Hello ladies and gents Robert Sykes ketose a.com today and get
special guest Robb. Wolf on the podcast, I've had
him on the show in the past. This time we dive into all
things but nutrition for the most part, we talk about
Jiu-Jitsu. We talk about mixed martial
arts. What?
He's been doing there for a long time.
He's brown belt, he knows what he's talking about.
I wanted to kind of pick his brain.
There, we also dive into homeschooling quite a bit, and
what he, and his wife do for their two kids, with regards to
how they structure their day, how they structure their
activities, how They structure their learning process very,
very, very interesting stuff there.
And then we also talked about, we talked about attrition some
we talk about lifestyle design thoroughly enjoyed the
conversation Rob and I are definitely speaking the same
language. I have utmost respect for him,
his character, what he's doing in the space and I have no doubt
that you will take something valuable from this conversation.
So without further Ado, sit back relax and Joe podcast with Rob
wolf. And we are live Rob.
How are you brother? Good?
Good. All good.
I forgot to turn the heat on in my office.
And we live in rural Montana. And so it's a little, it's a
little chilly in here. I Will Survive, man.
Oh man, Montana is beautiful. How long have you been there?
We've been coming up on two years now.
Where did you come from? We were in Reno, Nevada for a Is
for about 10 years and then 2 years, 18, months in Texas,
which we like to Texas, but the kids didn't love it when they
found out that it only snowed there about once every 30 years,
they were not digging on that. And so, we have some some really
good connections within our Jiu-Jitsu community that streak.
Last, Jim Jiu-Jitsu outfit that were a part of, and there's
really remarkable Hub of that activity here in the Flathead
Valley, Kalispell area. So, we moved here and Just just
loving it. Nice.
I bet they don't have any trouble finding snow in Montana
though. No.
But, you know, we were not bad here.
The Flathead Valley is only about 300, 3000, feet elevation.
It's not really that cold. It'll get some pretty good, cold
snaps, but if you drive like 30 minutes, any direction out of
the valley, it goes. I think the valley itself has
like 50 inches of snow average per year, but you go 30 minutes,
north, south east west. And it's like, 400 inches all of
a sudden so it gets gnarly pretty pretty fast.
When you get out of here ya know.
That's why me if I was going to live in any other state besides
Arkansas where I'm at. Now it would be Montana.
Like I've always loved month and I think it's beautiful.
I'm a big hunter. So there's often awesome
opportunity to do that there. It's just a beautiful state and
yeah, yeah, it is, it is funny enough.
My mom's side of the family is from Arkansas, from Appleton
Arkansas. So, I've been doing a little bit
of trying to reconstruct my Family Tree in that area.
And I think Appleton is one of those towns that just kind of
like dried up and blew away, it's basically, like, a cow
pasture down. Like, there's not much much to
it at this point. Is that like Northwest Arkansas?
Where's Apple Town it? Pretty Central, pretty Central
interesting. Yeah, I'm in the Ozarks, which
is not near as mountainous as Montana is, but it's pretty much
as far as mountains. Going Arkansas.
It's like an outdoor activities here, but not much in the way of
snow, right, right? Which isn't bad.
Yeah bad. Yeah.
Well talking about jiu-jitsu man you mentioned that.
So you've been doing that for how long now in total so it's
kind of a tricky question the first time that I ever did.
It was in 1993 like right before the first UFC and I was studying
Muay Thai at the time and was pretty close to getting my
coaching certificate in that. And but I was really intrigued
by the, by the Jiu-Jitsu ice, I went down to the Lawrence
Academy where the Gracie family was was Ang a couple of times,
but I really had to kind of pick one One path or the other.
And I ended up sticking with the the Thai boxing till I got my,
my coaching certificate and Nat and did that for a number of
years. And it wasn't until I moved to
Reno and and started over no Noah Chico.
When I when I started the 4th CrossFit affiliate gym in
2003-2004, my good friend Jon Frankel had just received his
black belt and I was running the CrossFit part of this operation.
He was running the MMA part and I was also running a couple
wider group, helping with that. And I did a little bit with
John, but I mean it was like, between 1993 and 2003.
I had maybe two weeks total of instruction, like it was really
spread out and pretty haphazard and there just wasn't a ton of
jujitsu around yet and didn't was 2012 right before our first
Daughter was born. I was like damn it.
Like I'm I'm going to make this thing happen and have been
pretty consistent since then. So you know ten ten going on, 11
years, I had to one year kinda hiatuses to to moving or injury
and stuff like that but otherwise have been pretty
consistent and I'm a brown belt now and it seems to be a little
bit of scuttlebutt About Me. Maybe maybe getting my black
belt sometime this year. So I've just been chipping away
at that but it's usually you know technically I've been
Jujitsu longer than just about anybody you ever meet, but you
know, the consistency really hasn't kicked in until like the
last 10 years and how frequently like throughout the week.
How many days a week are you rolling?
Typically, usually about three days a week and Nikki started
which is great. Nikki does Jiu-Jitsu also, my
youngest daughter does Jiu-Jitsu the oldest daughter took a took
a break on. I'm hopeful that she might she
might get back into it. It's some later date.
But we usually get Get to classes with open mats and then
we go to One open mat on Saturdays per week.
So it's about three days of training per week in the summer.
We actually do a little bit more because where we live in this
area. There's three different straight
blast gyms and the the primary coach that we all of the coaches
are great but Travis status. In is the vice president of the
organization and has been a spent a black belt for 20 years.
I want to say Only two years, something like that.
So we really like his coaching style.
And in the summer, we're able to make it to a few more classes of
his will bump up to like three to four classes and we're not
doing homeschooling during the summer.
And so it just in the summer, we get in actually more Jiu-Jitsu
than we do in the winter, just because of timing and home
school and all that type of stuff.
Nice, nice. So like my forte and fitness is
always been, you know, bodybuilding natural
bodybuilding. I compete with that and I've
never really done much in the way of All Arts, but one of my
employees are media guy. He's always been big into MMA
boxing. So we've got this big Jam at our
compound here. So we roped off a third of it to
have like some mats down, some some bags and heavy bags and
we've all just been collectively you know as a group all of our
employees will clock out early on Thursday.
And you know, do a bunch of MMA. We've gone through like striking
and now we're starting to corporate a lot more ground work
and some grappling and some Jujitsu we've been doing this
for coming up on like a year and a half that, but it's not like I
do. Nice gym at all.
It's just like us learning things as we go.
And I've got clients that do this.
Like they'll come in to visit and I'll show us some moves.
And so I'm learning how to do all these different Jujitsu
moves and the one of my employees put me in a ankle lock
the other day. And I tore my lcls, I was kind
of out of commission, but I love it, man.
Like the, I don't think I could ever give up bodybuilding
because it's just what I live and breathe.
But Jiu-Jitsu is such an art form.
And there's like so much and it's all technique, like, it's
one. Of those things that you could
pursue with the utmost intensity, every single day of
your life and you would never master and I like stuff like
that. Yeah, it's pretty cool.
In that regard like, there's always something new to be
learned some, you know, some refinement in your skill and I
think that that's really intriguing and then something
that I've found like our GM is really great in that They do a
good job accommodating. Everybody like our noon class.
There's a bunch of beat-up old has-beens like me.
So there's a bunch of people in their 50s.
There's probably out of a group of 30 people, maybe eight to
twelve women that are there. There's old guys like me.
So they do a great job of accommodating.
Everybody making it accessible to everybody.
They also have some absolute like, you know, top of the food
chain, like Savage competitors, but they, the, the coaching is
just structured in a way that It if you're brand new, if you're
old, if you're not that strong, like it will accommodate you.
