Behind the Toolbelt
Behind the ToolBelt is a live, raw, and uncut podcast that brings real, unfiltered conversations about business, leadership, and the entrepreneurial mindset. Hosted by Ty Cobb Backer, CEO of TC Backer Construction, this live show features industry leaders, innovators, and experts sharing their experiences, strategies, and insights. From building successful companies to overcoming challenges, each episode offers valuable perspectives for entrepreneurs and business owners and leaders looking to grow, and make an impact.
Behind the Toolbelt
Navigating Pressure with Calm and Composure: Cultivating Resilience and Growth Through Diving and Retreats
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Welcome back, everybody, to Behind the Tool Belt. Thank you for joining us on this awesome Wednesday afternoon. Thank you for hanging tight. For those of you that may have been hanging tight, if not, I will catch you on the replay, but this is episode 263 of Behind the Tool Belt. Stay tuned for our what do we call them?
Speaker 2:our intro from our sponsors. Welcome to Behind the Toolbelt, where the stories are bold, the conversations are real and the insights come to you live, raw and uncut. Every week, host Ty Cobb-Backer sits down with game changers, trailblazers and industry leaders who aren't afraid to tell it like it is no filters, filters, no scripts, just the truth. Please welcome your host of behind the tool belt, ty cobb backer.
Speaker 1:We're back. Welcome back everybody. Thank you for tuning in for episode 264. That's what it said. That's what it said, yeah, yeah, 264. Behind the tool belt Live from Cayman, live from Grand Cayman, grand Cayman, ireland.
Speaker 4:Yeah, okay, yeah, it is Cayman Cayman, cayman, cayman, cayman. They call it Cayman if you live here.
Speaker 1:Oh, really yeah Okay.
Speaker 4:Yeah.
Speaker 1:They know you tourist. If you say it came in, okay, that's what I found. That makes sense. That makes sense. So it's funny. I got a funny story, so I'll be the judge of that I do.
Speaker 1:Well, there's this small town, uh, in delaware. It's on the on the bay and it's called um lewis lewis. Yes, now it's called lewis. Okay, so when I was a kid, I lived there with that 50 year old lady I was. I told you about the story.
Speaker 1:Um, george reminded me of the story when I was on your podcast, when I was 17. She was 35. Oh, okay, yeah. So I lived there with her, okay, on this bay, it was the delaware bay, and back then, if you were local, you called it lose, lose, lose, l-e-w-e-s. Lose. Oh okay, well, years later we go back, I get my shit together and and, uh, jen and I got a camper down there. And we get down there and everybody's calling it lewis, lewis, lewis, lewis. Even the radio commercial tv's calling it lewis, lewis, lewis, lewis. Even the radio commercial tv ads were like lewis, lewis, lewis. And even when she was a kid, like, this is the place where everybody goes to vacation. It's about three hours away from where we are and uh, it's funny how things change where, like, all the tourists came like, took over this area, moved there because every national builder in the country is there building houses, but now everybody calls it lewis weird, but it's. It's actually pronounced lose, yeah, so I I understand that, because not that I was local, but I have lived there.
Speaker 4:I have a second name there if you lived there, you were local.
Speaker 1:Yeah, right, so I was local and we called it lose delaware huh, interesting, yeah, yeah.
Speaker 4:Well, maybe one day I'll go check out lose, yeah and I'll walk in and I'll start making fun of people. I'll be like do you fucking know that it's not lewis asshole? Like are you from here? I know, yeah, can't you tell with my accent that I am? Yeah, yeah, can you not read? Yeah?
Speaker 1:j Go back to school.
Speaker 4:Did you go to school in Lewis?
Speaker 1:Yeah Right, there's no I now. Great Right.
Speaker 4:So okay. So where are we? We're in Grand.
Speaker 1:Cayman. Yeah, so we're in Grand Cayman, so I do have a question for you, oh, let's go. Yeah, so we're, we're at, we're attending. You are the retreat master I'm going to consider you the retreat master.
Speaker 4:Never been called that before. I like that. I like that title.
Speaker 1:So you didn't have to self-proclaim it. Thank you.
Speaker 4:Thank you. Oh, so I didn't have to give myself a nickname like a bunch of other fucking assholes, exactly, all right, cool, so you're the retreat master of XL 2.0.
Speaker 1:Exhale.
Speaker 4:Exhale.
Speaker 1:Yep, yep 2.0. Yep 2025.
Speaker 4:I would why? Why, like I've heard you say, because you love to dive, but why did you want to start a retreat? It's a great question, ty, um, the, and, and and I do have an answer. I've thought about it a lot. Uh, I, I have participated and been a member of a number of different masterminds let's call them groups, whatever it is over the last course of five, seven years, something like that, and I got something from every single one of them.
Speaker 4:Right, I learned something, I participated, I got outside of myself, I got super fucking uncomfortable, you know, doing things that I never thought that I'd do before, and they started to grow very large and I started losing the connection that I had made with people in the group and it became a little bit, a little bit, a little bit impersonal. Now, that being said, like all these groups that are a part of are still amazing groups, and like I still recommend them to people, and like they break off into smaller groups and whatever. But I had this memory of the first retreat that I ever went to, which was at a circle event with Sam Taggart, and he had the circles less than a year old, I think, and I think it was 16 of us and I'm sure somebody will correct me, but it was around that it was like 15 to 18 dudes and we all went to Mexico and we did a bunch of crazy ass shit which is stories for another day. But I ended up staying and becoming really good friends and made some really amazing connections in that small, intimate setting, right. And so, as I felt like I was phasing out of these other groups, I was like, man, when was I the happiest when I was part of something like this? And I was like when it was smaller, when it was intimate. I was like, well, if I did something like that, what if I did it? And then I got to pick what we do. Oh well, I love to scuba dive. That'd be a really cool thing to share with people that maybe haven't done it before.
