Entrepreneurship, Glutathione, and Finding Balance with John Solleder

https://www.johnsolleder.com/

Books: Leaving nothing to chance

John Salader shares his 42-year entrepreneurial journey that began with a $32 investment and evolved through multiple businesses, personal transformation, and health discoveries. His story reveals how pausing and self-development became the foundation for both business success and personal wellness.

• Started first business in 1983 with just $32, making $800 in the first month
• Found inspiration in Ronald Reagan's commencement speech about mentorship and opportunity
• Adopted the philosophy "for things to change, you have to change"
• Pivoted during COVID to podcasting and exploring AI capabilities
• Developed a passion for glutathione supplements after his mother's health improved
• Transitioned from being 85 pounds heavier to embracing vegetarianism and raw veganism
• Completed a 21-day water fast that provided mental clarity and business insights
• Discovered that pausing and rest can lead to greater strength and productivity
• Found that diet changes significantly improved joint health and sleep quality

Contact John at johnsolleder.com or text 972-259-0875 to learn more about glutathione supplementation or his "Leaving Nothing to Chance" podcast.

Chapters

• 0:48 Meet John Salader
• 1:35 From Journalism to Entrepreneurship
• 4:20 Mentorship and Self-Development Journey
• 7:35 Pivoting Business During COVID
• 11:53 The Glutathione Journey
• 17:43 Embracing Raw Veganism
• 22:18 Water Fasting Discoveries
• 32:34 Finding Clarity Through Pause

Transcript

Speaker 1: 0:25

Hi, how are you? This is Dr Damaris Maria Grossman, and this is the Mindfully Integrative Show. Today we have an amazing guest. His name is John Salader. He has years of experience an author, a speaker, business owner and has even a supplement business. So I kind of want you to kind of dive in to learn more about this individual, not only in an integrative way, but kind of in a business and mentorship way, and how can maybe change your perspective. So nice to meet you, john. Thank you so much for being on the show.

Speaker 2: 0:53

Thank you for the invitation, doctor, and I love your show. I've become a big fan of it over the last couple of months and you're doing a great job and sharing some wonderful information with people.

Speaker 1: 1:04

Thank you so much. So what would you like to talk with the audience about today, and kind of a little bit about yourself?

Speaker 2: 1:12

Okay, well, I'm a 42-year entrepreneur. 42 years ago, april, I started my very first business, and how that happened was kind of interesting. I was not somebody that went to business school. I wasn't somebody who you would look at and say that guy's interested in business. Matter of fact, I had no interest in business whatsoever. I was a journalism major at Seton Hall University in New Jersey and I was about to graduate college. And April 18th 1983, a fellow who I had wrestled with in high school, who was a couple years older than me, came into the gym I was working out at and I was working a part-time selling health club memberships, and he told me about a business I could start for $32, which at the time I didn't know, and I was like oh $32.

Speaker 2: 2:04

I'll write you a check, but you're going to have to hold the check. And the joke between us for the last 42 years has been I didn't tell him what Friday he could cash the check. I said you can cash it on Friday. I didn't tell him what Friday and I started that business and thinking you know, hey, I'll just do what he tells me to do and I'll play around with it and it'll be fun. And lo and behold, that very first month I made $800. Lo and behold that very first month I made $800.

Speaker 1: 2:27

That's a lot out of a 32 investment $30.

Speaker 2: 2:30

Yeah, I mean, today's dollar is about $2,500. And I'm a young kid, I'm 20 years old, right. So, like you know, $800 or $2,500 today that's a lot of money, right? And of course, nobody had credit cards in those days, so it was cash. It was like people paid you with cash or check in some cases. But anyway, fast forward another 30 days into May of 83. I graduate college. Then President Ronald Reagan was our commencement speaker and he talked about two things. Now, I was not a Reagan fan, by the way. I was raised where my parents did not like President Reagan. They were Democrats, they did not like anything about him and I didn't even want to go to my college commencement, to be honest with you.

Speaker 1: 3:09

Oh no.