If your total pipe hittin, you know, Savage athlete, then it
will accommodate that too. But what I've found is that
Under the best of circumstances Jiu-Jitsu is Pretty Tough, like
it, it's a gut check like it's an ego check, it's physically
demanding, mentally demanding. You have lots of ups and downs
with it. And what I found is that the
people who stick with it long term, the really good people
like they are just resilient solid folks.
And even though we've only been in this area for 2 years I feel
like the social capital that we have is like we've been here for
20 years. Like, it's incredible to the
quality and amount of just awesome people that we've, we've
been able to incorporate into our lives has been amazing.
I think Jiu-Jitsu, it's just such a humbling Sport and that
can't help, but spill over into life outside of the gym, the
dojo, so to speak. I mean you just recognize that
you don't know everything and then you start to realize that
you likely, don't know everything with everything else
in life. So just you're more receptive to
have an open mind, just being a good person.
I feel definitely, there's that opportunity and especially if
you've got a coach that Brings in some of those in, is it less
tangible, you know, life lessons which are Coach, Travis Davison
is great about weaving that in, and in kind of a tough love
format, like, it's pretty hilarious.
Like he has a very dry sense of humor, but he reminds folks
constantly that, you know, there's lots of lessons to be
learned in the gym. And if you're not taking those
lessons from inside the gym, outside the gym, you really
fail, Failing, you know, like there's this huge opportunity to
get so much more out of that experience than just just
rolling around having people drip, sweat into your eye
sockets and stuff. Lie, totally totally.
You feel like Jiu-Jitsu has gained a lot more popularity, as
of late, or is it just seemed like that to me, because I'm
just not getting into it? I feel like it's been on an
upswing, like, they're some of the There have been some really
interact. I don't follow the competition.
Jiu-Jitsu that much, I don't really compete anymore.
Like, I just don't have a real passion for that or I want to
continue to enjoy Jiu-Jitsu and as soon as I turn it into a
competitive event, like I'm probably going to hate it in
myself and my family will hate me and everything.
But there have been some changes in like this, the rule sets of
some of the the competition. So like the Eddie Bravo rule,
Sets are pretty interesting. There have been some, someone
Corporation of like, combat Jiu-Jitsu where there's some
open hand strikes that get Incorporated in.
So it's not quite MMA. It's still mainly grappling,
but, you know, certain Jiu-Jitsu is interesting in that.
There is, there are segments of jujitsu Judo techniques and kind
of workflows that work perfectly for MMA self-defense and sports
Egypt. Like they all work great with in
that, and then there are things that work really well for sport
to Jutsu, but they will get you killed in a street fight or MMA.
And so, what's interesting about some of these, you know,
incorporation of so say like some open-handed strikes and
stuff like that, it it forces a certain reality around
everything that's going on and I think it's really interesting
for folks and, and You know, the UFC clearly just its presence
has, you know, continued to put Jujitsu out in the Forefront,
but I think it's interesting like the UFC and, and similar
outfits. When they went to these fairly
short rounds like five minute rounds, which is in eternity,
while you're doing it, used to like pride pride fights in the
early UFC's, or were no time limit to release like 20
minutes, the first round, 10 minutes, the next round and
stuff like that. You could really Developer in
interesting game, you know, like a weaker person, less explosive
could wear down a stronger, more, explosive person.
You had like smaller, guys, fighting bigger, guys.
It was really pretty interesting and then they kind of made
everything, very uniform and it really caters to the classic
person who's going to dominate in like a Collegiate wrestling
environment. Real tough, super explosive and
so on. Of Circa Panic, you know, as it
spins like myself, like don't really thriving environment like
that, but it's some of the, the alterations in the current
Jiu-Jitsu rules metamoris and some things like that.
Like a 20-minute round. It's interesting like, a
particularly for the people who are into grappling because you
can get some really interesting matchups because of the longer
timeline and whatnot, like a really high motor.
Explosive person, that's great. But those people you Wear them
out if you if you have a little bit longer rounds and and
whatnot, like, I love it. When the bulk of our training
rounds are five minute, 5 minute rounds during open, Matt, and I
love to bump it up to eight to ten minutes because I tend to
naturally gravitate towards more of a defensive game.
And if I can wear down that younger more sprightly
individual, like I start really shining at minute like 4 through
10, you know. And I think that all of those
changes have kind of Fed into kind of a Reawakening of of an
appreciation for grappling and, and the submission grappling
both in the ghee and noogie. Yeah.
Feel like the this has a sport from a cardiovascular
standpoint. I can't even imagine a 20-minute
round but like will typically do like two minute rounds and I'm
gassed Maan. Like I feel like I'm in pretty
good shape but after 2 minutes and going relatively all out,
like it is a totally different type of exhaustion.
So if you're playing longer rounds like Five to ten minutes,
I can imagine the benefit of, you know, having that on the
horizon, being able to kind of play to that game of wearing the
opponent down more so than just everybody going all out because
it's just different than like, like doing a combat sport when
you are using every single fiber, of your being to get on
top or getting guard or, you know, get him into submission.
Like there's just, there's just a whole nother level of
exhaustion that comes with that. You're not going to get, you
know, doing hill, Sprints or on treadmill, It's tough, like
CrossFit type stuff, I guess would be you know, maybe
analogous or similar or maybe even worse in some ways, you
know, because you're switching body parts and you're racing
against the clock and all that type of stuff.
But it's interesting is kind of counterintuitive, but the
shorter, the rounds are the harder people go.
And I would argue the more likely one is to get injured and
they're certainly a place for it.
But if folks are more, if they're very competent, Petition
oriented. Then you certainly want it.
Like, if you were an 800-meter Sprinter, then you, you cater
your metabolic training to 800 meter, right?
You know, Advanced you do some long stuff, but like, it really
gets time. Indexed around that like, you
know, minute and a half to two minutes, type a deal and
similarly, for for Jiu-Jitsu and grappling in general, 10 minute
rounds are awesome because you gotta slow down, you gotta slow
down, use weight, use angle changes, but it's That like full
body, explosive deal. Like it allows for a lot more
technical development versus just like who is the bigger
stronger scrappier person you know?
And and if folks one of the interesting things, like if you
and I are doing some training, let's say, we're just doing some
positional drilling. Like, I'm on Cross side top,
you're on cross-eyed bottom and your goal is to get out.
But the main thing is that I'm really Trying to refine my, my
cross side top game either holding or getting some
submissions out of it. So we go through this and it's
like, okay we're going to do an eight minute round or a
five-minute realm with me on top and you're going to start off at
like ten percent resistance and I get a bunch of success.
And then it's 25 percent resistance, 50 percent
resistance, when you hit like 60 percent resistance, My Success
goes to almost zero and then we're like, okay, let's dial
this thing back and and if folks would drill, Do more of their
training, like 90% their training in that scenario, where
it's scenario-based. It's like, yeah.
You're, you know, you're getting some good reps on the bottom
with figuring out how to get out and to be safe and all that.
But you're really trying not to use your attribute, to try not
to use speed, strength explosiveness, and all that type
of stuff. And then when that timer is up,
then we switch places and now it's your turn to be on top and
and get those really good reps. In general, whether you're
talking about like pistol work, or computer programming, or what
have you if you introduce much more than about a twenty percent
error rate. Like if if much more than two
reps out of ten fail, when you're trying to get a new
skill, figured out, you won't imprint proper skill.
You're going to imprint garbage and this is where like the, the
computer programming world, you know, garbage in garbage out it
really applicable to To this story.
So it's it's interesting longer rounds.