Speaker 4:Or bring experienced divers on so that we can all relax and go dive and have a good time was because I didn't want it to be people showing up and thinking that we were going to be sitting in a room with a whiteboard all day with content. There's a time and a place for content, and we've had Dr Gary, who's going to come on here in a little bit. I've brought somebody in to talk to us about breathing and exhaling and slowing down our heart rate and checking our HRV and all these different things that he's teaching, but it's like two hours of the day, right In the morning max, and then it's diving, hanging out, talking, you know, getting to know each other and forming some real connections, right, which, not to plug, but is the basis of my book that's coming out. That's called shut the fuck up and listen more, and it's how to build better connections with the people around you. And so I really wanted to see if I could pull off facilitating an event like this. And so last year was the first annual um exhale retreat, which thank you, william Rankin, for helping me come up with a name for that and I want to keep doing it. If people still want to go, I'm going to keep doing it.
Speaker 4:I told everybody when we started that night I don't do this for money.
Speaker 4:I do not make a bunch of money on these things.
Speaker 4:I barely do better than break even most of the time on these, but I thoroughly enjoy being here and watching. It's like being a dad, cause you kind of you watch the fucking room, you watch everybody else get to interact and, yeah, I jump in and I, you know, I do stuff and I talk and whatever but I get to watch everybody else grow and learn and and learn from the other people that are here, and it's a great addition to the culture movement you know, which you're a part of, and just an opportunity for us to get outside of that, and so that's the real reason is that I was trying to I equated this to as an alcoholic trying to find that first high again, yeah Right, and I wanted to find that moment in time right, which I never will, but I tried to recreate it the best that I could, to try and recreate what it felt like to to have that that smaller, more intimate, intimate group of men together to be able to to grow and learn together.
Speaker 1:Yeah, yeah, I heard bits and pieces of that, but I just wanted everybody else to hear why and I know sometimes you're sarcastic and you say stuff like it's because I like to die.
Speaker 4:But I, and that's fair. That is part of it. Yeah, sure.
Speaker 1:And that and that, and that's cool too. And the other night you said that you don't do this as a business. You're not in it for the money, and we know that. That's why it's that's. You could probably have had 23 to 30 people here easily, I'm sure. And the cool thing that I like about it is is that it is like nine or 12 of us, whatever it is not. Nine of us is the share thing.
Speaker 4:Yeah, yeah, 10 with me 10,.
Speaker 1:yeah, and that's what I really like about it and in the intimacy of it and the connections that you make, like like mike goldstein, who will who'll come on shortly here, but um is it golden stein, isn't it yeah? Okay, stein, just making sure I just I never say anything, right yeah, it's okay.
Speaker 4:So he's in the room. So I just thought I I thought I'd make it embarrassing and a little awkward, since he was here I don't even know what episode this is. Yeah, I know it's 274.
Speaker 1:Yeah, I know we're coming up on our fifth year anniversary. Selfishly myself, personally, I like to come to something like this, especially when you're involved, because I have to travel. When you're involved because I have to travel Like I've said this a couple of times as I've been here like I have to travel, usually halfway around the country, to be around people like you that motivate me, that push me to be a better human, being a better entrepreneur, better father, just really pushing me outside of my comfort zone. The whole diving experience is just a totally different level of of uncomfortability. I mean, there's nothing really comfortable about it on your first couple of dives, right, okay, but once you get through that, it's just like anything else before before you know you there. There's always pain before growth and for me it was very painful.
Speaker 1:I played a lot of head games with myself on why I didn't want to come here and you had to listen to a lot of that. Like I'm coming, I'm not coming, I'm coming with every excuse in the world and we'll probably laugh about that for years to come. But I made it, came back and I saw that you're bringing other newbies into the fold as well and pushing them and, like you mentioned earlier, you know you're kind of like dad, you know and and and I think the the one little piece that you left out was is like watching people grow, like you're like, you know the retreat master and you know like, but but you in, in all seriousness, it's. It's pretty rad to to be a part of this for the second year. I'll keep coming back until you tell me I can't come back only because of the. You know it is.
Speaker 1:Each dive is different. There was one dive, I don't know, yesterday it's like the second dive that we took. I jumped in mask filled with water, couldn't get my ears stabilized, I just was, it was off. Couldn't get my ears stabilized, I just was, it was off, I was, it was it started out wonky.
Speaker 1:Yeah, and I realized that I was the problem. It wasn't that the equipment, there was something wrong with the equipment, not that the conditions were perfect, that that I needed to just stop being a part of the problem. So took, lifted my mask up, did my thing, cleared it out, swam back up a little bit, let my ears pop, come back down and and for me especially diving and golfing. Golfing there's a lot of life lessons learned on the golf course. Okay, same with diving. Diving there's. There's so many different things that you could apply to your life. Like get out of the way stupid, stop being the problem, just take a breath.
Speaker 4:Take a breath and thriving in chaos, because I always equate it to like when I if you watch you know, like any old military movies, or if you've ever done've ever done any um, I did a, I did a like a seal training thing for half a day in San Diego and the big thing that they were trying to teach you was how to, how to um, eliminate the outside noise so that you can actually focus on the thing that you're doing right now, because none of this matters. What matters is what you have to accomplish right now. Right, and the the in the example that you just gave is fucking perfect, because it's. I jumped in, my mask flooded, something was fucking with me, my ears were screwed, but like, but if, but, if you just stop, if you just stop and breathe and go, okay, step one, equalize, step two, take off my mask, clear it, put it back right and, like you, just step by step, do it. All of a sudden you're like, yeah, and I'm back yeah, right, and was that the feeling?
