He's a failure in his own mind. He's like he's his whole identity is one of someone I can't follow Health Plans. Nothing ever works for me. You know, I've tried this book. I've tried that plant. Nothing works. Hold on. I flip it make it easy of him make it achievable and actionable next time he comes in. He's like a few foot taller. He's bouncing. He's got a smile on his face. Now, he's not only done what I've asked him to do. He's superseded it. Now. He's taken on the identity of someone who's successful.
Someone who can make Behavior change and I think that's the power when you take action. Mmm
willingness also plays an important part in in this of course, I mean if he was not willing to do anything different than nothing is going he's going to change right like somebody has to have an Impulse or a desire to improve their life and to get out of their comfort zone a little bit. Even if it's only just slightly and the book is really
A oriented around you know, emphasize emphasizes the the slight nature of of all of these practices to make them inherently doable and accessible and replicable no matter who you are and and I like that about it. I mean, I think
You know, I got flamed on social media recently because I put out a little video or there's a little discourse that I had in a recent podcast around self-help books and I chose a admittedly inflammatory title saying, you know, you should stop reading self-help books not because I don't think self-help books don't have value. But really my point was the information is not the problem. There's a bazillion books out there everything you need to know about how to
Change your life how to improve your mindset your body your health your Fitness. It's been written and we can refine that and there's always new ideas. And that's all Grand. But ultimately it's useless unless you can Implement those changes into your life to translate what the words on the page into action. And I think what you've done in this book is is is create that accessibility which is fundamental. I mean, that's the key if you can't make that
even then it's of no value.
Yes about taking action. It's about you know, it's about doing something it's about people listening to this conversation at the end the fair not hopefully enjoying it. Hopefully feeling is spied in some way. Hopefully getting some new bits of information or a reminder of certain bits of information. But then it's what are you gonna do? What are going to do on the back of this you're going to keep walking keep, you know, keep driving. Are you going to ghosts go back to your life we can ago.
Interesting is a one thing that I can take from that and apply because that's really that's really where the change comes. It's I mean I'm so I'm really passionate about this Rich because
I don't think these things are as hard as we think they are and actually there is a lot of information out there, but that's the what right what to do not how to do it like an look. I love BJ's work. I love James closed book Atomic habits. It's fantastic. Right really really great stuff where I think mine is is different there, but they're very clearly. Mine is very different book. It's it's very practical. It's very much. Like let me distill it down into the essence the six rules of behavior change, but actually she
you what you can do and I really think that toothbrushing analogy is really important for people right because I with I've spent Health into mind which has mental health body physical health and heart which is what I call connection and emotional health and if you look at it another way
Every person listening to this as giving their Dental Health four minutes of their time a day.
But how much time are you giving your mental health each day your physical health and your emotional health are they not also worth four minutes, you know is that they not worth the same level and care
toothbrushing what y'all try the ultra endurance athlete inside of me is offended by that. Well, you know, I will because I'm like, I'm like the it has to be a big Grand gesture. You know, it's like that's what gets me excited. Like I'm going to change every and I don't always succeed, but I have a more of the mindset.
That it needs to be difficult because that's what gets me emotionally engaged. I'm just wired that way. I know most people aren't but it's a little bit different
Rich. So I think you're interesting for a couple of reasons. So firstly I would say that for some people as I said at the start I said, some people don't need to start small now those people I've observed in my practice and I would imagine you to be an example of this where something so big and so significant has happened whether it's
it's chest pain going upstairs when at a certain age, whether it's a bereavement losing a job losing a house some significant life event that suddenly causes you to reframe everything sure they can turn around and change their lives over you can hide us
that there's a potential energy and that they can be harnessed for some dramatic change
and I get that and I expect that. So if that is if you are currently in that situation fine, but surely the most people who are not
At that extreme where they haven't yet got to the point where I've got to do this. Actually. I'm at Rock Bottom unless I change things are going to be really bad. I think starting small is really really valuable and really important. Now the other thing I would say now, I think I heard on a recent podcast of yours that you have starts a strength training. Hmm. Is that right? You've started going to the
gym and that was an example. I wrote it down. I was going to share with you that that I have started very
slowly in tiny little chunks and I'm now in week 3, I've got a little bit of momentum and I'm able to show up for it in a pretty fluid way and I'm starting to increase my bandwidth like the amount that I'm doing but I did have to start very small to begin that habit
shut. I think it depends on it depends on what aspects of your life you're talking about. So someone could look at you from the outside and go. Oh man.