Making them not so much focused on just like live rolling where
everything in the world can can happen instead like.
Okay I'm going to start off it Rob, you're going to be on my
back and you're going to start with whatever whatever, you
know, like we've been as I get closer to my black belt, like
I've been starting with like some of the blue belt, some of
the Purple belt, I'm like, okay, get on my back getting A full
rear naked, choke locked in, just back it off.
Just, you know, a couple of millimeters shy of finishing me,
and then, can I get out of that? And, and so, I'm getting to
where I'm able to get really deep into a submission and use
posture and and Framing and connection to get out of that
versus me being like a Tasmanian devil and just like exploding
out of it. And, you know, like arms and
legs flying all over the place. Get the other benefit to that
I'm 160. 165 pounds and I'm 51 years old, I'm in good shape for
my age but like when I was when I was 31 I could clean and jerk
almost 350 pounds. I cannot clean answer gamer near
that. Now, you know what back injury
and 20 years down range and all that type of stuff, but the only
hope that I have for my aging person to be able to deal with
younger stronger. Individuals is better technique.
I can't outspeed them. I cannot outmuscle them and so I
don't blabbering on like an idiot but it's a you no longer
round, very focused training. And and instead of open rolling
doing 80 or 90 percent of your training time, I think should be
very position-specific and the better you get at the drilling
parameters, you know? So again like, you know, and
let's just say back control again.
Like you could start off with back control the Sin has a
harness, okay? Three, two, one, go.
And then the person mainly is working Escape, so you're trying
to submit them that you're trying to control them, but it
starts off maybe like twenty five percent resistance and they
have some success and you start ratcheting up.
But then over time that turns into.
Okay, I've got one arm in of the rear naked choke go.
Now we've got two arms in of the rear naked choke go.
And you start learning how to get out of Stuff like that.
And then hopefully also you just learned how to, hopefully, not
let somebody get onto your back and get the rear naked choke in
and all that. Like, there's all this early
prevention, that's really, really important.
But then, it's also it's pretty fascinating to learn the really,
really late Escape stuff because somebody could be almost there
almost have it sunk in and they're just pouring everything
they've got into it and if you're able to address that with
posture and and Should not strength or explosiveness, it
steals the soul out of the person.
You know, when when I like tell somebody, okay, get on my back
and I'll have them like finish a roux naked choke.
I'm like great. Okay, good, I'm going to tap
your leg and I'll say go and then I'm going to try to get out
and I go slow, I'm not thrashing around but I'm just you know
posturing with my neck and everything to get out of this
thing in the person's like goddamn.
That's kind of demoralizing. Like I gay I had I had you right
where I would normally finish. One.
And it was my A-game and I couldn't put put the guy away
and that's where you get some really high level technique
driven in and I guess 11, final five around all that stuff is
too. Especially as we age a more
defense oriented game. Really gives a lot of benefit
because for somebody to finish me, let's say a cross colored
choke from Mount or from closed guard.
You got to put one hand in, they got to put another hand in, they
had to have my posture broken down like there's a bunch of
different things that need to happen for that to occur.
I only need to intervene in one of those steps to shut the whole
thing down. I don't even need to shut all of
it down and it doesn't necessarily mean that I'm going
to jump on top of them and dominate them and win.
But it also means that I didn't lose right, and this is a lot of
the Hicks and Gracie perspective, like you may not be
able to beat everybody but you You yourself can become
uncomfortable like you can develop such a great defensive
game because the the defensive player has a bit of an
advantage, like there's usually even really smart, submissions
are only one or two steps when it starts becoming like three
and four steps like it. You're not going to get it on
high level people typically but still even one, two, three
steps. I only need to intervene in one
of those moments to be able to shut that attack down.
And then they, Holding onto it and in fail, or they have to
shift to something else. And I just need to be one step
ahead of the person. Again, I may not end up
developing like a game that would win World Championships
and puts a lot. Lots of people away via
submission, but I can become really, really tough to submit
myself. Yeah, that makes total sense and
that's that's where we're definitely lacking with.
Are hungry with people like, which just the blind leading,
the blind right now because you don't have a official instructor
and we don't have the we don't No, we don't know, basically, so
we're just all going out there and trying to dominate one
another and let our egos get in the way, which is, never a good
thing. But I feel like having something
like that orchestrated, in which you are put into near submission
and then having to strategically work your way out of it and just
rent those drills day after day after day that I think would be
incredibly beneficial well this summer you.
We should go out there and hang out with you guys and I'll show
you at least give you a framework for like how to
structure the training you know? Like it with YouTube and
different things like that. Like, you can learn like every
technique Under the Sun. A lot of it has a lot of feel to
it, but a lot of the success that comes out of this is just
really the way that people approach the training practice
itself. Yeah.
Well shoot, man, you got an open invitation, anytime you want to
come here and show us what we don't know, for sure.
Cool, cool. Okay, you mentioned home school
and took home a dive into that, man?
Like how long have you been doing that since since they were
born? Not since they were born Noth.
So Zoe is 10. Second is 8 now and they both
started at a Montessori School. When we were in Reno and we
started off liking it, they did the preschool program.
They did the kindergarten program and I think both of
those were really good and then when so we went into first
grade, Nikki has a friend who is from Italy, she's Italian like
from Rome, she was this gal was raised.
In a Montessori program from from like you do all the way up
until she went to college and she adds like two phds and a
master's degree in all this stuff, very academically
successful, really wonderful person, but she loves
Montessori. But what she had two daughters
about the age of our daughters, and they were both really
struggling in school. And when she was talking to them
what she kind of figured out the, the Montessori.
Methodology is interesting. It's different than the standard
School curriculum. They tend to do a little bit
more self-directed exploration, but they do have like, you're
going to do some math, you're going to do some reading and do
some spelling, you do some art. Like there's there's some
specific stuff there. And what we discovered is that
we were spending a remarkable amount of money to have our
kids. Just basically, once they got
past the kindergarten level, like they were just kind of
fucking off like the teachers were not holding their feet to
the fire. With regards to re exposure to
things. Like at the kid really liked
math, that was great because then the kid would go do it.
But if they didn't, they just didn't didn't succeed at it.
And we were super frustrated in the public schools in the Reno
area. Were not great.
And this was actually right around the time.
Also, that Google basically made my website disappear from
search, I don't know if you heard about any of that, but it
was like, the Google owl update and we just got up one day and
87% of my site traffic was gone as was 90 percent one percent of
my income. And at the exact same time that
that happened, my ability to sell things, like the keto
masterclass and things like that on Facebook just disappeared.
And there was this kind of this was a 2018.
So I would I'm early to a lot of things and I was very early to
cancel culture. There was this thing.
Again, I mentioned the Google owl update, and there were a
good number of people. Oil in the low carb seen that
were kind of hoovered up in this thing.
And it wasn't that they made your sight literally disappear
but where I had had hundreds if not thousands of articles that
would pop up, you know front page on a Google search return.
You know, like low carb and type 1, diabetes low-carb type 1
diabetes athletes, you know, CrossFit and paleo.
You know, I have lots and lots of Front Page search returns
with this stuff, it just went away.
So do was no all of that work on creating link backs and and, you
know, Google ranking everything. Just just disappeared unless the
person knew exactly what to look for.
They would never find my materials.
So we decided and kind of out of necessity, we sold our house and
Reno took that that money and pushed it into some other
business activities that we were hoping would we kick over and
fortunately, they've done pretty well, but we had, And on
homeschooling the kids in the transition because we were
arriving kind of like mid year and we didn't want to drop the
kids in mid-year. And also with our oldest like we
realize that she was probably like a about a half a year to a
year behind in like spelling and math and she's a sharp kid.