Speaker 1:yeah, it was one of the best dives, right, we just had to get through I was so quick to like okay, I'm not doing it right, I'm done, you don't need that.
Speaker 4:I was like that's your first immediate, because your heart starts fucking racing, right, because you're underwater, yeah Right. So, like when I jumped in today, I've got a thing on my second regulator on my second stage that for some reason, when I jump in once in a while, it fucking goes and air just starts blowing out of it. And so I've learned, like I have to fucking beat on it on my shoulder or I have to, I literally unplug it and then I'll plug it back in while I'm underwater. But if you notice, like I don't put all my gear on and then, like, do the giants? Like I grab my fins and I jump in and I'm putting my fins on, like as I'm going down, and then this thing's fucking going.
Speaker 4:And it hasn't happened the whole time we've been here, and it happened today on the second dive. But I've seen it so many times now I just know and I know to expect it, and so it doesn't freak me out when it does happen, right. And so the more you do anything in life whether it's in business and life and work, whatever the more you do something and you don't overreact to the situation, you're able to thrive inside of that chaos and everybody sees you as the calm force right when everybody else is doing this and you're like, no, this is, this is the way we go.
Speaker 1:This is what we do, like we're fine, right, like that's, that's what's cool. And I can honestly say this and I'm not just sitting here stroking you but since last year, there's been some things that have popped up um, not in personal stuff, but in business that I feel like I've actually been able to deal with better or or dealt with it in a good way. Okay, then I probably would have, prior to coming to this, and and I'm I'm going to say it was because of the trip last year and putting myself under so much emotional turmoil and trying to figure it out on my own, because it's not going to be a good idea too I think it's a good idea, but and I'm just going to use this I'm going to tell you what one thing that came up was is so we had a sales manager down at one of our locations and we found out that they were washing checks down at one of our locations, and we found out that they were washing checks, okay, and and, uh, one of one of my uh, he's actually the, the vice president of the southeast division, and he was fired up, right, and he was like I want to kill this dude. We're gonna do, to do, to do to do all this stuff.
Speaker 1:Yeah, and uh, kim came over and his wife there. They just happened to be up at our office for training, so we were all in the same room and this gentleman happened to be there too. They were all up there and uh, sam was doing the invoicing in the home and I reached out and said, hey, I already paid a deposit and she's actually sent us the copy of the check that she sent. She must've took a screenshot of it for whatever reason, and then sent us a copy of the check that got returned to the bank after it cleared, had his name on it and everybody, kim was tripping out. I think she was tripping because she thought I was going to be tripping. Yeah, okay, cause I've worked with her for 11 years, so she knows like, I think she was waiting for me to go out there because he was sitting out in the conference room.
Speaker 1:Yeah, and I was like the quiet, you know, during the storm, I was like, look, this is what we're going to do. He's basically going to have to get off our property. I don't care how he gets home, he has all of his equipment here because he brought it with him. I was like, just simply, he's got to go and as things come up, we'll deal with it. Yep, you know, and Mike was fine and I didn't fall into the chaos either, like I didn't let it. I just thought, you know what?
Speaker 1:There could be a lot worse things that happened. There could always be a lot worse things. And when they come up, if there are jobs that he's taken deposits from or final payments, we're just going to have to take it on the chin. It is what it is. And if this is the worst thing that happens to us, we're probably doing pretty good, because, considering the fact of how many years we've been in business, I've never had anything like that happen or somebody stole from me like that. Now, in other ways I've had people time steal and things like that but that's a unique one though.
Speaker 1:Yeah, I've never had anybody wash.
Speaker 1:I've heard of it but I've never heard of a friend, haven't happened, how they, I don't know, but it was perfect. Wow, it wasn't like he made a copy of the check, it was the check with their name taken off and his name put in their place. Son of a bitch, yeah, but I really feel like it's helped me deal with other things, because it's almost like if you can get through the diving exercises and the training that they give you, literally if you can get through that, there's not training is more stressful than the dive yeah, that's, that's what I'm saying.
Speaker 1:And last year three quarters of our diving was just training, yeah, and I think we got to do one or two normal dives with everybody else. But up until then I think I even suffered from ptsd because I thought I'm waiting for, like, why am I gonna have to take my mask off, what, what? Why am I going to have to take my tank off down here? All the things that are going through my head. Like I'm running it, all these scenarios through my head.
Speaker 1:Well, if I get wrapped up or tangled up over there like I'm looking at shit, like trying to stay away from stuff, so I don't have to take off my yeah, but no, this is good, this is a great exercise and and really it calling it a retreat is underselling it, because we none of us are retreating here. That's just my opinion. It's not, we're not relaxing and like we're getting so much out of this, like we're not just hanging out the house all day or sitting in the classroom, literally. If you I don't know if you wear an apple watch or not, but I, because of the dive- no, they're too distracting okay they are, but because of the dives I've closed all of my rings like three times oh, I bet yeah, like literally.
Speaker 1:I wish I could do that at home as quickly as I did it here.
Speaker 4:Just with a couple of the dives you can eat like a fucking pig too it doesn't matter because, like we're burning so many calories and your body temperature gets lower because you're in the water. Yeah, you don't think about that now but like the water's 80 and you're 98. Yeah, so like your body temp is dropping, yeah, right, like we need to warm up now Cause we're going to cold as fuck. Right, doing this night dive, yeah, yeah.