Super fit guy, you're a you know plant powered Wellness Advocates you run out for marathons. You've been called one of the fittest people in the world. Yeah, they could look from the outside to go. He's got everything legs. What does he need to worry about his health and wellness for but then you could also go well is which covering all his bases. Is he looking after his emotional health? Is he looking after his mental health? Is it looking after the muscle the muscles on his body which are even more important as as
He and as all of us age because then you could go. Well, hold on a minute, maybe riches and again, I don't mean to make this personal. I'm just using it. You don't mind. Do you no. No, I'm go. I don't know you you can say okay, which is eating, you know, plant-based food. Lots of Whole Foods. He's running and going on his bike but is integrating his muscles could this program for you for years ago if you did like what I Strength train every day, but not at the gym, I've
No, I think I missed a day for three years. I do a five-minute workouts every day. And I sometimes I do more right but often I'll just do those five minutes and it's part of my morning. We've seen I make coffee. I put my timer on that before I plunge the cafeteria it goes on for four or five minutes. And in that time I will do bodyweight exercises or kettlebell swings or something because it's all there in my kitchen setup. I do it in my pajamas. I don't need to get changed. There's no friction between me.
Me and doing that behavior I come up so I can kitchen I don't need a reminder to make my coffee. It's you know, I don't need my opinion my PA to call me and say hey you got to make coffee in the morning. No, I'm going to do that. So that's part of my life. Now some days if I've got time. Yeah, I'll go and rock out a 40 minute workouts. I might go for a run. I might go for a swim but it's my tooth brushing for my strength. It's that five minutes everyday little often consistency.
And I would argue potentially that had you for example implemented something like that for years. Okay, maybe there would be less of a need now to go right I've got to go and source of strength and go to the gym now. I've been presumptuous because I don't every aspect of your life. But what about the point I'm trying to make is we've all got our shreds the things we like doing and often we all of us myself included neglect the weak spots. Yeah, and one of the things that's been really
really gratifying since the book came out. A lot of people have contacted me and said, you know, what if at the lady who helped me design the book she she said to me so don't give you I've always thought I was really Fit and Well, you know, I do Pilates regularly I walk every day, but that section on heart.
I do nothing. Like I literally do nothing and since since working on the book, she started to phone a friend every evening and she can't get them. She sends them a really personal message on text or WhatsApp and she is said to me wrong. It's transformed the way I feel my other behaviors that I engage in that I'm trying to stop our almost just falling by the wayside because I'm addressing my
It's held my human connection side in health. And so she was fit in inverted commas, because you know weights good. She don't pull Artis. She's doing all the things that we think are an associate with Wellness, but there's a little there's a there's a blind spot there and I really what the thing I really think is is where the really affects what I'm really proud of about this this plan is it is it's not like BJ says it's deceptively simple, but it's very very effective because
You're covering each day mental health physical health and hearts out there. If you want to do more if you want to do a half hour meditation go for your life. If you want to have a long workout or a long run or a long bike ride as I will often do great, but I still do that five minute strength workout. It's not a substitute. So it's like toothbrushing for everything else in my
life. Yeah. I think that's solid guidance that I think the key even when is when even when you have the impulse to do more at least initially
Italy in the early phases to resist that Temptation because if you establish a pattern of let's say, oh well when I go to the gym, I do an hour, then you feel like the next day or a week later. If you don't do an hour that you're falling short, I think it's better to start with 10 minutes 15 minutes and then create momentum around that and then if you want to step it up, you're in a more sustainable situation to perpetuate it and to your point earlier. Yes. Had I done your five minute.
Thing, you know over the last four years. I might not be experiencing some of the back pain that I'm experiencing right now. But because I have this kind of addictive alcoholic personality this all-or-nothing disposition. I would look at strength training and say well if I can't do two hours, I'm not doing it and I really want to go trail running right now. So that's going to have to wait as opposed to if I just did five or ten minutes a day. I would be in a much better situation, but I swing like this.
Grand pendulum, so now I'm doing all strength training and like barely, you know, it's like I can't get you know balance is you know, the fickle lover that I just I can't quite Court, you know, and that's my constant refrain and when you say, you know, nobody the example of the woman in the Pilates, it's like whack-a-mole. Nobody's got all of these bases covered and I think being gentle on yourself and understanding that that's that's part of what it means to be human rather than
Judging yourself against a standard of like well, if I don't have my mind body and heart, you know, if I can't check all of those boxes every single day that I'm falling short of some, you know, some example that I've set for myself then you're going to be operating at your peril.
Yeah. I completely agree and I always say it's not about making people feel bad that they're not reaching these things. It's it's it's like I hope most of the things I do. I hope it comes from
Passion. It's very much not about talking down to people. It's about very much saying hey, look have you thought about this? You may not have looked at it like this. A lot of people will say which
I've always thought I've got to do 30 40 minutes or it doesn't it doesn't count. You know, like oh, I've got to do meditation. I've got to do 20 25 minutes a day what I've had with patience for I start them off on one minute a day. That's before. I knew any behavioral change science and say, okay. Well what can you agree to and commit to remember one lady who was suffering with menopausal symptoms and you know, we really together felt meditation would really help her but she just couldn't get it going and I said well
Can you commit to do you think I said what about 10 minutes ago is now 5 minutes now and so, okay. What about one minute?