Like there's no, there's no drama there but she would have
felt dumb getting plugged into the school where like everybody
was ahead of her. So we had just planned.
Okay, we're going to do this for six months, get it, get the
kids, totally up to Minimal the Texas schools in theory were
supposed to be pretty good but then covid happened and all to
you know the insanity around covid.
And so we were just like okay fuck it just we're just gonna go
to home school and then we did eventually make our way up to
Montana and Nikki is a saint. Like she just does a great job
with this stuff but she does the bulk of the reading spelling.
All of that. I do the the math and little bit
of The science. Like as we get further down down
range and we get into like the chemistry and physics and stuff
like that. I'll probably shift more into
kind of covering that material but we just have found some
really remarkable resources online.
We use this thing called Matthew C for the math.
Curriculum for the spelling writing stuff.
There's this thing called spell to write to read and it actually
makes English make sense. Like when I learned Spanish and
German, I didn't, I finally kind of understood English.
I'm like, oh, that's what that is 10.
That's why use a pronoun here versus there.
You know, and it all the stuff I didn't really make any any
sense, like a remembered, like, I before E, except after C and,
you know, couple of things like that.
But the this program that Nicky uses on the spelling writing
reading is really phenomenal. And the kids are pretty
crackerjack at that stuff and then we layer in some some
history and some you know, like so we use super into sled dogs.
And so we did a math and kind of engineering project where she
she built a sled dog harness and we had to measure it and cut it
and, you know, do all the stuff, but it would have otherwise been
really onerous process for her, but because it was about sled
dogs. She was like, dude, I'll do this
all day long. She lucky can't, you can't stop
me from being excited about this.
So we weave some history in in their different interests.
Some, some Science and philosophy.
Like we really try to talk a lot about economics and kind of
Market Centric activities. There's another set of books
called the from the Tuttle twins.
That the kids absolutely love to read and they do some exposure
into kind of kind of Market based thinking and what not and
the kids really seem to like it. And although it is, it
definitely is a Time demand, you know, the kids can sleep in as
late as they. They need to sleep in and we do
make them go to bed early. Like we really are like the blue
hair. Seemed particularly in the
winter. Like the sun goes down, like
4:15 in the winter here. I mean, it's like down.
There is no light by about 4:15, when it's when it's the, you
know, November December. So by 8:00, like I'm like, dude,
we're going to bed. I'm done.
I'm the same way. It's all good, we done.
Yeah, and in the summer, we stay up a little bit later because
the days are much much longer but Even then like our kids
sleep 12 hours a night and when we when we see our friends whose
kids are up pretty late and then they have to get them up at 6
a.m. or 5:45 to get them to school by like 7:15 or
something. Like these kids are crushed.
They are absolutely knackered and our kids when we have to do
an early wake-up occasionally like we did a ski school for on
the weekends and it was awesome but I could so see the
difference in there. How big the amount of bickering?
They had the poor decisions, they made impulse control and it
was because they were three hours Short slept because of the
demands of getting up to go through the ski school.
And so there's just a ton of different reasons.
Like we have better control over their food.
I feel like Nikki Nikki, he's got an econ degree.
I've got a biochem degree, she speaks Italian Spanish and
Russian. I speak some German and Spanish.
Is she like we've got the bases pretty, pretty covered.
And we really grabbed some phenomenal resources to help us.
And what we've really leaned into is finding the stuff that
the kids have a natural predilection towards, and then
orienting, as much of the material around that as we
possibly can, and it's gone pretty pretty.
Well, that's awesome. And we've got a eight-month-old
them and we're trying to figure out what we're going to do from
a you know schooling standpoint and I went to public schools and
I was growing up and that you know, did Well for me like I'm
happy with how I turned out so to speak but I don't like as
things have changed, I don't know that I'd want to put my son
in public schools now like some of the stuff they're teaching is
totally irrelevant. Some of it isn't taught deeply
enough so we're leaning towards the homeschooling, right?
And there's there's a pretty reputable Montessori school here
close to us. But honestly, man, I'm kind of
liking what you're saying here. So is there like a curriculum
that you like is there a company or a software ninja?
T that has this curriculum that you tend to gravitate to and
then add to that and subtract from that as Indoors.
It just pretty much all pick and choose.
Yeah. So like the, the math is the
distinct called Matthew, see, like letter use C, SE e, and it
goes to all the way from beginning counting, and basic
addition. Subtraction all the way up
through second semester calculus.
So, like I can take you start to finish in my expectation.
For the girls is that they will finish High School having done
per semester calculus, and both of them are on.
Track with finishing it probably by like, eighth or ninth grade,
which would be 3 years ahead of where I was with, with all that
stuff, you know? And they may never do a damn
thing related to math or engineering or anything, but
they are never going to be faced with a math problem that they're
going to be challenged. Like it is the rest of their
life after they do that and then the spelled right to read is
just kind of laying the foundations of, you know,
grammar syntax. All that type of stuff.
And then Nikki has has pulled in.
Like there were, there was a book of reading list thing that
had some history that had some really interesting story.
So we were kind of age-appropriate books that we
would read to them and that the kids would also read and, and
so, we supplement with that and then like, if I find a cool TV
show, like Netflix just last year, had this, this thing that
Morgan Freeman narrates. Our Verse and it's phenomenal.
Like it's really cool in the kids, just eat this stuff up and
so they get a little bit of TV time and basically they split it
between like Nature and Science shows and baking shows like they
love watching like baking and possible and stuff like that.
And I think there's some you know cool elements to that.
But we I'm of the opinion that if kids learn to spell right and
and have outstanding reading comprehension and they have good
written and verbal communication.
Mission. They're going to be buttoned up
on that like they're good. And then if kids have a good,
basic mathematics background, they can do anything.
Like they can they can plug into and do anything.
If one of them decides to be an engineer, they'll be super well
set up for that. If they want to go into
business, they'll be set up, you know, for doing that.
I just feel like the ability to process information, do critical
thinking and then communicate really effectively and then just
having the basic skill sets of Statistical analysis.
Like like if somebody bombed you with, you know, sixty percent of
the time, this works 90% of the time, you know, like what's that
bullshit? You do.
And so I just think that that critical thing thinking
outstanding reading comprehension and then ability
to communicate, both verbally and written plus a good math
background, you can just plug into anything and like the
history happens with that like I think back to all The history
classes I had. And he only thing that stuck in
my head were the things that were really important to me.
We have maybe put a little bit of a disproportionate emphasis
on things like the Constitution founding of the United States.
And I know there's a lot of like, controversy around all
that stuff and I really legitimately do.
Try to give all angles on that and then let my kids figure it
out from there. And what's really kind of cool
about that? I really I will tell them.
Then here's my take on this, you know, some hot button topic.
Here's my personal, take on this.
But here's a take from other people and I'll even pull up
like YouTube videos and have other people kind of articulate
this thing. I'm like, what do you girls make
of this? And what I've been finding is
they end up just kind of naturally coming up with this
kind of libertarian. Market-based like you do you all
take care of me kind of approach and it's not me breathing down
their And threatening them raining.
It's then being critical thinkers and and being
emotionally empathic to the plight of the world and that the
world isn't fair. But one of the best ways to deal
with Injustice and, you know, not fairness is to work, really
fucking hard to better your situation.