Speaker 1:Wow Thanks. You're welcome, I will. Yeah, I'm going to have to, so, yeah, so, thank you. Thank you for, um, you know, bringing in the people too. So we did some yoga. I never did yoga, which was cool. I was kind of sad that we didn't do it this morning. Um, really, like seriously, we didn't do it this morning because it's I never thought of it, but I could actually, like he had mentioned, like I could feel everything stretching from, like, my heels to the back of my neck.
Speaker 4:Did you notice that you were better from the beginning to the end and how much more you could move?
Speaker 1:Oh heck. Yes, Even the second day I was better than the first day, isn't that crazy, yeah?
Speaker 4:And you think about it and it's like we go do things like this, right, we do it for three or four days and then we go back to our old world and we go back to the same bullshit that we fucking did before and we don't make any changes, and it's like man, if I did yoga every day or five days a week.
Speaker 4:You know, I'm much more flexible, I'd be in my spine, would be in better alignment and I'd be fucking. You know what I mean. Like we talk all this shit and say all the right things and then we go right back to doing the same shit we did before. Yeah Right, doing the same shit we did before? Yeah right, completely. Like I want to integrate that into a part of my life more right, because it's only going to help me and the other things that I do at the gym and playing with my kid, and you know what I mean.
Speaker 1:Like everything well. Who doesn't want to be limber at age 80 someday and really that ultimately alive? That's up, that's up to us, right?
Speaker 4:we still want to be swinging golf clubs and and diving and diving, because this is one thing you can do, for I've seen some crippled ass motherfuckers getting off of a boat like for real, because once you're in the water, you're weightless. Yeah, right, right. So the hardest part is getting in and getting out. People help you with that. Yeah, you know what I mean. So, like you can do this as long as you can play I mean, you could probably do this longer than you play golf.
Speaker 1:Absolutely, you know what I mean well, it just, and not to throw vick under the bus, but I'll throw him under. Um, well, vick, um, for whatever reason, hasn't had the opportunity to to learn how to swim. Okay, um, so he's, whether I I don't. I never got real deep with him about. I don't know if there was a situation why, um, and there probably is why he doesn't like to swim, um, but even for somebody like him that isn't a very good swimmer could do this, because I'm not a very good swimmer.
Speaker 4:So you technically you could, but you couldn't pass a test. Right yeah, it's true, right yeah, you technically could, but you couldn't pass the test. Um, it's true, Right yeah, you technically could, but you couldn't pass the test. So you haven't asked him. He's sitting right here, so this will be awkward, but you haven't asked him about it and you haven't went deep on it. But yet that also means that you haven't made fun of him for it. No, because I would fucking just make fun of him until he's like look, there's a story, my sister drowned, like I don't fucking like swimming.
Speaker 1:You know, my sister drowned and like I don't fucking like swimming, you know, I know, at some point in time, the more I yell at vick, the like it doesn't, unless he listens.
Speaker 1:Yeah, it doesn't help, so in in. But even like bullying, like no, like I I've made him feel like the biggest piece of shit in the world. Or you thought it lasts for like three days, like if I ride his ass like dude, you got to go to meetings or or whatever the case might be, it works for about three days. The best is attraction rather than promotion. I, I have to lead by example. If I'm doing these things, eventually he comes around to it and because it's never a good idea, so he's like a wife, he's like a wife.
Speaker 4:He's like a second wife, because that's basically how we get our wives to do anything yeah is like do it long enough.
Speaker 3:They're like well, I want to do stuff with you.
Speaker 4:He'll fucking learn how to do fun shit then, and quit being a goddamn buzzkill fic.
Speaker 1:I mean wife, I mean fuck he, he does come, but but I know him, yeah, you know what I mean, and I know he feels it like when he missed uh, what not starfish city? Stingray city? Yeah, um, yeah, the other morning I knew he was gonna beat himself up and that was the one too that you yeah, but yeah, yeah yeah, like I knew, I didn't have to say anything to him. Yeah, like I, I knew it. Now don't think for one minute, I won't bust his ass.
Speaker 4:Okay, I do bust his balls will be busted yes, totally I do.
Speaker 1:I do, but I also know when to stop got it okay yeah all right message. I he I know when he hears the message.
Speaker 4:So here's what we'll be doing next, different next year. Okay, there is. I have decided that there is going to be an application process.
Speaker 1:Okay.
Speaker 4:Um, certain people, like returning members, um might not have to um, but, like I am going to be very intentional and I think I'm going to, I'm going to break it up into there's going to be two different trips, and one is going to be for a certain group, whether it's experience or it's just like the people, whatever and then there's going to be another one for people that um need a lot more help.
Speaker 4:Yeah, Right, because, like I don't want to um, I don't ever want to exclude anyone but the, but the groups need to be um symbiotic, right, um? And the first group is always special. Whenever it's a first group, right, like that was super special, but everyone's special, right, like this one is unique in its own way, right, like, with the personalities and all the stuff that we have here this time. But I am going to, I think for you know, whether it's late, 25 or 26, when we do the third one, I'm going to do some type of some type of like application process to vet and, and not that nobody here would have made the cut, like that's not why I'm saying that, it's just I want to, as this, as this continues and grows, there's always going to be a cap to it, which means some people are going to be left out. You know what I mean, and I'm going to feel bad about that.
Speaker 1:Are you warning me that I'll be left out? Yeah, that's.