Yeah, I could be one minute. I said all right. I'll make you a deal you start doing one minute. I'll give you a point for two weeks. But you're committing to one minute a day. I'll see you in two weeks. She comes back in two weeks and she's like, okay cool. Actually, I started off doing that. Sometimes it's two or three minutes now and then literally over to three months she built up to a 15 minute practice a day. The reason starting small is so important is that if I said start off with 20 minutes, you know, you do it for two three days. You're feeling really good. Yeah, I've
Meditation thing licked I feel great and then the next day. It's like ah, you know, I've got a few emails today. I went I'll do it later and I'm sort of talking from personal experience as well. And then later never comes and before you know, it's something you used to do and I've I've just found it to be very effective start small keep the bar super low meet that bar. And if the case you want to go more great, but the bar is all you have to meet and this is very much like what a my favorite Health snacks in the heart section.
Ian is the tea ritual which I do myself with my wife and when we do it, our relationship is different and what we don't do it. We just a bit more distance and it's super simple. It's just this five-minute dedication. We have to each other that each day.
At some point and for us we've locked in because you can't just say at some point. If you say at some point, you're not following rule number two, which is sticker onto an existing behavior. And you know every every human bet every Behavior. We do need a trigger of some sort that trigger can be your memory. It can be a reminder. But you know BJ's research has shown that the very best trigger is when you stick it onto an existing Behavior, so it becomes associated with that existing habit that you have a so.
When our kids are in bed, which is around 8 p.m. In the UK, we will come down to the kitchen do the washing up. And before we go on our computers or screens. We make a pot of mint tea and and the requirement is for five minutes. We're going to sit there and catch up now Rich, you know, the truth is there's no timer right at the end of five minutes. I don't I don't sort of go. Hey babe. I'm done. We've done our Instagrams waiting for me. Yeah right know some days. It's
We're still chatting in half an hour, but some days which it'll be like me or her we'll go look. I've got a ton of work to do let's do it, but I can't stay too long. But that's fine. And sometimes it's three four minutes. It's just that's how you create the Habit. That's how you create the streak. That's how you build a momentum. If one day it's an hour brilliant, but it doesn't mean the next day has to be an hour. And and the other thing I'd say Rich because some of your traits
But you mentioned there I kind of relate to maybe not in the same extreme or I don't perceive them into the same extreme, but I have certainly in my life been pretty back and forth with certain things, you know, a lot of my friends would say over and over again. You have got such an addictive personality. I'm either all in or all out and you know, they often say authors write the books that they need to write for themselves. So maybe there's an element of that in this
Us as well, but I have found in my own life. This has really helped me when I've kept it small but I've kept it consistent. It's it's the Bedrock upon which everything else set. So it's not like I don't like going all then and making a big challenge like, you know doing a big swimmer and that never done before I love that as much as the next person but at the same time I have learnt for me that having those three Health snacks a day just as that it's the
Bedrock it's like my tooth brushing. It's like these are the consistency. These are part of my day. Like it's just as much it's not a negotiable. It was a negotiable at first, but when when it's built in and it's a new habit, that's when things start to change good. I don't have to think about them and like if you go in my kitchen right now, there are four charts on the wall. So I've got my charts because every time I do them I took them because that's a key part to celebrate your success some some
Way of wiring in that behavior. So at the start of the year, I chose my three have snacks my wife chose her my two kids chose. There's now they're all a bit different because you know, it's about choosing the ones that resonate with you. But this has been very very effective with my children, right so they are School meditating every day. Now only for two minutes mine and I'm not saying that because I'm suddenly Super Dad not at all I have been for me.
Obviously if I'm writing a book on this tub, why would I not want the nearest and dearest to me to understand this stuff and experience it so but they've got it and they take off each day. They've got these beads but my that their grandparents gave to them which these Indian sort of Molly's mother beats. Yeah like you I've seen you I don't if you've got them on your wrist. I had a mine yesterday. I don't know exactly but they thought that then set they just do a few cycles of those each morning. They
I can't remember what the kids have got but you know that the heart snack is the Gratitude one that we do around the dinner table, but they take them off and they like ticking it so it's not the benefit that Daddy has told them about that. They'll get from it. They like getting their tics right and that's how their create look again. Like every parent. I'm trying to do the best I can I don't know if this will lead to them doing this when they're adults. I hope it does but I'm hoping I'm really trying to instill.