And if your situation is better and you have an opportunity to
help the people around you, then by all means do that, you know,
and it because that's a, you know, good, good neighbor, good
empathic thing and And so that's it's been interesting to me,
man, that they have given a pretty and I know, probably some
listeners like, oh, I bet he's just a, you know, big jerk and,
you know, white male and all this stuff, and it's like, okay,
whatever, whatever. But what I'm finding is that,
the less I leaned on the kid, my kids, and the less I threatened
them, unless I shoehorn them and do any type of ideology, you
know, like I'm personally not that religious but I have given
them my thoughts about why? Not and, and also pointed out
that some of our dearest friends are very religious and we have
people who are Christian. And we have some friends that
are Buddhist because they're from Cambodia and I'm like, you
know, and so I've said to them, this is for you to figure out.
I'm not going to strong-arm you into it and they've really kind
of come to some very beautiful realizations and none of that is
anxiety-provoking, they don't have a bunch of guilt around it
and, you know, all this stuff that that I had as a kid.
So so I think it's a pretty effective way of raising like
real legit, you know, functional human beings and what will be
fascinating to me is if this is going to be like a superpower
when they emerge on the scene, you know we're really going to
need kids that are have these skill sets because I think we
have a lot of problems to unwind or if they're going to stick out
like such sore thumbs that they're going to be the first
ones against the wall with me, when like to The government is
like, no, you guys are too dangerous like you to free
thinking like we're shutting all this stuff down.
But, you know, for for right now, I enjoy it.
The kids enjoy it, I feel like they're really thriving in this,
this process. We try to do a lot of
extracurricular activities, like the whole family has learned to
ice skate this year. We did some skate skiing Sagan
is doing Jiu-Jitsu, so we use really, crushing it at swimming,
and so we just try to channel them into Two areas, they have
some some natural passion know, I love them and I think that is
absolutely the way to go about it.
I feel like the parents that I've known, who have tried to
strong-arm their kids into thinking one way or the other,
towards some ideological belief, that always backfires on them.
And I feel like, if you can just simply speak to your kids like
you would speak to any other, you know, adult in a civil
conversation way that is respectful, like they just learn
to think for themselves that have critical.
Kind of smarter than we give them credit for you.
Just have to like, explain to them.
Why you think that way and what other people have different
beliefs than they are able to come up with their own, take on
things? I feel like so many parents,
just tell them, yes or no, but they don't explain the why, but
if you just simply let them, you know, Cimarron things.
It's pretty impressive. What they're able to come up
with totally independent from you.
It is and and when I'm not there, either when I'm dead or
if I'm not there in that moment and they're faced with a
challenging moral. Ation.
I've I'm going to have a lot of trust that they're going to be
able to make a good decision if they don't, then I am hopeful
that they will. We have a good enough
relationship that can be like, Dad.
I fucked up like this happened. You know, it's like, okay, well,
let's let's figure that out. Like, let's unpack that and
figure out how we can avoid making a mistake like that
again. Yeah, 100% when it comes to like
the public school setting or traditional private school
settings, I feel like one of the knocks against homeschooling is
that they're just not. Spending ample time amongst
their peer group and there's like a, like a pecking order
that kind of takes place naturally and I can see that
argument for sure. But I'm assuming, I mean,
especially with homeschooling programs.
Now that there's so many opportunities for kids.
I think there's benefit for them to not just be stuck within
their own peer group, like but having opportunities to be
within their own peer group but also interacting with those
younger and older than I think that opportunity opens up when
you take them out of the conventional system.
Yeah, for sure. And I have noodled on that a lot
and I think back to my I was public school also in it.
I think at the end of the day it worked well for me, but I didn't
enjoy a lot of it. Like there was a fair amount of
bullying and different things and that does build character.
But it's also like man, you can build character other ways
besides like dealing with kids that are you know living out
like Lord of the Flies. Yeah.
And even even my girls when they start bickering with each other
I let him go for a while and then I'm like, hey, are you guys
being as kind to each other? As you can be?
So I don't like yellow Adam shut up, you know, or whatever.
But I asked him a question, like I really try and they're like,
now I'm like, could you do better than what you're doing?
Like, do you guys enjoy that one?
There was a period of time because we homeschool because
Nikki and I work from home, we spend a lot of time together
like we have to get creative about doing things where the
kids aren't with us and and you know, getting other other inputs
and whatnot. But the kids were Both girls
were at each other's throats for a week and I was like enough
like this, just sucks it. And so, I looked at Nikki, and I
winked at her, and I just started yelling at Nikki, and
she started yelling at me, and she was like, this butter, this
Butters melting on the counter, like the type of an asshole.
Are you? And I'm like, oh well you you're
dropping hair all over the place because Eurostar the Italian and
dude, we were yelling at each other and it was like the most
ridiculous shit and both the girls just like shrink back into
a chair. Then I stopped and I'm like, was
that enjoyable for you? And they're like, no, I'm like
that's YouTube that you to everyday for hours a day and I
want to say it was like three months after that it was please.
And thank you. And, hey sis, thanks.
And and so you know like kids don't know how to treat each
other and I'm also not in this thing where it's like, you know,
you always intervene in conflict and all that type of stuff.
But there's also scenarios where it's like, The kids are just
being shitheads to each other. And, and that, that's not cool.
Like there should probably be some intervention there.
Like it. There's one kid.
That's, that's being a bully. It's like him.
Why are you treating other people this way, like, what's
wrong with you, such that you're doing this and don't let them
weasel out of it, like you, because can we do that in a work
environment? Can we do that at a university
setting? Fuck no.
Like, no way. So it this isn't really Table at
any age. And this is similar to the way
that I've always talked to our kids, we never baby talk to him.
Like we have make-believe time, where, you know, I'm, I'm some
character out of Harry Potter and so were they or whatever?
So, you know, it's not like all dry and stuffy all the time, but
I never talked to him like, like babies.
I never have. I never will.
And similarly, I have an expectation that they treat each
other like human beings, the way that, you know, and it's like a
well-run military group. There's a pecking order and yes
there we can be a lot of ballbusting and stuff like that
and there's accountability. But when these things function
well there's mutual respect, that is born of like some, some
legitimate love for one another and then also competency in
different things. You know, in that bonds people
together. And if you let people Foster
these, these bad relationships, you know, like picking on each
other and mind games and stuff like that, people will grow to
hate one another and And like bad stuff comes out of that.
You know it's unproductive for business.
It's not good for Learning. And so this is you know, and I
still I don't know if you know the die is not cast, this race
is not run. Like, I don't know if this is is
going to hamstring my kids and in some capacity, but we've
worked it. It's stuff like that where I
will mention, you know, if they if they encounter some kids that
are what I would consider being like mean or disrespectful or
whatever. I'm like well it's up to you
whether or not you have a relationship.
Damn and you definitely you know self-defense and you know both
both verbal and kind of spatial. And so it's up to you how you
navigate that but I wouldn't play into it and they get that
stuff. Yeah.
And I feel like yeah that does not catch you don't really ever
know what's going to happen until they get out there into
the real world and make their own way.
But I feel like if you're raising them in a way that
encourages them to take responsibility for their own
actions and be independent, all while maintaining their
integrity Dirty and high moral character.
Like that is just going to be light years ahead of the masses
that aren't putting an emphasis on that.
So worst case scenario, I can't imagine being too bad for them
for sure. Yeah, yeah.
It seems like a good spot to be for sure.
So with you being as busy as you are with, you got everything
going on and you do, I mean, how did how does your day unfold?
Like, when you wake up, your wife's busier, because you get
two kids at home school, like, what is a typical day look like
for y'all? So like on non Jiu-Jitsu days,
the maybe the Last year, Nikki and I have been getting up
around 6:00 6:15 cup of coffee. And if we do some some, like
Zone to cardio straight out of the gate, we do 15 minute
meditation first. And then we do some some Zone to
cardio for about 45 minutes to an hour.