Speaker 4:I wanted to do it live on air, just to, but but not direct, right, I wanted to be very passive, aggressive in my delivery of it, just to make sure, similar to how Mike would deliver it that kind of news too. But no, I just I think I think that that honors what we're trying to do, right, I think that honors what we're trying to do, because the diving is amazing, but I truly think that by having multiple nights and it not being just a one night, two night deal, right, like we're here for four days of diving, so five nights, four days, right, every night you get a different opportunity to organically connect and have conversations with people. Right, I don't go out and hold people's hands and be like you have to do this. Right, if you choose not to participate. Well, you spent the money, right, you got the responsibility to get whatever you're going to get out of this and if you also don't participate, you won't be coming back. Like you're not going to be asked to come back if you don't participate in what we're doing. Right, like that's obvious, um, but nobody's done that.
Speaker 4:Right, because everybody's like I'm here for a reason and I and I want to, I want to get to know people better, and there were people on this trip that I knew I mean, it's my fucking trip, like I know them, but I didn't really know them and and I gotten opportunities to sit down and and and dig a little bit deeper for an hour or two or whatever, and I think that that's the stuff that we're, that that's the stuff that we're missing, right, um, is having those, those sit down, um conversations and and really getting to know each other. I think it's the reason both of us do this shit, right, because we get to sit down and have conversations with people and I don't know. I think it's powerful and, like I said, I appreciate you saying that you'll keep coming back as long as I let you. I'm going to keep having them as long as anybody gives a fuck to be here, right, and if they don't, then maybe it'll just be me and you and I'm cool with that too.
Speaker 1:Right, if everybody says, fuck off, yeah, I don't want to hang out with eric, I'll be like that's cool and let's talk about george and big kev and primo, yeah, or to the team that you got or who, wherever they came from, right, like very very, very fortunate.
Speaker 4:Yeah, you know, I mean, george is my brother-in-law, so obviously you know that's that's an easy play there, you know, to get him to ask. But, yeah, the people that he surrounds himself with, right, with Frazier, I mean, for instance. So Frazier came down here and George and Frazier worked together 20, 25 years ago for 12 years on the East side, um, and stayed friends forever. Frazier does not live here. Frazier lives in Florida now and comes down often but doesn't fucking live here. This is not what he does for a living. And he sees what we're doing online and like thinks it's cool. And George is like, hey, man, like Eric's doing this again, would you be interested in coming down and helping facilitate? And literally, and he just looked at George and was like, yeah, I'd love to do that. Like, fuck man, like I can't even thank him enough, right, like money doesn't thank somebody for that, right, like genuine gratitude.
Speaker 4:And the guys on the boat and Ernie the chef, like we just I think we all can can agree that we've all put ourselves in some in some places in our life that we probably don't deserve but to have the, to have the people around me that I have, um, in moments like this that I know I can count on all the time, and I know that you know if, if, if somebody is here at this event and doesn't doesn't either a enjoy it or B doesn't get anything out of it, I can feel good knowing that that's on them. Yeah, right, for sure. Now, that being said, I still put it all on me, right, and I still sit there at night going fuck. I hope that you know what I mean, cause I worry about what everybody's experiencing, right, especially when you pay to do something. But at the end of the day, I feel good because I know that we have amazing people here and and and and if and if somebody doesn't get something from it, um, that it that it can't be on me.
Speaker 4:Um, I think, I think we've put the pieces in place that we needed to. Um, but, yeah, man, I could do, I could do this shit forever. Like I would love it if this could be my job. Yeah, right, like I said in the beginning, this is not my business. Not how I make money would be really cool if I could, but, but it's not.
Speaker 1:Yeah, no, it's good. No, it's good, and so Vic why don't you get Dr Gary?
Speaker 4:and so yeah, so everybody knows we brought. We brought Gary in because I wanted to have somebody smarter than me teach everybody how to change their state and become calm and solve problems and that, and he came in with so much science and shit I can't even explain that. It'll be great to have him come join you and then I can go shower and shit alright, thanks guys.
Speaker 1:Why don't you swing in here too? We got Mike Goldenstein Golden Soft, yeah, why don't you?
Speaker 4:come on, in, here too, we got mike goldenstein goldenstein, goldenstein, like a sign of fear.
Speaker 1:Yeah, why don't you come on in here um everybody? Dr gary, yeah, I'm not sure what your last name is montemayor.
Speaker 3:But dr gary's, fine, that's what I go by, we'll keep it at dr gary mike hey, mike Mike.
Speaker 5:Hey, mike Goldenstein.
Speaker 1:Yes, we don't have any more. Okay, so, dr Gary, why don't you explain to us what it is that you do for a living, and then we'll get into what you've been able to do for us here?
Speaker 3:Sure, I'm a doctor of natural medicine. I hold a PhD and doctorate in natural medicine, and I do. I work in the world of quantum medicine, which is looking at consciousness or disease from a subatomic perspective small particles and how they work, thoughts, beliefs, things like that. So what I was doing here is leading participants in neurofeedback meditation let them hear their brainwaves, let them see their brainwaves, let them feel their brainwaves. It's good because we can talk about the woo-woo in the context of science and that really makes it come down to guys like us. You know, we want to know the science behind it, and so by doing that, we've shared heart math, which is heart-brain coherence, and being able to paint pictures on the wall. Other things we've done are like measuring our biological age, doing breathing and watch it decrease. So, yeah, we've been doing a lot of things with our participants here, you know, teaching them a little bit about quantum medicine.
Speaker 1:Yeah, you know, for me, I've never got to experience. You know I've watched. You know, teach them a little bit about quantum medicine. Yeah, I, you know, for me I've never got to experience. You know, I've watched. You know TV and stuff and I and I I see things, I read things too, but I've never sat in on the things that you were doing. Like, I don't even know the word for half of that stuff that you were doing, but I guess, mike, what what was your take on it?