Then I remember Archie at the end of boot camp with with BJ. He asked everyone in the group. Okay. So what are you going to go and do with this stuff like that? Everyone went round there. Certainly, I think eight or ten of us there and I said, I'm going to teach them the fog behavior model as soon as I get home. I'm like what better skill could there be than to teach my children how human behavior works? You know, how what what are the three components that every human behavior needs, you know, and
And I don't mean to keep going on about this rich, but the the point is is that a lot of people will hear this and they won't apply it right. I say people forget the book right? Just listen to what we've said right? Think about. What is a habit you want to bring into your life, right? Let's say it's meditation right fine.
What can you commit to can you commit to five minutes a day? If you can't go down to two minutes right? Make it super easy where it doesn't feel intimidating. Think about where in your day. It's going to go you may need to experiment. Is it first thing when you get up is it with your morning coffee? Is it at the end of the day? Is it just after you do the washing up and you put the last dish on the dryer do you do it then before you go onto Netflix? When is that moment in your day? Is it journaling? Is it first thing in the
on is it a bedside journal in which case I'll leave the journal next to your bed with a pencil so that every time you either wake up or you go to bed you are being visually triggered to do that behavior. It is not difficult. If we apply the rules the problem is and this is The Human Condition. We don't think the rules apply to us. We think are no I'll rely on memory. I'll rely on motivation, even though we know motivation goes up and down, but Amazon don't rely on on
At that they've called it looks they know what they need to do. They're not like humans as I know. We're a machine that could easy people do it make a hard. They
don't the other thing is the the book really doesn't talk about breaking bad habits. It's all around forming new good habits, right? It's almost like forget about the bad habits. The more you focus on creating new good habits, the more you'll crowd out those bad habits. So, you know one thing I'm curious about with
You is like where's you know in this whack-a-mole kind of analogy of trying to You Know cover all your bases. Like where's the blind spot for you? Like where's the weakness? Like, what's the hurdle or the challenge that continues to trip you up that you're trying to work on
right now?
get honestly
my sugar consumption has gone through the roof over the last two or three
months,
mr. Tree. Yeah and
I think it's you know, it's funny. Like I talked about breaking bad habits. One of my rules around that is just as you want to make an easy Behavior Behavior you want easy to do make a behavior. You don't want hard to do.
I'm not generally works, right but something's happened in lockdown for me.
And I sort of it comes down with some sort of I think emotional stuff that I'm processing and sort of trying to go through as well as the stress of the situation their lack of, you know, travel than interacting with as many people as you were, you know, I love my wife and my kids and it's been great to see them so much, but I really think I'd missed seeing other people out with that and bouncing off and actually coming back to their home interactions with a bit more freshness. Yeah.
You
know and I realized that when I go out for walks or a jog, you know, it's almost like my little treat to myself. I'll stop somewhere and get some you guys are called candy some sugars and and look I know this stuff ain't helping me yet. I'm unable to resist in that moments, right? So and again it might said, oh, you know poor you with your sugar like know is I'm not I'm not complaining. I understand what's driving it. I understand.
At I've got quite a few things have come up for me during lockdown in terms of you know, I have been on this sort of personal growth Journey for about seven years or so. I do I do see a therapist with regularity not because I had you know, like a inverted commas a problem per se but more because I'd like to understand myself better like to understand what's driving my
Is why do I react to certain things? Why do I not and I found it. The best journey of ever taken is going on this self-discovery journey, and I think lockdown has supercharged that for me. So I've really been dealing with a lot of stuff from my Early Childhood the way I was brought up the way I feel love was expressed to me as a child and I think back to thinking how I dealt with it then and we had a we had this we had this list in this big box of sweets.
Home and it's all starting to fall in that. I've sort of program my response to stress. Hmm has been to soothe it with sugar. And for some reason, you know, I had a really good few years where I was. Yeah. It wasn't worthy getting tempted. I wasn't really finding it but it's really slipped back and I'm really trying to uncover what that is and I'm making good progress. I do a form of therapy called ifs, which called internal family systems which
I found just fantastically helpful, and I've got to say it has changed in the last couple of weeks. Now. I don't know if that'll be long-lasting or not. But honestly the problem at the moment for me is probably sugar. Hmm and
interesting. I haven't heard of that mode of therapy before what is that
specifically? Yes. Oh, that's a therapist. I've been seeing who I really respect. So it's cool. I said I Fest is called internal family systems. I'm going to say
H this is this may surprise you but this is the one area of my life, but I've just gone on trust so I have not researched the hell out of this thing. I've not gone in I purposefully God, you know what I'm going to trust the process the guy who I see says he thinks is going to be really good for me. I just got okay, cool. I trust you if you think it's going to help me I'm doing it.