Speaker 2: 3:10

My father, to his credit, said hey, even though we don't like the guy, we respect the office. You need to go. And I said, OK, out of respect to my dad, I'll go, but I'm not going to listen. I'm going to sit back with my arms like this. I'm not going to listen, I'm going to go. And he started talking, and he was. You know, the reason why they called him the great communicator was he knew how to break down walls with people, and he started to talk about two things that, to this day, get to me. One was the fact that the people in the then, you know, east German market wanted what the West Germans had. They wanted variety of food, variety of clothing, variety of technology, you know, all the things that you know people want in the West that don't necessarily have in the East, and that eventually, that that iron curtain would fall, and eventually did. Second to that, though, what really got me was mentorship, when he talked about the fact that in 1932, height of the Depression, he went back to Illinois, where he was from, worked as a lifeguard, talked to a very successful businessman and said you know, I'm kind of having a hard time finding a job, blah, blah, blah. And the businessman said to him what you need to do is you need to find a business you're passionate about. Secondly, you need to find a mentor to teach you that business. Well, he took that advice, got into broadcasting. One thing led to another. Eventually somebody heard him, they moved him out to California and eventually became an actor, governor, president, et cetera. So Reagan's message of mentorship really got to me because I said I'm being mentored in this business not only by the person who introduced me to it, but by people at that company as well. And then fast forward about another 30 days and, as luck would have it, I wound up in Hartford, connecticut, first business meeting of my life. I don't even own a suit and tie, to be honest with you. At that time I showed up in slacks and a shirt, you know, and I didn't have any clothes uh, business clothes. So, uh, I go to this meeting. And the fella at the meeting doing the meeting said these words. He said for things to change, you have to change, and for things to get better, you have to get better. Well, turns out that the late great jim rohan had written those words a number of years before that, but that message got to me that I was to be the brand. In other words, who the president was, who my parents were, who my family was, was insignificant. I had to work on me, on my self-development. I had to become the brand, if you will, and I digest things like Think and Grow Rich, and as a man Thinketh, and the greatest salesman in the world, bob mandino, and all of these different things that I could get my hands on at the public library. I would go to the library, my library card, and I'd go, like self-development or whatever, and I'd find these titles and I'd go and I'd read them and, uh, that began to get me thinking correctly. So I had this.

Speaker 2: 6:04

It was a, it was a crazy 60 days of my life at a very tender age of 20. I turned 21 during that time, by the way, and, um, those lessons have stayed with me for some 42 years. I still work on my self-development every single day. Uh, part of my faith and self-development. I kind of see them as one in the same, and I'm constantly working at getting better, getting smarter and learning. And as I've gotten older, like everybody else, you know, things have changed. I mean, I started my first business, doctor, the cell phone. The telephone plugged into the wall.

Speaker 1: 6:40

Today. I mean, things are the technology has changed and call me to marriage, no problem, but things have changed, right. I mean, I can only imagine yellow book pages, no problem, but things have changed, right, I mean I can only imagine yellow book pages. The phone Now it's like the tech, everybody can get everything nowadays.

Speaker 2: 6:54

It is crazy. And so the last couple of years, or last year specifically, I've focused on really two things. One is learning about AI, because AI is a game changer, as we were talking about off screen I mean, it's a game changer. I go back to about 20 years ago, when Bill Gates said there's two types of businesses, that those will be the businesses online, with a web presence, and those out of business. And I think with AI now it's the same. It's going to be the businesses that apply AI, stay up with it as it evolves and use it to the best of their ability. I think those businesses will succeed. And the other thing, of course, is what we're doing right now podcasting, because this is the new media.

Speaker 2: 7:37

This is how people are getting their not necessarily their news, but they're getting informed on topics like the things that you cover on your show, the things that I cover on my show, the things that other podcasters cover, where they're hearing from real people in the field with specific topics that they're interested in, and you're hearing firsthand, instead of hearing a reporter tell them what they think they heard.

Speaker 1: 8:00

Right, right, just like real information, and I mean you hope most of it's checked, but you know and also sometimes the entertainment of it, the information, and and there there's that people get more access to it. I feel like the podcasts give people more access for sure.

Speaker 2: 8:16

Exactly, exactly. On a business front, what do I do for a living? Because podcasting is still a fun thing, but not not a, not a profitable venture. I didn't start it for that. I started it really just kind of to not only work on my self-development, but I really started in 2020, during COVID, because I had written two books that came out almost simultaneously this, this one. If you're in a, if you sell for a living, this book has a lot of things in it. It's called moving up 2020. Yet on Amazon English or Spanish, by the way, digital as well this book has a lot of technique in it.