And then even on the end of that because we've been finding it
tough to fit in our resistance training.
It's not Optimum timing because we're doing, you know, like the
endurance thing and then we Ash with some strength training, but
we've been doing like a set of front squat to set a push press.
You know, what are basically, 11 lift and we take it up to like,
kind of a soft, like, five rep, max it at the end of that.
And those were on non Jiu-Jitsu days that usually takes us till
about 7:30 7:45. Then we start, getting
breakfast, spun up and, and really the food thing.
Like I have this fantasy that we could live We live, but there
was like almost like a cruise ship Buffet, just ran 24/7 and
we could just like bang in there and like get really good food
and jam out and like no dishes, no prep, no, nothing like this,
the food prep is a pain in the balls for sure.
But Nikki and I have set up like a schedule where we know what
we're going to have for breakfast and dinner on any
given day. And I just have to have food
pulled out and kind of kind of ready to go and usually lunch.
You just whatever leftovers are from the previous dinner.
Maybe I make extra stuff for breakfast.
And usually the breakfasting goes in waking the kids up goes
from about 8 a.m. to 9 and then 9 a.m. is when school kicks in,
for the kids. Nicky usually takes the first
shift on on that. And I get in and do my work for
element in the healthy rebellion and the the stuff that I need to
do and then I'll kind of tag team out with Nikki somewhere
around. 10:30, or 11 it. If it's a non Jiu-Jitsu day for,
for Nicky and I to Jutsu day, usually, we're wheels up heading
to the gym, about 11:15 1120. That takes us all the way to
like Jiu-Jitsu is a pretty big time commitment, because we have
the noon to one is the main class and then 1 to 2 is open
mat. And then it just so happens that
on the same days we have Jiu-Jitsu Sagan has Jiu-Jitsu at
4:00 and so we have to jam back home.
Home, the usually eat in the car.
So I have to have food prepped, you know, everybody eats in the
car. The kids are usually doing some
home school type stuff for reading while we are at the at
the gym and then Zoe goes to swimming.
S goes to jiu jitsu. And during that hour and a half
period, if we still have some starch in, your britches will
lift some weights do like some kids stretch or or something
like that, like, it's more mobility and kind of Corn trunk
work because usually the after we've done our to get to on the
knackered enough that I'm like I don't really want to like squad
or deadlift, you know, bencher or something like that.
But I'll do that in some Mobility work and then we head
home. And again, if I been on point, I
either have food already cooked or or I've got like a slow
cooker with like a pot roast or something.
In it, we get home. Eat and then we'll put on some
sort of a usually, a science. Or like a baking show and the
whole family stretches and living room floor.
So we all do some Mobility work and we have the lights down and
it's kind of dark and you know, we're having some family time
and watching a little bit of TV and have a little fun with that.
But instead of just sitting on the couch all like sit in a
straddle, I'll sit in the pancake or things like that.
To just try to improve my Mobility because I had a really
catastrophic back injury about 15 years ago and I found it.
If I do that like I'm pretty good to go.
Like I can don't get injured. Jets.
I don't get hurt while I'm lifting, and I'm already there
watching TV anyway. So I just do some light
stretching, and then brush teeth.
Read some, you know, read a story to the kids bedtime and
out, and then rinse lather repeat like the week's go by
fast and in a blur with that but we get it done.
No, I like it, man. When they're, when they're doing
their home school stuff, do they have?
Like a like they just do all that the kitchen table or they
get like their own little? Mock office set up like house
that structure because I feel like that both actually.
We, we rotate them. We have.
We're fortunate that we have an extra.
So Nikki has an office, I have an office and then we have like
the kitchen table that it, you know, goes between standard
eating and then also doing home school stuff and we will rotate
the kids where they're doing to work.
So it's a different, a little bit of a different experience.
So it's not like exactly the same all the time.
And then every Friday we get up earlier And jam out of the house
and we get the girls some hot cocoa.
And we do their spelling test and their end of week math test
and maybe have a little snacky treats before we, we go to our
Jiu-Jitsu class it at noon. So, bright days is always in out
of the house day. We even, we've been having the
girls do their Friday school work on Thursday, because we
don't go anywhere and we don't really leave the house.
So we've had them do a double day that day so that we can go
to the local skating rink and we'll do an hour and a half or
two hours of skating and then go to Jujitsu and and then kind of
wrap up the week from from there and in the kids love that and
there's just enough so that we're not always at home again.
The one of the weird things, it's awesome that Nikki and I
are able to work from home. But one of the things that was
kind of weird is You know, we'll sit down at dinner and I'm like,
so, what did you guys do today? And they're like, well, old man.
Like I looked at your stupid face whole thing.
It's like, there's nothing new. There's nothing, you know,
different to talk about. So when they go to the open,
it's actually a homeschool our for skating Nikki and I try to
lead them 100% alone. Like we do our own skating, we
try to be as separate as we can, so that they can interact with
the other kids kind of do their own thing.
I'm like, so, who did you meet today and what you talked about?
So that we've Something new to bring into the situation.
I love it. I love it.
What about Saturday? And Sunday.
They pretty much similar the rest of the week.
We did Saturday. We do an open Matt Nikki night,
but I also will rope the girls into bringing.
They're getting big enough that I can do a little Jiu-Jitsu with
them. So, I'll kind of do my first 15
or 20 minutes, kind of warming up to going over a little bit of
stuff with them. And then, usually, there's some
other kids at the gym that they play with, and they might You
know, play Monopoly, or whatever.
And then we do 2 hours of open, Matt.
And that open, Matt is mainly drilling like going back to that
that point that I made at the beginning of the show.
Like, we're not, I do a little bit of open rolling at the very,
very end, but probably 90% of that is just positional drilling
on whatever, we've been covering that week.
And then send a, we might go skiing when I might, you know,
do something different. Or sometimes we just do laundry
and like Hunker in and watch movies and don't really Do much
of anything on that that Sunday and just get ready for the next
week. Nice.
What's taking up most of your
time professional like the healthy rebellion and just
creating content healthy rebellion and element.
Like I've been writing a lot of content for for element and
funny enough like I'm a co-founder with element but we
have this amazing you know c-suite administrative team that
runs the thing. But I've actually been pretty
helpful in making strategic decisions about what we do with
product development. We do on marketing and stuff
like that. So I spend a fair amount of time
working with the different teams within element.
I do a lot of time on the customer experience side because
we get a lot of inbound questions and have created
material. So our CX team has resources to
answer the really repetitious questions and then if we get a
new question or kind of a complex question around health
or something like that, that I do the best job that I can to
answer that stuff. But it's not a grinding workload
there, but when you layer it in with everything else like it's,
it's about all I can do and then Nikki, and I do a podcast a week
ourselves with the healthy Rebellion radio and eyes that
it's, it's fun. It's cool for me in that I think
content generation and kind of customer service is like the my
super powers. Like, I'm really good at that
stuff and it's the first time in my life that that's all I've had
to do like Nikki. Being you know, kind of a mom
popped sole proprietor doing this.
This health influencer thing for 20 years now we've had to do
everything. And now that we have this team
that we're working with with element, like other people
handle a bunch of the stuff that we can do, but we're not experts
at and so it's really kind of cool because I have some I'm
pretty good at a very narrow wedge of things, and there's a
million things that I'm terrible at and for the first time in my
life, like I'm Doing the stuff that I'm both good at and I love
doing the most. So it's been really rewarding
like it's been very cool. That's awesome.