And it's been transformative so effectively so I don't know how it is sold. I don't know what the brochure says because I'm purposefully not looking because my personality if I start looking I'll go on a deep dive I'll spend every day looking at YouTube videos. I'll get the books on it. I will certainly try and go always has the right therapy. Is that the wrong one
maybe the whole purpose you have to just yeah, you have to give yourself over. It's the it's the openness. That is the portal to the heel.
I think exactly so maybe at ain't even the ifs. Maybe it's the attitude. I'm bringing to it, which is one of acceptance but it's but essentially in the sessions that I have done you basically, you know, you'll you sort of get into this sort of I would say this state you sort of they talk you through it you close your wires you try and tap in almost step outside your body. And so you're actually observing from the
outside and then it's almost trusting what's going to come up and whatever comes up you start talking about and so recently a situation came up from early in childhoods and you go back into that you you try and experience what was going on and then what's really interesting and I think where it changes is that you know, 42 year-old rangan goes back into that scene with let's say seven year old rangan.
And introduced himself and you know explains who I am, but I'm come here to help really sits down like a friend understand what's happened can observe it can can relate to what's being you know how seven-year-old me is feeling go through that have a conversation and you there's a mechanism. There's a there's a process of wrapping that up and making peace with that situation which happens right, which was a real situation.
I'm sure this is a similar theme to the sort of thing people do in other treatment modalities, but this is just the way I've done it and then you come out of it. You might revisit it yourself for a few days, but you make peace with it. And then you sort of you close it off a certain way that the therapist guides you through.
I have found I've had some profound like I can't believe sometimes I'd be really worried stress that something was really really bothering me you do that and the next are the doubt you'd wake up like a different person feeling calm grounded not getting triggered by things and I really feel generally speaking until this little sugar thing recently, which I actually think is a good thing because if I'm honest I think I mean, I always think I'm getting to the core of the problems and then
Until you until you've healed that and then you that you find all this a few more layers of this. All right, so go through
right but the ideas is is deflating these triggers like revisiting the traumatic event walking through it trying to understand the origin story behind some of these unhealthy behaviors and stripping them of their power by making peace with it in this kind of dickensian Ghost of Christmas Past way.
Yeah, exactly and
You know.
I've loved it. I loved it because it's improved not only how I feel about myself a lot of my addictive tendencies in the past. They've gone not because I'm trying to avoid them but because I no longer feel the need to engage in them. So, you know before they serve the raw, but because some of that stuff is getting healed right? Well, I have no reason to actually engage in that behavior anymore, and I've
It's improved not only how I feel about myself. It's made me a better father. I'm much more closer and connected with my wife having sorted out some of this stuff myself. I feel I'm a better I think I'm a much better doctor. I feel I'm better able to you can really see these patterns in patients now so clearly and I really feel a lot of the time of patients now I go to the emotional stuff a lot earlier than I used to because you can see the root of what's really going on here.
Um, and it's and it's you know, even even you mentioned when you got what was the word you used. You got flamed on social media really? I love that that use the language you got flamed. I've never I've never I've never used. I've never heard it like that, but I don't really I don't generally get trigger non-social anymore in the way that I used to and I'm convinced that it's a lot to do with healing me and healing mind security is because the reality is if I'm full
Be secure in what I'm doing fully secure, right which I'm not right? I'm guessing there and better than I was but I wouldn't say I'm like completely Zen with everything, you know, and now I don't need anyone's approval anymore or anything. I'd like to think that's happen and it's much better, but I know there's still work to do but now I don't really get triggered I'm able to you know as the Viktor Frankl quote goes about you know, between stimulus and space is a gap and in that space as awareness and in that awareness its choice, you know, he words that
More beautifully than that, but I really feel I'm able now to take a beat be outside the situation and go up. But you know, is there any truth in what they've set? Well, not for me? Okay, cool. Fine old they may be having a bad day. They're taken out on me. They think they know me because they hear me on my podcast or they see me on TV, but they're really know me me, like that's their perception of who I am and I it's
It's I just find myself Freer and find myself getting his upset. Even you know, relating back to the pandemic. I find myself able to be a much a much better detached Observer that I think had the pandemic hit two or three years ago. I think I would have got caught up in a much bigger roller coaster than now and actually one thing I will say about this pandemic that
I something I spoke to gamble Matt about the start. I had a sort of invite him back onto my show to talk to him about it. And I said to gamble that couple. I wonder if these emotions that many of us are feeling are really new emotions because to me, it feels like we're being stressed acid with stress testing ourselves in the sense that this pandemic is now a stress test all these emotions that are coming up for us really knew.