Speaker 1: 8:55

We'll put the links in the show notes for those to reach out.

Speaker 2: 8:59

Great, and so this one came out right before Christmas 2019 with the idea of Perfect timing, perfect timing.

Speaker 1: 9:05

We really need it.

Speaker 2: 9:06

Not knowing a few weeks later what would happen. And then this one came out, basically in late January, called Leave Nothing to Chance.

Speaker 1: 9:14

And this one's more of a. This is the brand new you just wrote. This one Leave.

Speaker 2: 9:16

Nothing to Chance.

Speaker 1: 9:17

This one no 2020. Oh 2020 also Okay.

Speaker 2: 9:20

So within 90 days? Oh, that was a lot of writing for.

Speaker 1: 9:23

And then right yeah.

Speaker 2: 9:28

I've got two books that came out at the same time during COVID. So what do you do? You got to do what my two favorite words in business today You've got to pivot and you've got to become agile.

Speaker 1: 9:38

You've got to go agile, ok.

Speaker 2: 9:41

Now the pivot is real simple, if you think, I mean, we've all played basketball sometime in our lives, right? If you think if you're, if you're away from the basket, another guy's coming down the court, he throws you the ball. You pivot on your foot to turn to face the basket and try to throw the ball into the hoop. It's the same thing, kind of in business, right? All of a sudden I'm supposed to be in 60 cities in all these different countries speaking about my regular business which I'll mention in a minute and promoting my books and all of a sudden I lose the ability to do that because there are no meetings and you can't really fly anywhere. So what was I going to do? So I pivoted to starting the Leaving Nothing to Chance podcast, which you can get under my name also John Soliter on YouTube. I pivoted to that to promote my books for the most part, not knowing for how long, by the way. I thought this was a short term situation. It's turned out to be a long term situation with podcasting and now growing with it. And where's the agility coming? The agility comes in to move backwards and forwards, forward and back in business. In other words, sometimes you've got to adjust because the circumstance COVID would be a prime example of that, but there's other examples of that interest rate fluctuations recently, I mean there's all of these things where we got to be agile. Today the great thing is, with technology, we've become more agile than we've ever been before, because it's not like we have to pick up and move somewhere, for example, to do business, but sometimes we just have to move platform to platform or technology to technology. So that's kind of what I'm doing today, my regular business.

Speaker 2: 11:17

29 years ago there was a very small company in Quebec, canada, montreal, canada, that started out to promote a product that was the result of research done at McGill University. That started out in 1975, believe it or not, to promote a product that was the result of research done at McGill University. It started out in 1975, believe it or not. My mother was sick in 1996, and a doctor in New York recommended that she try this particular product. Okay, and the product is called Immunocal and it was developed at McGill by two professors. They ultimately did research at places like Pasteur, with Dr Luc Montagnier, the Nobel Prize winner for discovering the HIV virus, dr Wolf Droga, who did research up in the German cancer institutes up in Heidelberg, et cetera, et cetera. 1996, my mom gets on this product.

Speaker 2: 12:12

I'm not really looking for a business. I'm living in Tel Aviv, israel. At the time, by the way, I had gone over there to do a consulting job for a friend's company and see the world a little bit. It's a great place to see the world. Yeah, that's great. And I'm over there having a good time. My sister calls and says Mom's sick you. And says mom's sick, you need to come back to New York, which I did. And, lo and behold, about 90 days later I wind up in Canada, in Montreal, and I find out more and more about this particular research, and it's on glutathione. Some of your patients will be familiar with it, some of your listeners will, some won't, frankly, but it's something you want to know about. Ok, glutathione is every cell in your body, primarily liver, lungs and whites of your eyes, and we started to market this product here in the United States and Canada.

Speaker 2: 12:57

I was really the first significant person to join the company to market it or other people there when I got there, but they never really did a whole lot and weren't really marketing people. And I got involved in marketing it and today we market market in 18 countries around the world. We're always looking for people, by the way, that are looking for a side gig or side hustle. You can just contact me from the show notes and I can help you to do that. And why would you want to work with me? Well, I've done this successfully. I've helped to build this brand and, by the way, there were three other brands prior to this that I helped to become household words, mostly in the one in the herbal market, one in the sports nutrition market and the other in the weight control market. So I've been doing this for 42 years.