Speaker 5:Yeah, so I had a couple of different abilities going there and just being able to kind of slow yourself, try to figure out you know kind of how do we deal with stress internally. So mine was interesting to say. It was, first and foremost, fun to have Eric behind me, take a picture of the screen and send to Reggie Brock just to prove that I actually had a brain and it has waves to it. So that was a win number one. My experience, though, and I and I asked a couple of questions afterwards because I feel like I do have a pretty even keel personality, like I just I I'm kind of in this home mode, but what I was having an issue doing was relaxing to the point where the stresses didn't keep coming up, and so I think it just kind of kept me at this level.
Speaker 5:Yeah, I don't get real high, but I couldn't get very low either in relaxation, because and I was asking you that so what keeps you from really truly relaxing? Because all of the things that are on my mind that I know I'm I'm not doing right now, I got to get home and finish them and and the stresses and and work and family and all that kind of stuff. It just it doesn't go away for me. So I, how you know, as somebody is trying to work on their ability to slow down. How does somebody work on that part?
Speaker 3:of it. I call it training the puppy. Our how does somebody work on that part of it? I call it training the puppy. Our monkey mind is like a puppy. You ask it to sit and it may go over there, sit for a second, but it's going to come back and start sniffing your feet once play. This is your conscious mind. It wants to protect you. In a way, it says you need to be thinking about this, you need to accomplish this. This is you're expecting a phone call. You have deadlines and it's going to keep coming back. This is you're expecting a phone call. You have deadlines and it's going to keep coming back. And, as such, you have to. You have to train it to stop and eventually it will. And that's what meditation does. That's what biofeedback meditation does you eventually teach it how to, to, to be able to go, sit and be quiet.
Speaker 3:It takes 21 days to change a neural pathway. So if you're meditating for 21 days and every morning between 4 and 6 am, just do it for 30 minutes, 20 minutes, whatever you can, you'll see a change in your life. You'll see a change in the way you think and more control over your thoughts and knowing that about 95% of the things that we think are going to happen, never happen, and so thinking about them is not really something that really helps. There's two things that happen in your mind One's thoughts and the other's thinking. They're two different things. Thoughts are nouns, they're passive, we always have them, they're part of us. Thinking's a verb, it's active and it's a choice. The only time we think is when we think about a thought. And when we're in the present moment, think about that. Where, when we're in the present moment, when you're truly in the present moment in meditation, you can't think you're actually in the zone, and a lot of times you know say, well, I have to think about everything. No, there's a difference between thought and thinking. When you're doing a puzzle with your kids and all of a sudden you pop up and look at your watch, all of a sudden time and space has reentered the program. But before that you're in something called situational creativity, where you are just into it, and those are thoughts, pure thoughts, coming through. So that's just one of the examples about the difference. And when we're trying or not, those the thoughts, if you let them come through like puffy clouds, they'll just keep passing through, but when you think about it.
Speaker 3:You grab one, you can obsess with it, and a lot of times people who do that are like a broken records. They keep going over that one thing over and over and over. They just can't, they can't break that. And so what we do is we teach them how to do that. The other ways to do it is through uh, through tones. Listening to uh, sometimes listening to music takes you out of that chatter mind things that you really like. Well, we call that, you know that's, you know tonal energy, uh, bioresonance, and it, just it. It helps and treats you. So those are there's. There's a few ways, but there's a couple right there.
Speaker 5:And you were talking about, the morning is really the best time because your body does do a reset at night.
Speaker 3:So if you're going to be serious about this and retrain it, morning is usually the best it is, and the reason why is because we have our pineal gland, has two major functions it's when the sun comes up it secretes serotonin which keeps us awake and going throughout the day, and at night, when the sun goes down, we start to excrete melatonin which creates, you know, sleep. And so at the end of the, at the end of uh of melatonin cycle, it uh it starts, as you know, as soon as the sun comes up. So between four and six, you know anywhere, if you can get grabbed 20 minutes in there sometime to start meditating, that's the best time.
Speaker 5:Well, he told me I was in a perpetual sleepwalking state, which makes a lot of sense. A lot of people who know me, um, and when I was diving, even I was told a couple of times, you know, because it's like herding cats, but I think I was sleep swimming too. I just kind of wander off and then eric gets all mad at me and starts trying to get a hold of you know, get my attention and I'm not listening because he's banging on the tank and all that kind of trying to get him. I'm already gone, I'm just, I just do my own thing. So that's, that's just me.
Speaker 1:Yeah, I can definitely agree you, you are definitely a cool cat, but I let's talk a little more about this, the difference between thinking and thoughts. Okay, cause I've never thought about it that way before and when you were talking I was like, so what's better, thinking or thoughts? You know, and and so let's let's just dig a little deeper on that. For those that might be listening to this for the first time, we got to experience your, your lectures and stuff, you know, a couple of times, so let's talk more about the, you know, grasping those thoughts and dissecting them. Like, explain that a little deeper.
Speaker 3:Sure, when an event happens in our life, it's it's like two arrows come out of at us. The first one we can't help, whatever it's coming. It's coming, it's hitting us. Those are thoughts. It's going to be part of us. But for us, the second arrow is thinking. It's a choice. We can think about it or not, and I was.
Speaker 3:I read a book one time, not long ago, called don't believe everything you think. It was by a gentleman named Joseph Wynn, and, uh, I wrote a review on it and told him I was doing research. I thought this was really good and he said that he wanted to talk to me. And we've become good friends ever since then. We have three hour conversations about every couple of months and it just goes on and on about some of the depths that we found.