New or are we just been put under so much stress that any weakness is been exposed a very much like a hamstring strain right that if you walk around you may not feel it. But it's you may not feel that on a 5K run but on a 10k run maybe start to feel it. It's not as if that just miraculously happened that the imbalance was probably already there, but your body was never being stressed to the degree where it showed up and I find that quite interesting because sometimes I sort of feel
Some of this stuff must be new but other times think what is this just deep insecurity that was already there. Hmm that now is being properly exposed which goes back to what you said about this being an opportunity because if you look at it through that lens that well isn't this an incredible
opportunity then right shining a light on something that needs redress and here you are. It's right in your face. And now is your moment to heal
it
Yeah, so yeah, I mean I think with a start-up is what I'm struggling with it sugar consumption, but I think that's going to get I've Optimum
long answer to the question.
Exactly. I don't know how we got here but I kind of lost myself in that but it was it
was so that's all right, man. That's your Vibe. I've given you the Long Leash and you're running with it. I knew that that's the way this conversation would go and that's why I love you, brother. I love you. Let's let's have one more thing. I want to ask you before I let you go. Which is how is the
Swim run stuff going. Have you been able to keep that up?
Yeah, so that's that's interesting. So at the start of the year in January where what I was on the book tour in the UK. I was on the Chris Evans breakfast show and I know Chris came out and spoke to you and Chris challenged me on are to do the London Marathon, which I had no idea he was going to do and I accepted it was about I think we had about 12 or 14.
Weeks to go. Yeah, and I was like, oh my God, how am I gonna make it a train for this and do a book tour. So I had started training a little bit. Now. I was actually getting a hamstring strain. I was really struggling to run and then obviously that got postponed till October and I was actually it's not happening anymore. But what was really interesting is that in July I got invited to bantam which way did
Very first one button and it was a few first doing this kind of it was a secret Adventure. I didn't know what it was going to be. It was going to be a swim run down the coast wild camping overnight and a swim run back, right? Anyway, I went
I had done was that the thing that that Ross actually went to also
know Ross actually unfortunate Ross was meant to be coming but he couldn't make that one for this reason the end unfortunately, but it was again. What am I most incredible?
All 24 hours of the year. It was actually I don't think I've ever travel that distance. So it was it was pretty much a 20K swim run down the coast we wild camps that I've never done anything like that actually, so I was a bit scared. I didn't sleep at all and then we did a 20K back.
I found it easy. I like I really enjoyed it. I had no idea that I could cover, you know, 37 to 40 K swimming and running. I like if you'd gone back a year and a half ago or even a year ago a year ago. When I did the first one where that was, it's 12 months ago when I couldn't even swim a hundred meters without having a panic attack. I
don't think he'd ever put a wet suit on until the day I raced right so correct. Yeah, but learning
curve you gotta let me cut but yeah, but this goes back to what I am.
Extreme person, you know, I will sometimes do stuff like this and be like, okay. Yeah fine. Let's go. Let's go all in and see what happens and it was an incredible experience Rich because I got everything I got the first time but it was effortless. I really it was so different from when I first did it I enjoyed it. Like there was no we want timing we weren't racing. It was like eight people, you know after these covid pandemic times getting together and
Moving down the coast. The weather was outstanding it was about as beautiful a British summer days you could have it was warm the sun set the sunrise was just incredible and it was just so awesome. And then when I saw the distance the day after because I wasn't wearing a GPS or anything. I was just like I'm just going to trust these guys. I'm just going to go where I'm being taken. I thought wow you covered 40K. That's just I didn't think I could do that. So that was really really interesting for me and
I've actually been working remotely with this running coach over lockdown and I've got to say Rich. This is lady called Helen Hall who I have had access in my life particular last year's to really good coaches and various different strands in life.
This lady is something special like really I've never come across someone with this sort of caliber. She running coach is actually doing a disservice. She's a you know Runnings the name on the label, but actually it's everything. It's spiritual that's emotional. It's how you and working with her and freeing up certain limitations in my body has completely mirrored some of my personal growth it. I mean, I'd love wow.
It's because sounds
interesting. I'd like to meet her is so is so she's not just writing a training plan for you. She's like this Sensei.
Yeah, she is. She's got she's just incredible like and her story. She has she doesn't she doesn't look for any fuss and he PR. She just gets us she's just loves running and she studies the human body and how it moves and she's got this amazing machine, which actually she doesn't wait.
Aiding need but this machine is a through there's you have 15 sensors on you and you literally just run and she can see how every joint in your body moves. Now. This sounds as though it's going to be super technical but it's not actually she's just uses that to help you identify where the obstruction is to the she's actually not trying to help you run. She's trying to help your body work more efficiently, right? Because her Believers if your body is more fluid and free, it's going to translate to better running but a walking better.