Speaker 2: 13:43

So I kind of figured out some things, but there's more to figure out and I was looking for a good team of people to do that. And, once again, no obligation. If you want to contact me, happy to tell you more about the product, more about the business.

Speaker 1: 13:59

Oh yeah, of course. So how did Glutathione work for your family and for your? I mean? Obviously business-wise that's one, but I obviously believed in it passionately, so it must have helped business-wise that's one, but I obviously believed in it passionately, so it must have helped.

Speaker 2: 14:17

Well, my mom was 69 at the time she got on the product. She passed away in January of 2020 at age 92. So it helped her to see a lot of Helped her significantly.

Speaker 2: 14:22

Yeah, it helped her with a lot of Christmases, a lot of seeing my kids be born. I was a late bloomer, I got married in my 40s so we got a chance to meet my kids and watch them grow up. I mean, she wasn't here when they graduated high school, but she was close and my sister's kids in New York. She had a chance to watch them grow up and my niece get married and have her own two kids and everything else. So yeah, big believer in glutathione and everything else. So yeah, big believer in glutathione. It's one of those things that you know. Once again, it's not talked about every single day, but when we began this in 1996, 97, nobody had ever heard. We used to tell people because they couldn't say the word glue the tie on.

Speaker 1: 15:05

Oh, glue the tie on. Oh, yeah, yeah.

Speaker 2: 15:07

That's great, like glue your tie on, you know. And today, of course, it's become very mainstream. I mean, there's a lot of companies, frankly, marketing glutathione supplementation. The thing with ours is we've got 91 patents to support it. We've done all sorts of research on everything from TBIs to various cancers to you know, you name it HIV, etc. To various cancers to you know, you name it HIV, et cetera. But the other part of that is, if you just take a glutathione tablets, they get destroyed in your digestive tract.

Speaker 1: 15:37

You've got to get the pre-pandemic. Yeah, I was actually going to ask you that. I said usually the bioavailability. I have conversations with people of how is it ingested. So is this a liposomal or is this an inhalation or an injection?

Speaker 2: 15:50

Actually it comes in a little envelope. Oh, okay, it's whey protein. Uh, mix it with juice. If you want, mix it with water. We've got like boosters that can go with it. That uh help with a number of different uh things as well. Uh, and for taste. Of course, this particular one's for energy, but we've got them for, you know, fruits and vegetables etc. Etc. Uh, the main thing is you got to get the glutathione into your. You're going to get the three precursors, amino acids, into your gut to create the glutathione so it feeds the cells. That's one of the research studies that we did.

Speaker 2: 16:21

Along the way, companies reinvested over $10 million, by the way, in research. So even though we are a network marketing company, we're a serious research company. We started out as a research company in 1975. We were that till 1996. And then the investors said well, we need a way to sell this, to start to get it out to the marketplace number one and make money from it. Of course you know they had a big investment in it. So 96 is when that began and we're in 18 markets now. So if you want to know about it, folks just contact me and I'm happy to send you information, no obligation. If you're interested, great. If not, hey. Once again, just something you need to know about.

Speaker 1: 16:58

Yeah, no, I think glutathione has many benefits. So, in general, I think that's important In reference to just like your story and how you've been now. How are you, how is your podcast going? How's your business? Seems to be going Well. How's your own health going?

Speaker 2: 17:15

My own health's great. Um, I made some changes in it as I got older. Uh, I, I. I adopted a vegetarian diet eight years ago. I transitioned that last year to a raw vegan diet. Uh, january.

Speaker 1: 17:29

Wow, how's that going? I am not raw vegan. No, I could do more vegetarian, but I'm not raw vegan. No.

Speaker 2: 17:38

I'm about 90% raw, Mostly fruit, some vegetables, occasionally some nuts, Occasionally, once in a a great while I do eat cooked. I shouldn't admit that my raw vegan mentor is having a heart attack right now. But once in a while I do cook. There are certain things like green beans, for example. I just have to eat them cooked. For some reason they just don't taste good raw.