Speaker 3:And in his book he said that thinking is the cause of all human suffering. And I said we got to get into this because you know what you're saying is very profound. And he said, sure, it's really simple. You think about a thought, a thought that you know is bothering you and it's going to, it's going to be that broken record and it's going to be, it's going to be suffering because you're not, you're not educating yourself, you're not doing anything, you're just going in a circle, you know, you're chasing your tail with that thought, with that thinking, and he says there's nothing we can do about you know, things that come at us. That first arrow, but the second arrow is a choice and I thought that was really profound.
Speaker 1:So how can we think more positive thoughts?
Speaker 3:Right, Well, that's good. First, we've got to understand our thinking pattern. We have 60,000 thoughts in a day and 85% of them are negative and 95% of them are the same thoughts we had the day before. So we're in a pattern and of those negative thoughts, only 7% are judgments on other people. The rest of it's judgments on ourself.
Speaker 3:And so that when you constantly do that to yourself day in and day out, and so that when you constantly do that to yourself day in and day out, it's going to have an effect on who you are, your character, you know what you, what you manifest in your life, and things like that. So that's one of the things that we have to you know. That we have to realize is that you know we have so many negative thoughts that we need to start changing that pattern. And there's a new paradigm and that's why people are turning to different things like, uh, cold plunge meditation, uh, doing there's someone, we're doing ayahuasca and bufo, and things like that, just to get out of that state of that constant. You know, negative thinking, yeah.
Speaker 1:Yeah. So what, what? What would you suggest somebody would do um to to change that paradigm, other than, I guess, meditation, cold plunge like self-affirmation. Stand in front of the mirror and say positive.
Speaker 3:Absolutely One of the things that we do a lot. You guys are scuba diving. I think that's a meditation. I think we're in the alpha state. We're chilled, you know how you feel. Your delta is probably going way up and you're dive, swimming. I mean, you're actually dreaming while you're down there. The other thing is exercise. People go on long runs. That's a meditation as well. You're in the gym, you're in the zone. That's a meditation as well.
Speaker 3:You've just cleared your mind, and the more you clear your mind and you realize you don't have to think about things because it's not going to do any good, your subconscious knows how to handle it. You've already built character through all the years of your life and it knows how to handle. And the answer, no matter what you think, it's going to happen, it is going to happen. And thinking about it's not going to help. But your thought pattern, what we call the quantum self, the self is, when you stop thinking, what's left is this pure intelligence. Call it, you know, super mental intelligence, and it comes through and it starts to solve your problems.
Speaker 3:One of the things we did today was heart math, and when we actually started doing heart brain coherence, we're able to paint pictures on the wall and things like that, with a software program, that in itself will start to create and slow down thinking patterns that are constantly causing negative thoughts. So a couple of minutes a day, sometimes two or three times a day, just doing that breathing technique, along with putting attention to your heart and thinking about really good things and breathing those sentiments in and out of your heart. Your heart actually has more communication with your brain than your brain does your heart, and that it has neurites, the thinking, and we call it the cardiac complex, and that in itself is pretty amazing connection between heart and brain.
Speaker 5:So this group of guys are typically entrepreneurs, high achievers. We have this level, we're just high all the time. But talk a little bit because you mentioned it shortly but didn't really get into it much that disruption of trauma in somebody when they experience a significant trauma and now you're trying to get back into whether it's meditating or getting back into a state of confidence and relaxation how does trauma come in and how does somebody deal with a disruption to their normal rhythms, like that, sure, one of the things that we learned today was heart math, disruption to their normal rhythms.
Speaker 3:Like that, sure, one of the things that we learned today was heart math. And whenever you have a trauma, that the emotions uh appear in a part of the brain called the amygdala. And when they appear there, you react to them because they're either a sense, a visual, an auditory or or a feeling, and any one of those things come in to trigger that that trauma and start you thinking, you thinking about it, okay, and so, um, by doing, by doing heart math or and I'll I'll tell you a little story about thought and thinking that happened to me. Uh, I was. I was doing seven days of really intense, uh, research in Barcelona last year, and I was at a very busy intersection. It was the eighth day. All that was over. I was going to go to a paella cooking class in Barcelona. I'd never been there before, so I signed up. My wife wasn't with me because I had this big, long event, and so she stayed home. And as I'm sitting at this busy intersection, a child runs across the street and gets hit by a taxi cab.
Speaker 3:Now, I was a first responder in LA and I went to one knee, knowing that what was coming was not good. So I took a deep breath, went and did everything I could, but I knew when I walked away was my biggest fear that I'm going to crumble. And so I said to myself you know, reading these books and doing this. I said, okay, you're on man. I said don't think, just pray. And I kept saying that and every once in a while I'd say a prayer. You know from the deepest part of my heart, from you know absolute, unconditional love for that child. And then and then I kept saying it don't think, just pray.
Speaker 3:40 minutes later, when I finally arrived at that paella cooking class, it was all gone. I was good, absolutely good. So it is one of the things that I did for myself, knowing and believing that that you know I could do this, I had to do it, I didn't have a choice and, knowing that is the power of belief, I myself said I'm going to do this and I did it and I saved myself from the crumble and the and the suffering that I would have done if I would have thought about it. So it was. That was a really good, really good example of you know what you can do when you put your mind to it. Yeah.
Speaker 5:A lot of us are fathers as well. What age do we start talking to our kids about helping them understand think patterns and meditation and that kind of thing?
Speaker 3:Beautiful question, okay. So let's start at the beginning. When we're from we're first born to two years old, we're in the Delta state. That's deep sleep. So when children are up and walking, their predominant brainwave is sleepwalking. They're in a deep, deep sleep. So you know you can see them, you think, and you know they're not really engaging with you. They you're like looking through you and past you because they're in a higher state of consciousness.