Anything right and it like there was this one session which was probably two or three months into lockdown that I was going through in my therapy some quite deep stuff from childhood. It was really interesting. A lot of things had moved in the way in my running gait, but I was still getting this hamstring pain as she identified. She you could see it on the screen my T10 to to eat 12 right in the middle of my back the first be weren't moving. Everything else is moving around it, but they were lat
literally just under my solar plexus and this is something that I was working on with my therapist in terms of you know me showing myself to the world me not hiding anymore really being who I am. It was incredible. So I was with Helen Helen sort of helped me move if we did this two or three minutes of exercise or where she helped me move my T10 t11 vertebrae.
And then you go back on the machine and suddenly my whole running Gates different my hamstrings not hurting it would take me quite a while to unpack it all but what I really took me back to the conversation. I had like you with Sandra. Well, I'm about running as transformation running as a spiritual perspiration approaches. Yeah. I got this was not about running to do a marathon. This is not about running to get a piece.
Maybe This was oh my God running is showing me the limitations. I've got in my body and mind and as I become Freer mentally I feel as though I'm becoming Freer as a runner and she's got the biomechanical evidence to show me that way. So when these things can seem quite theoretical as Concepts you think really did that really happen. Then you see it. Wait a minute that wasn't moving before now it
Is it richness are in the UK? All right, so you got to yeah,
will she work with people remotely like I want to do this. You gotta connect me.
Yeah, I will connect you she I'm sure she will let me connect you. I'll talk to you offline about this. All right, does she have a website though, if people are
listening like oh, you're just going to tell Rich you're not going to tell everyone else.
No. No, I think I'd like you know what? I think she does. I think it's Helen whole if you look at Helen whole running coach. All right, I'll find it. I'll put it in a
showdown.
That's right. Yeah, but she's and are you are you are you still running in the
vivos? Like China working on the
Barefoot? Because that's another thing that I've been practicing like I've used when I decided to Pivot to the strength training I decided you know, because I've always been fascinated by the kind of things that Tony riddle talks about like rewilding and and trying to learn, you know, a diff running style that is you know, essentially More Human by doing the barefoot.
I think but I'm always training for something I don't have time. But with this moment, I thought here's my opportunity. So I've been wearing the vivos and I've started really small. I'm you know, doing the feel better and five methodology. I started with like a 5 minute jog at 10 minute Jog and I'm I'm up to about an hour now, but it's really forced me to pay attention to my gate and I'm using some of the techniques and the tools that Tony talk.
About but I'm kind of doing it myself and I definitely could use a little guidance and instruction but I'm enjoying it and I've noticed it is it's changing my posture. It's changing how I land is changing my gate and how I carry myself not just running but throughout the
day.
Hey, man, it's really excited to hear that as you know, I'm a huge Barefoot proponent in general. I think running is tricky for people because as you say, you know, you always training, right so if you spent a whole lifetime and cushion shoes, I think it's one thing living in barefoot shoes and walking in them and running errands in them. But it's another thing altogether to run and yeah for many you got to
really start
slow. Yeah, but it's for me my whole journey into buying
And it's me getting rid of my crippling backache which I had for 10 years or was through the lens of this chap called Gary Ward who actually held in his train with so it's all kind of quite unified the philosophy which is how do you get the body to move optimally and Gary was the first person said your back problems on a bat problem your back problems are right foot problem. I was like, what do you mean? It's like your right foot is stuck in pronation and that's going to have an effect up the chain and he gave me a few simple exercises.
Exercises to get my white foot moving instantaneously. My back is like 80% better. This was I did have seven eight nine years ago, you know, it's a distant memory. I used to be someone you ask my friends would say, oh he can't he won't be able to do that. He can't lift any furniture because he's got you know bad back. I do not consider myself to have a bad back. I don't even think about my back. I met that was a thing off the past and that's actually not that Gary advice.
To get barefoot shoes know for me. It was the fact that once I got into feeding my right foot move and when I would then go and put on cushion shoes. I thought well, I can't really feel my feet anymore. So I was like, I kind of want to feel my feet. That's what got me into bed, but she is and I have lived exclusively in barefoot shoes for maybe seven years now like Vivo beverages. That's all I wear for work for play for working out. So for me getting into running, it was just a natural extension for me.
Yeah, I didn't even consider not doing it because that's just how I live. But I do know people Rich who live in barefoot shoes for living in but they won't run in them. They'll running shoes. Yeah. Yeah that as well I totally get that. So but Helen definitely works on Zoom. I wonder if she can because most of what we've done over lot down has been over Z. Mm. She's been but that was on the foundation of me having already been in his studio and being on a machine.