Speaker 1: 18:01

Got it. Yeah, I think I haven't really done it. There are certain things that I wouldn't be able to digest well if they weren't cooked in general. But yeah, no, that's great. So you're juicing, do you let a smoothies a lot of? Do you already cook a lot of your foods or you don't cook them?

Speaker 2: 18:15

Mostly. I mean I'm a huge fan of melons, honeydew, cantaloupe, watermelon. You know this time of year like we grow watermelon here in Texas, so that's great, I actually grow it in my backyard. But melons, berries, grapes, uh, sit some citrus uh uh. Jackfruit, uh, some dorian once in a while, dorian I mean have you had difficulty?

Speaker 1: 18:39

I mean there are more. There are vegan communities throughout the um areas, but I know texas might be a little challenging uh, texas, texas is interesting.

Speaker 2: 18:50

This is, you know, it's beef country.

Speaker 1: 18:52

Yeah, that's so said here. It might be interesting, but I know that Austin there are some areas where there's a large vegetarian community, that there are vegetarian restaurants.

Speaker 2: 19:01

Austin's become a big area of all kinds of alternative health. Frankly, dallas is evolving slowly but surely. There's more vegetarian restaurants now than there were, you know, when I first went this way eight years ago. A vegetarian, not really raw vegan. Once in a while, something pops up a raw vegan restaurant, but unfortunately they really haven't been able to be real successful here as of yet. Um, but I just spent two weeks in Costa Rica at a raw vegan uh event. That uh the guy who mentored me, a guy named Fran Turk, uh got me into raw veganism a year ago him and his wife, uh, katie, and they live in Costa Rica, on the Caribbean coast.

Speaker 1: 19:42

I don't know if you've been to Costa Rica, but I have not, but I've heard wonderful things about the, the, um, the meals and the, and the food and the area.

Speaker 2: 19:51

The fruits there are just amazing. I mean incredible. And coconuts, a lot of coconuts, jackfruit, I mean just about everything grows there. They just have a really great climate to grow fruits and vegetables in.

Speaker 1: 20:06

Sounds like a place for retirement for you.

Speaker 2: 20:09

You know, that's one thing we're looking at. Yeah, I really like Costa Rica and the ocean. Yeah, people are great Everybody's, not everybody, but most people are fully bilingual too. So I speak some Spanish, but not enough to be dangerous. My wife is French, but we met people there from everywhere, by the way Germany, hungary, czech Republic, obviously, all the Latino countries that are that are in the vicinity, canada, of course, americans, I mean. It's become a real melting pot, if you will, of cultures, which is good too. So you got, you know you got plenty of different variety of people as well, but that became a lifestyle and part of how I found that lifestyle.

Speaker 2: 20:55

By the way, I used to be 85 pounds heavier than I am now and I came off of being an athlete for many years. I competed in the sport of judo primarily. I did some other sports as well, but I always competed as a heavyweight. And all of a sudden, you know, you start getting a little bit older and you start realizing, like your joints, my joints, are taking a beating with all the sports and I have multiple surgery shoulder, back, et cetera and that was when I changed my diet because I wanted to help my joints, my joint.

Speaker 1: 21:25

Right. So you learn that anti-inflammatory and you really change the perspective, but you took it to another level and I respect that and I think that that's surprising those that are maybe listening. Is it possible? Is a certain type of diet make a difference? What do you think?

Speaker 2: 21:41

Oh, I think it absolutely. I think, like everything right, what we put in our mouth is going to determine our long-term health.

Speaker 1: 21:47

100% agree with that. Now, I don't think there's one diet, but I feel like, if this one is working for you, I'm definitely an advocate for things that are more natural.

Speaker 2: 21:58

So have you seen changes? Well, what I found was that my joints are never going to be super healthy.

Speaker 1: 22:07

Right? Well, I mean, they're going to change over time, which is a normal progression of aging.

Speaker 2: 22:14

I find, with the diet that I'm on now, that the synovial fluid seems to reach my joints a lot better than it did when I was on a non-vegetarian diet. That's one thing. Thanks you, Losing weight always helps. I mean that certainly helps.

Speaker 1: 22:30

Oh yeah.