And it with regard to healthy Rebellion that is yall's primary
content Hub and is the main thing with him that the podcast,
primarily mainly the podcast, like all I try to do like an
article a month, you know, kind of a longer form piece that I
drop in there. And then, if I just see news
articles that pop up, like there was something that popped up the
other, With MCT oil seeming to show some benefit for pre
Alzheimer's. And so I'll give a little little
analysis and kind of drop it in there.
And we spent all that up because we would although I do still
have a social media presence. I didn't really want to feed the
algorithm that that much and so the bulk of the maybe the a
level content. If if I have any of that, it
goes into the healthy Rebellion or at least it goes there first.
And then maybe a week or a month later.
I might dribble some of that out.
On to social media? Yeah, I think podcasting as a
medium is the way to go man, like, I don't know, the
algorithm with podcasting works or if there is an algorithm sure
there is. But for whatever reason, like,
all of my social profiles, I mean there, I don't really poor
much into him because I don't, I'm not really excited about any
of them, whereas the podcast, like it's a, it's an organic
conversation. I'm talking when you were
talking about an hour for an hour about like everything from
Jiu-Jitsu to home school and just feels like humans are
supposed to talk like this as opposed to little sound bites on
social. Yeah.
I agree in the ridiculous shit. You need to do to get popular
and social media. I'm just like, shoot me, man.
I'd rather just not be known then to and God bless other
folks if they want to do that. But I'm just I'm just old and
crusty and I, you know, I own some T-shirts.
So I don't need to run around shirtless every every damn day.
You know, all talking about. Yeah.
And that's your jam, man. Yeah, but I'm right there with
you, man. And I got to give props to
element the whole team. There's been super awesome.
They sent me. They sent me so many boxes, man.
Like I've got my whole crew drinking this stuff I cycle
between like three different electrolytes, but I've openly
said, it will stand by you always 100% the tastiest without
a doubt. That's cool.
That's good to hear. Like we put a lot of effort into
making that thing good. And it's funny because it is
just salt, but like we provide a lot of Other information and
support. And, you know, we started as a
premium item, like it was, it was just a Homebrew guide, like
how to make your own key to weight is what we called it
originally, and it was like, this much table salt.
This much no salt for the potassium.
Samantha magnesium citrate, lemon, juice Stevia, shake it
up. And and, you know, go and when
we posted that online, we weren't using it as like a lead
magnet. We weren't collecting emails,
but in six, Once we had like a half million downloads of that
thing, and folks were tagging us like crazy on social media.
They're like, this is awesome. My only complaint is when I
travel like TSA doesn't like me, you know, having three bags of
white powder in life, my carry-on bag.
Like, if you guys ever made like a stick pack or something, that
would be really cool. And that was the whole, the
whole Genesis for, for element coming to be like that was, that
was not our plan to become salt Moguls.
But it's Gone really well, well, you have absolutely crushed it
with regard to just marketing and brand awareness.
I mean, y'all are tapping into entities, and individuals way
outside of the keto low carb, paleo Spectrum, I fail, at least
that's what seems like for me. Like, I'm just seeing really
properly done marketing and your, you know, sponsor other
podcast. I feel like people that are
certainly not in this nutrition space or aware of element and
using it on a regular basis. Yep, we definitely started like
the keto lokar. Scene was like, Senator the
bullseye for us, but at the end of the day, like there's so many
people for whom better. Electrolyte management is going
to help them and there are people like Stan efforting that
have been talking about the need for four more sodium, even in
like a higher carb, you know environment, but particularly
like physique oriented and stuff like that.
And if you think about it, every nerve impulse we have every
muscle contraction that occurs is driven by sodium potassium
pump. Soooo.
Yeah, and if those are off by a little bit, the other thing to
consider is the most tightly regulated physiological.
Processes in the body, are pH, and electrolyte.
So, if those are off by just a little bit, you either feel like
absolute garbage or you die, you know.
And so it kind of it's self-serving on the one hand,
it's like the guy who has the electrolyte company is saying
electrolytes are important but also like the physiology is
there, you know in the kind of cool thing about It is, if
you're feeling off due to electrolyte insufficiency,
particularly sodium, if you drink some more, you consume
some 10 minutes later, you feel great.
Like, it's an immediate turn around and I think about all the
different supplements I've taken and you know, like, creatine I
know is good for me and I know it's been officials.
Got all these neuroprotective effects and everything.
I honestly can't tell whether I took creatine or not, like
saying just this thing that like the, you know, I know, good for
me, it's Dirt Cheap. So why the hell would I not do
it? But I can't say that.
I noticed it that much. But one of the Gosh, it's a
little bit. Like, if you're feeling tired
and you have a cup of coffee, you feel less tired.
And you know, it like it's not it's not a subtle effect and I
think that it's similar when people are under fueled and
electrolytes. If they get that right there
like, bam, like I really feel good.
So it has a really tight feedback loop in that regard.
And if the product tastes pretty good, which I think they do then
it's it's relatively easy, sell them like our best strategy
right now is Sampling to people and having people try it.
And if we in general, if we can get a a packet into someone's
hand, we usually will sell three somewhere down the road.
Like, our main impediment right now is just to have enough
people try the product to see if they like, it has the the
podcast like sponsoring podcast been of all the different
marketing tactics. Probably one of the most
beneficial for are just reaching new new members, super good and
and in large Art. Because like the folks that
listen to you follow you, because you're an expert in in
the area that you focus in and you provide added value.
And so, then if someone like you is like, oh, I like this thing,
give it a shot. And then we make that easy.
It's like, you know, we were doing this.
I'm not sure which thing we're doing right now, but we were
doing, like, this eight, stick pack sample thing for, like,
five bucks, and it's like, pretty and a money back
guarantee. And so, it's pretty low low.
Barrier of entry. And, you know, somebody doesn't
like it will give them their money back and if they do like
it and, you know, great. And so we've had a lot of
success with that because it and, you know, it's been better
working with coaches than, like, athletes.
Like its kind of one thing if you got somebody who's a stud
Croft CrossFit athlete and they're really you know, they're
good looking and they're inspiring and everything.
But That person's recommendations don't they could
be they could be a million plus, you know, like Instagram person
but their their influence towards like, selling a product
like element is smaller than a well-respected coach that has a
10,000 person Instagram following.
Yeah. Because that coach is people are
following the coach maybe, they're good-looking.
Maybe they're a stud athlete. Also, but they're mainly being
followed because they can help people get results.
Schultz. And so there's like a trust and
a by in there that is is disproportionate to to, like
just just numbers. I remembered seeing something
that was really interesting, there was super good-looking gal
on Instagram. She had like 2.8 million
followers and she but it was just, she was good-looking, that
was it and that's fine. You know what you post, pictures
of herself and everything in that.
That's fine. But she got tied in with this
clothing company. And she Trying to sell like this
kind of it's basically like a basic white T-shirt but it was a
cool t-shirt like good, good gal t-shirt.
You know makes them look good and everything.
She couldn't sell 30 of them and and she was kind of bemoaning
this. You know she's like I've got two
point, eight million people and blah blah blah.
And and so there's a there's a really interesting thing that
occurs where and this is where it's kind of cautionary tale for
folks that are out in this space.
My following Is not huge. I've got a hundred thousand
people on on Instagram, similar number on on Twitter which is
great. It, you know, it's a, it's
reasonably sizable. But you see all these people
with, like, millions of followers and everything, but
that engagement, like I have really good engagement because I
legitimately try to help the people that take the, the most
important thing that they have, which is time and allocated some
of that time to, like, listening to my ramblings or, you know,
take a taking in some of the stuff that I'm doing so.