Lockdown so I won't but I'll connect you and she's such a lovely soul. And he just heard her dream is to get everyone in the world. I think to run pain-free. She believes We Are Born to Run she feels actually it's we don't run efficiently, which is why so many people get injured and her goal is to teach people to do that. And so so I plan to do the London Marathon next year assuming it goes ahead and I'm looking forward to and You Know Rich and
Do it in Vivo. Barefoot shoes run. The marathon will do. Yes. If
I I would do unless something was to happen to change my view on that but my current plan is to do that. But again what's really changed me Rich and I think in lockdown in particular
And it's this thing about for me running is going to be.
It's going to be about me tapping into who I am people as hell. What time you going for? And honestly, I used to be a super competitive person, but I can honestly say hand on heart.
I'm not bothered about the time. I'm doing it for the fun of doing it for the joy of actually being challenged by someone saying yes, but actually I want to do it just so I've done a marathon. So I've experienced it. I actually maybe it will change during the time. Maybe I'll be like, oh I want to do this. I want to break five hours or when I get four and a half or whatever, but I'm not really looking at times because my drive to run now.
Because I've seen the connection with where my body holds tension which affects my running and where my mind holds tension because of course, they're not separate. I want to heal or that and bring it closer together. So I believe if I keep doing the emotional work. I actually believe that I will be running Freer and I believe I'll be able to run a marathon pain free and enjoy it. Mmm.
That's exciting man. I'm excited for you. Yeah, you definitely maybe I'll join you definitely for a swim run once the races start up again.
Man, I let's do it. Let's do it for sure. We're told me about wildcats and be
thing. Yeah, you told me about one that's coming up next year or something like that that you wanted me to check out. I can't remember.
Well, this is a this is lot Vivo Beth or who I love as a company. They they've you know, I they've helped me get into swim run and in bantam, which is very remote part of the UK. It is absolutely beautiful. That's where I sort of did my first one that's why I did the one in July.
Bad, could it be hosting a very another really special a lot of people who went to their swim ones have said that the best they've ever been to like the whole experience the kind of the terrain the way it's put on is just incredible and I've just wanted to let you know what that day is early doors. Next year's say hey look if you are traveling to Europe if people are traveling back then yeah. I just wanted to make sure that you had it on your radar because you would absolutely you would absolutely love it. So
I've had enough
Opens I'll put it on the calendar assuming that we can get back to international travel which I definitely am missing very much. So, all right, man, I'm going to let you go. I appreciate you congrats on the new book feel better in five. Fantastic. I hope that we can see each other in person soon. Meanwhile, everybody who's listening can wrong. It's really easy to find on the internet but check out his podcast feel better live more still killing it on the charts everywhere.
All your books and your easy to find on Instagram is probably the best place wrong and Chatterjee there right? Well, yeah. Yeah anything
else.
I'm on time just Bridge, you know, it's a pleasure to come on, you know, I love our conversations. I don't know where they'll go. Frankly. Sometimes. It doesn't matter. They'll go where their months ago, right? Yeah, and yeah, I appreciate everything you do man. So I just want to acknowledge everything you do. You've been a huge inspiration to me you continue to be so so thanks very much for allowing me to come and speak to you on your amazing platform my
pleasure and likewise my friend. So until we meet
Again, take it easy
piece.
Do you feel better? Do you feel better in five? Do you feel better in two hours after having listened to that? I do hope you guys do is well. If you're new to me or rangan, you can dial up our previous episodes together. That's RRP 376 and 486 check out the show notes on the episode page at Rich world.com to dig deeper into wrong hands world and his work pick up his book feel better and fide hit up his podcast feel better live more on all the platforms.
And give him a ring on the socials on Instagram. He is Dr. Chatterjee and on Twitter. He is Dr. Chatterjee UK tagging with a note let him know how this one landed for you. If you'd like to support the work we do here on the show subscribe rate and comment on it on Apple podcast on Spotify and on YouTube Share the show or your favorite episodes with friends or on social media and you can support us on patreon it rich world.com / donate. Thank you to everybody who worked hard but on today's show.
Show Jason camiolo for audio engineering production show notes and interstitial music Blake Curtis for videoing Today Show and also Gareth Rankin's video guy for helping out with additional video files to help us compile the best version for YouTube Jessica Miranda for graphics Ali Rogers and Davy Greenberg who generally do portraits but not today because this was a this was done remotely dk4 Advertiser relationships and theme music by my boys Tyler trapper.
And Harry, thank you for the love. I appreciate all of you guys. We're coming up with another role on me and Adam are going to sit down in a couple days and bang one out for you. That should be available midweek barring any kind of catastrophic 2020 emergency. Nothing is off the table right now, but that at least is the plan as of this moment until then try to feel better in five put some of that stuff into motion. Try to create a little momentum around a couple.
All new healthy habits and then hit me up and let me know how it's going until then. Peace.