Speaker 2: 22:30

Yeah, but what I found is just everything from digestion to sleep improved because my body started to work with the food I was ingesting, as opposed to fighting it, and that would be my biggest suggestion to people is, if you try any change of diet, okay, like if what you're doing isn't working and you try something different, it doesn't have to be raw vegan. That's pretty extreme, right right.

Speaker 2: 22:58

But whatever you try, do it with a doctor's care. By the way, I always consult with my doctors. You know, like your patients, you want them to consult with you and just say, hey, I'm thinking of making a change. What do you think, doc? And my doctor is South African and he's older than me. He's 10 years older than me and he's a big bicyclist. And he was like hey, try it, If it works, great, If it doesn't, you can always go back. So my doc was very positive in his approach, so I did consult with him. The other thing I did a different topic, but I also have done two long-term water fasts.

Speaker 1: 23:33

Okay, a long-term for you. What is long-term for you? What does that mean? First one was 10 days.

Speaker 2: 23:38

Okay, that is long-term. Okay, that one was in Austin medically supervised retired chiropractor. I stayed in his house. He's got like a facility in his house that you stay at. I spent 10 days during Thanksgiving, by the way. Oh, wow, that's a challenge.

Speaker 2: 23:52

The funny part is I'm on the phone one night and I've got no sound on. I'm talking to a buddy of mine and you realize how good these people are at marketing food because, hey, you're not eating, but at the same time you're watching all these food commercials and whatever they would advertise you want. If it was pizza, it was pizza. If it was, you know, meat, it was meat. If it was the bread, it was bread, it was. You realize the psychology and you go to that book that Dr Goldhammer wrote. Dr Goldhammer wrote and now I'm going to forget the title of it Dr Alan Goldhammer from True North, and it's all about the psychology of how good the food industry is and making food taste good or making it like so it makes you eat more and you realize I mean like it's right up there with sex.

Speaker 2: 24:40

I mean the way that they advertise it's addiction, it's literally.

Speaker 1: 24:43

They make it like it's addicting.

Speaker 2: 24:44

You could smell it and taste it over the television like I had to change the channel. I finally just said you know, let me just put on, I put on like a basketball game or something and just said, let me, let me not have anything with with a lot of advertising on it. Um, but that, that was. That was one thing. And then my second one answer your was 21 days. That I did last June. That's a significant amount of time.

Speaker 1: 25:06

How did that go for him Physically?

Speaker 2: 25:10

spiritually. How did that go? You know it went terrific. I was surprised. You know the first three days. For anybody who's never fasted the first three days day one, you're living off yesterday's food. Day two, you're living off some of yesterday and the day before food. Day three is when your body starts to kind of really clean itself and the autophagy and all that starts to happen. And when that starts to happen is when you, like you look at your arm and you're like you want to chew your arm off about the third day. But if you make it through day three to day four in my case, in the two long-term ones that I've done by day four all of a sudden your body starts to work properly and all of a sudden you're getting a lot more, frankly, a lot more blood to your brain. And what I found was by day four I wasn't hungry anymore. Now my other advice to people on that if you are to do that, number one, obviously with supervision, consult your doctor and work with them on it, or another medical professional. But number two if you can get to a facility to do it, great. If you can't do that and you do it from home, you got to lay low.

Speaker 2: 26:16

I literally took 21 days off from my business. I returned some phone calls and checked emails, that kind of thing, but I wasn't going to the gym, I wasn't working out, I wasn't driving my car. Okay, you know my wife was, was was with me and she wasn't doing the fast, but you know she was here supervising me. My oldest son was supervising me as well. So do it with supervision. But you got to rest, because what would happen is, you know, I'd have a conversation like we're having right now, feeling great. I get off the call five minutes later, be like, wow, I need to go sleep.

Speaker 1: 26:49

I bet, because your body has just used up all the energy that it's expended, probably for the day.

Speaker 2: 26:54

Exactly and plus, to get the best results. You know the idea of a fast is you're putting your body into resting mode, resting in recovery, so you don't want to go. Well, I'm going to miss the gym. So if you're going to miss the gym, then don't do the fast, is my advice to people. It's like, do it. It doesn't mean you can't stretch and do a little yoga and walk a little bit. Obviously move your body, of course, but you can't do what you normally do.