I don't go to that. Well, very often pestering
people to buy shit from me. And so when I do make a
recommendation people like, okay like this is credible and I'm
going to take it, take it seriously.
So it's maybe something for folks to Noodle on.
Like if you if you do a flight to quality instead of doing the
things that the algorithm likes, which will get you more
followers, but it won't necessarily translate into more
more revenue or legitimate engagement.
It's a, it's a longer road and it doesn't feel as like dopamine
titillating because you're not getting as much interaction, but
it works far better if you're you're actually trying to help
people and if you're legitimately trying to build a
business that you want to be here 30 years from now and and
not just some flash in the pan thing.
Yeah, 100% man, like I'm all about playing the long game as
it pertains to business for sure.
But then also just you know what, you put out into the
ether. I mean feel like so many people
are taking, you know, these shortcut Get rich quick schemes,
the trying to do these flash in the pan think as it relates to
diet and training. And I've always lived by the
code of ethics of, like, do something that you can sustain
every single day of your life and don't waver from that.
And if you do that over enough time like you will find success
and that just means you got to put the blinders on and put your
head down and get to work. But shoot, if you love The
Grind, if you love The Journey, then that's not really an issue
in the first place. And it's funny.
Something I've noticed is the folks are always trying to Lake
or read o 80/20 everything and it certainly should it shouldn't
work dumb like you want to work smart, right?
But if, if one just commits to doing really outstanding work,
you're never depressed. Yeah, you're never lethargic
you're never wanting for some meaning in your life because
you've got the meaning is doing a good job.
You know, when there's this like weird There's a really
remarkable like dopamine feedback around having a plan
and actioning on it and, and seeing that stuff through and
just showing up every day and just a little incremental
progress. And even if the, if everything
you're working on ghost shit, you know, like, when we had the
algorithm update, I was like, man, what do I do?
And there was a time there were like, I don't know, maybe this
is where we close up shop and we're not on the interwebs
anymore. But we had had a podcast for
years and we still had good. Engagement there and I was like
that's what we're going to do. We're just going to figure out a
way to circumvent, this whole algorithm driven you know
Nightmare and it's been really good for us at the end of the
day Google trying to suppress. What we talked about has ended
up getting my work in front of 10x. 100x more people than if we
had continued on the path that we had been on.
Yeah. And they're real people.
And that that's a huge differentiating Factor there.
Yeah, it's much better to have. You know, a tenth of the
following, but those be comprised of quality people that
are buying into the message that a respectable individuals.
Like, I'd rather I don't even care what my audience size is.
I am blown away by the Loyalty of the people that follow me.
Yep. And then I'll take that over the
numbers. Any damn day of the week.
Yep. Absolutely.
So we're speaking the same language there.
Well hey man, we've been talking for over an hour.
What do you got in a python? That's got you excited and we're
just kind of wrap up with that man. you know, I still just
beating this regenerative Act drum, you know, like Diana
Rogers and I did that that book and things like on the foul
great book by the way and think yeah it and How do I want to
couch this Lake? If we poke around the interwebs,
if we poke around media and social media, and I don't want
to like overly politicized this but, you know, like if covid
comes up or climate change comes up, people present stuff like
they've got it. All figured out and only like
Diane. And I have an orientation
around. All this perspective into
orientation is essentially that if you're really concerned about
claiming climate change grazing, animals are not the place to be
concerned and, you know, And if it really is a big deal than
maybe you should focus on the stuff that actually matters and
grazing, animals might actually be a solution to different
elements of climate change and economic infrastructure and food
sovereignty and a bunch of other stuff.
But that's that's really been the passion.
And my wife has been getting into like in FTS and some of the
crypto space but not in this late, get-rich-quick scheme.
But in the perspective, that This gets pretty far afield, but
it's all throw it out here. I try, not to throw things out,
it it, you know, really complex things in like, simple sound
bites because they it just chaps my ass but, you know, kind of
short on time but I'll throw it out there.
But like our economic system is broken and it's going to break
and it's going to implode and it's going to cause a lot of
damage and heartache for people and some things like Bitcoin and
etherium and stuff like that. I think offers some some hedges.
Against that and whether you agree with things but like what
happened to Kanye and some other people were like they were deep
banked. Basically, I'm horrified by
that. Like I just can't eat it.
I had my website basically removed from the Internet or the
ability to find it. So, I've experienced some of
this and what I guess I am of that flavor of libertarian that
even if I had somebody a really Didn't agree with like some
over-the-top vegan or, you know, something like that.
I would be horrified if the government be a media came in
and like silence that person remove them from the internet
and destroyed their ability to make a living and D Bank them
such that they were you know, they're crushed.
And so a lot of the work that we've been doing in addition to
like this decentralized food space is this web 3
decentralisation of fine. Nance the right to transact, the
right to self sovereignty and to be able to make decisions for
ourselves for our local communities and whatnot.
And so that's the stuff I've been really, really passionate
about. And I think it's it's in the
early days but the more people that we can get just thinking
about that. I think the better it's going to
be for all of us. No, I think all of this just
goes back to being more self-sufficient.
Less dependent upon anybody. Anything.
In the entity government included.
I mean, nobody is out to save. I no one's coming to save you
like I think that's just like the in the the bottom line.
There you have any land out there in Montana we do we have a
little bit and we're looking for a spot to actually have cows and
sheep and and do the more the homestead deal.
Yeah we're doing the same thing here man.
I've been clean land. We're trying to get some
chickens and pigs, maybe a cow or two and just like like I
don't I mean that obviously, She's not going to be what
provides our livelihood, the point where I can still support
everything, but I would like the idea of being able to lean on
that heavily enough so that I'm not dependent overly dependent
upon anything. And I think just simply leaning
into your local community leaning into your fellow human
on a local basis. And adding more value in that
regard, like everything's moved. So online.
Which I mean, if you look at what you and I have built as
from a brain standpoint. What what influence we've been
able to have Of nutritionally speaking.
We've been able to scale that much more so than we ever could
locally as a result of the internet and social media, but I
don't ever want that to come at the expense of being able to
double down on our local community or what be able to,
you know, exactly the touch points we can have within our
own Inner Circle. So I think returning to that is,
is key. Yeah, I was talking to Nikki and
I'm like, you know what, there might come a day where like they
issue, phone books again, like local, might actually matter it
again, at some point, you know. Yeah, I'd be out fully agree all
for it Rob. You are a brilliant individual.
I always enjoy chatting with you.
What am I gonna see you going? Are you going to any conferences
is coming here? I am not planning on it.
Like the the funny thing is because our Jiu-Jitsu 16 is
really good here. The the folks that I'm really
interested in tend to come to Montana, so I don't even really
have to travel that much anymore.
Like, I, I traveled so much for so long and then when covid shut
that all down, I was going like, oh traveling, kind of sucks.
Like I like being at the conferences but the coming and
going kind of blows. So I don't know might be this
year. Might be next year that I get
back out and likes hitting like some metabolic Health Summit and
some things like that. We'll see but I really enjoy
being home now. No, I totally respect that man.
I've got several competitions in Washington state.
So I'm a meander through Montana to get some of the scenic route
in which case. I'll let you throw me on the mat
a few times. That'd be great.
We'll put you up and I'll feed and water you while you're here.
Awesome man. Well, where can people go to
find out more about you, brother, Rob wolf.com, and then
drink element.com or kind of where all of the material that
I'm producing ends up popping up perfectly.
I will link it to that, make it easy for people to find both you
and elements and the keep doing what you doing.
May keep fighting the good fight, keep putting out the
content and just keep killing a brother your to man, it look
forward to seeing you in real life.
Yes indeed take him you too.