Speaker 2: 27:28

If you're a high-intensity athlete, you're going to have to, you know, lay low for the period of the fast. And then, of course, the refeeding is extremely important, also just as important as the fast. Frankly, you know you don't get off a fast and go and just, you know, munch out. It's like you've got to gradually reintroduce your body to, you know, water-based foods, you know your watermelons and things like that, to just kind of get your digestion, you know, restarted. So it was an interesting process, but it was a game changer for me. That 21 days was a major game changer, not just in terms of helping me to keep off the weight that I had already lost, because it helped me to do that, also from a psychological standpoint. It just proved to me that, hey, you can do this. Okay, you didn't starve to death, right, you didn't eat your arm.

Speaker 1: 28:05

Right, right, and this is mostly water and tea, or just water, just warm water 9.5 pH water.

Speaker 2: 28:12

you know lots and lots of it. You know and and, by the way, that's one of the side benefits I've honestly never been a great water drinker, but ever since that fast, it's like I appreciate water so much more and what it does for my body. So I really bet, you know like I always got what it did, but it's like the fact that it's, you know, roughly 70%, or whatever it is, of our body and our brain. It just kind of opened my eyes to how important water consumption is on a daily basis.

Speaker 1: 28:42

That that I could not agree more, the fact that you did it for 21 days. I commend you for that and I mean, like you said, under supervision and with good purpose. I find that really necessary and so I think that fasting in general is necessary. Now, long-term fasting there's been so much research done. Even if people do them one a month or every couple of weeks, I think it's important. I myself do 12 to 14 hours daily for the rest of my life and if I add in some of these long-term ones, I think that they are very effective. I mean we just keep eating. I mean you know the environment and the. You know the way in which, like we said, like you said, the environment and the. You know the way in which, like we said, like you said, the advertising and the foods and this, that and the other People just keep eating and they just keep eating.

Speaker 2: 29:42

You know I found with that too. I read a lot of the research that that Walter Longo did at the Longevity Center out there in UCLA, yeah, and also the work that Goldhammer and I'm having a 64-year-old moment, I'm forgetting his partner's name Huberman.

Speaker 1: 29:51

Oh no, huberman maybe. What is it? Huberman? I don't know what you're trying to think about.

Speaker 2: 29:55

I know what you're talking about though, yeah, you know who I mean. I mean they've been doing it 40-, 40 plus years up there in California. But you know, as you study these different things, you know you start to realize that that there are so many benefits to it. But you know, I go back to my athletic life for a second. When I would get stronger in the weight room is not when I would train heavy. It was when I would be in rest mode. And you think about our digestion from the time we're babies, we're ingesting, ingesting, ingesting, ingesting, ingesting. All of a sudden you're basically telling your gut hey, I'm giving you whatever. Seven days off, 10 days off, 21 days off. I'm kind of giving you a rest. Well, what happens with anything when you give it a rest is it generally comes back stronger over time? The other thing I found was that I started to get some of the best business thoughts I've ever had during that 21 day fast.

Speaker 1: 30:55

And the only thing I did your own meditation.

Speaker 1: 30:57

You understand a lot more about body than I do, certainly, but what I found was that Maybe, maybe I do, maybe I don't just because I've studied it, but I find it more when I. Maybe, maybe I do, maybe I don't just because I've studied it, but I find it more when I not the studying part when I was practicing it personally, like you were practicing, so I I don't think it's a matter of just studying. I feel like it comes down to I learned more when I was in meditation and doing nothing also then then the actual doing this, a bunch of stuff you know, the only thing I could surmise is this if the blood's not going to your gut, where's?

Speaker 2: 31:28

it going it's going here, right, like, like hippocrates said, right, you know your brain is checking stomach right. So it's like, well, if your first stomach isn't using the blood because it's not working, it's just kind of turned off. You know this is what what's using it, you know, and that's sort of water fast. But I know, I know I've talked to a lot of people that have done, you know, uh, fast with juices, fast, when they're still drinking coffee. You know that that's not, that's not a water fast. I mean, that's a liquid fast, but it's not a water fast. But to do it, to do a true water fast, I mean you're ingesting nothing but water. You know, uh, and you know I'll be getting trouble. Of course. You know rehydration fluid, which which, uh, you know whoever's overseeing you can talk to you about. I didn't need that in either case, by the way, I was one of those, like the guy in Austin. He said you're a great faster. I don't know how you become a great faster. I just, for whatever reason, had agreed with my body.

Speaker 1: 32:15

You didn't dehydrate too quickly. You were able to take in. You didn't have to add in any new nutrients or anything.

Speaker 2: 32:28

I think too, and I'll just say this to people because of the sports that I did you know judo wrestling, you know jujitsu, powerlifting as I got older. Those were all weight, weight centric sports where there were times I had to make weight, where I had to step on a scale and be a certain amount of weight, which means I was used to going sometimes a day or two days without food. So if you've never done that, once again I really recommend just be supervised, just have somebody making sure you're okay and your doctor would be the primary person, your spouse, et cetera. I mean, just make sure you've got supervision. It's not something you want to do if you live alone by yourself, without anybody looking in on you and making sure that you're doing it properly.

Speaker 1: 33:07

You make good points. No, I appreciate your insight on the pause. I mean I literally made this podcast of making mindful ways every day and I appreciate you stating the pause in you know the doing and that that takes a lot. It takes a lot of effort to really understand that and that things came up for you in the quiet.

Speaker 2: 33:30

Yeah.

Speaker 1: 33:31

Because it was like your body was like hey, hey. So I think that's, I think it's a really important key point for people to understand. So, before you leave today one, I'm going to put all of your information on the show notes. But one, how can people reach you? And two, what, what additional insight do you?

Speaker 2: 33:50

have for those listening. You can reach me a couple of ways, obviously, you know, johnsollendercom, s-o-l-l-e-d-e-rcom. Or if you want to send me a text I generally don't answer my phone a lot because I get so many texts all day and so many numbers I don't know, like everybody else does. If you want to send me a text, say, hey, I heard the show, interested in glutathione, or interested in you know, side hustle, whatever, or interested in whatever for that matter, uh, my, my number is 972-259-0875. Just send me a text to say that you heard the show because, like I said, if I don't know what it is, I don't respond to it.

Speaker 1: 34:25

but, of, course yeah, for a mindfully integrative show yeah, let me know where you heard of it.

Speaker 2: 34:31

Um, and if you want to listen to our show, you know once again, you know, leaving nothing to chance is the name of it, but you can also just get there on youtube with my name, john underscore solider or john solider, you'll, you'll find it. We've had, you've nothing to chance.

Speaker 1: 34:45

And in your podcast, what do you um? What's your stories and insights that you um celebrate and discuss?

Speaker 2: 34:51

well, I'm sorry. What's that?

Speaker 1: 34:52

in your on your podcast, um what are the stories and insights that you discuss?

Speaker 2: 34:57

you know we discuss business. I mean we started out as a small business show but we've morphed. I mean I interviewed a guy yesterday, for example, who is a Episcopalian bishop who goes around the world singing OK, in war-torn areas, and just you know human interest. I mean we want to hear those stories too, because those stories motivate us of what other people are doing with their lives. We talk a lot about health. Obviously So'd love to have you as a guest doctor uh. We talk about nutrition. We talk about, you know, skin care, sometimes longevity. You know things that are going to help somebody, because why they listen to a podcast is to learn something, right?

Speaker 2: 35:37

right, exactly, exactly you know you don't listen because you like us. I mean that that's a side benefit if you, if you happen to like us, but you, you want to get off of there. If you you spend a half hour listening to a podcast, you want to get off of there and say, hey, I learned something or something I want to go check out. You know something I wasn't familiar with, that I want to check out, that I hadn't heard of previously, you know. So that's kind of the goal is to give people some good information.

Speaker 1: 36:02

That sounds awesome. I really appreciate you being on the show and taking the time to give some insight to those listening and watching, and I really think that an important key, like I said previous, is you know that pause there and you have done so many things already in your life, business and and I can't wait people to like either also reach out on the book.

Speaker 2: 36:24

So I'm going to have that in the show notes for those individuals to read and take a look at, and I will myself, and I really do appreciate you being on Thank you, continue to do the great work that you're doing to inspire people and help people, and we'll send you well, we can do this offline if you want, but we'll send you information too, so we can get you on our show.

Speaker 1: 36:45

And share our audience Sounds great. I would appreciate it. Thank you so much, and thank you, guys, each and every one of you, for listening and make sure you make it a mindful way every day.