Speaker 3:We get to the age of two years old to four years old, we're in the theta state, and theta is magical and and magical I mean they believe in the Easter bunny and you can't tell them it doesn't exist, things like that. It really. They see it, and you know people who meditate and go into those states. They see it too. You know it's magical. And so then we get into the alpha, and alpha is the state where and this is really important to parents it's when we're downloading everything around us. And the old saying show me the seven-year-old and I'll show you the man. And the reason why is because they have already downloaded everything in their environment and they've set their character.
Speaker 3:Okay, and so when we work with you know, meditation or linguistic program, we're trying to correct any traumas that happened during that time, because that's how they react to the world. So during that time, it's a sacred time it's good to keep them. You know they, you can see them put their hands over the ears and say stop fighting, because they can't say no, they don't have the beta wave, they don't have the filter yet. And only when they're eight years old and to adulthood do they finally find the filter. That ain't listening to this. I'm out of here. When you watch young ones, they can't leave. They're just like no, just stop. They don't have the guidance for themselves to get out of there. Really interesting. So, yes, the ages, that age, you know, four to seven, real important, real important.
Speaker 5:See now, what I heard him say is I've got the mind of a two-year-old because I'm just in that state, sleepwalking state.
Speaker 1:So you had mentioned earlier, just a little bit ago, about exercising and stuff like that. Did you say that it releases while you're exercising it's releasing serotonin.
Speaker 3:No, that's when you're sleeping, serotonin it actually, when the sun comes up, it starts to rise and it starts to make you awake, okay, and everything. Other hormones start to follow its lead and be able to start doing this, digestion, doing its. You know, balancing of, you know your neural hormones. It starts to do all that and so, yeah, that's what serotonin does. But when you exercise, you get endorphins and Keflins, things like that, especially when you're pushing really hard. That gives you that euphoric feeling and uh, but it has nothing to do with serotonin.
Speaker 1:Okay, I wasn't sure, because I know when I exercise, obviously I start to feel better. And I read somewhere um I for cardio. I tend to walk, sometimes indoor, sometimes outside, but when I can walk outside I do when I have the time. But I read about 20 minutes into it. Most people start to feel like a sense of euphoria. And why is that Like? Is something being released in the brain? Is it just because I think I'm doing something good for my body?
Speaker 3:Right, right. Yeah, dopamine, one of the things that we get is really satisfying. It's when you know you've accomplished something really good. You have that, you know, euphoric feeling that, combined with endorphins and Keflins, have that kind of almost a morphing feel that you break into this. You know that second wind and you feel good about it. Into this, you know that second wind and you feel good about it. You know those are the things that happen.
Speaker 1:so yeah, neurochemically, those are the things, okay, no, that's great, that's good stuff. Mike, you got something else for?
Speaker 5:me, yeah, one more. So when I was all hooked up and I was uh meditating and I started getting uh lower and lower, pretty sure I started reading vick's mind. So when does that esp, espn, esp start kicking in? Because's got a? He's a weird dude, I don't know, I didn't, I didn't mean it, I would again, we're going to be talking about this when he's in the presence here, but you know so, when that ESP kicks in and I start reading everybody's minds in the room, that was pretty cool. I enjoyed that part.
Speaker 5:You know, you've got like all the good stuff.
Speaker 1:So how can we convince vick?
Speaker 3:that it's a good idea to learn how to swim. Well, let me answer one question at a time, okay, and first, I'm actually really passionate about telepathy and uh, so one of the things that we that, uh, I was listening to a podcast the other day and I binged listened to it because it was so amazing. It was called the telepathy tapes and it's about autistic children that that University of Virginia has been studying literally all these cases of them saying that children not only can read their mother's mind and see through their eyes and know where they hid the cookies, and the mother says how could he? He wasn't even here and I hid him. I know he doesn't know where they are and he found them, things like that. And then you know they're.
Speaker 3:These are really severe autistic children and they were finding and they were doing these tests and they put, you know, mom, in this room and they'd have a film crew scientist in the other room with a child and they hold up an UNO card. He could tell you the color. Then they were doing mathematical formulas, you know, on the calculator and he'd give them the answer you know, knowing that he could actually see it. And then they were saying you know how do you know this person? You know Adam. It says I met him on the hill. Adam is another autistic child. Mother has never met but they met. And so mom calls, finds a number, calls Adam's mom and says yes, they meet on the hill.
Speaker 3:So autistic children actually meet and talk and learn. Because they say my teacher doesn't understand me, she thinks I'm dumb because, you know, I have no control in my body. You know I'm, you know I just, and so I'm always having to, you know, tell her that I'm. You know in any way they can, that they're listening, that they're, you know, able to do this. They're very gifted. So one of the other things that they were doing was they were giving them these iPads so they could, you know, press, press the letters and and and say sentences. And they were getting really good at it. And and one of the things that the first thing that that iPad said to to his mom, he was 17. He says I'm in here, you know, I'm in here. Isn't that amazing? So you know, these are the kinds of things if you ever get to hear those tapes you'll binge listen to them. They're absolutely fantasinating. They're talking to you about this from the science perspective. You know how we can listen to. It's called the telepathy tapes on podcast. Yeah, wow.
Speaker 1:So, um, we're, we're getting ready to do a night dive here, but before we, before we get off here, I guess, um, before we get off, what is something that you would like to leave our guests or our viewers and watchers with before we get off here?
Speaker 3:Yeah Well, I would say it takes about 21 days to change a habit. Get into some meditation, even if it's you know those 20-minute runs, and clear your head. Do it every day, every day, for 21 days. Minute runs and clear your head. Do it every day, every day, for 21 days and watch your, your and then certainly cherish those quiet moments without the chatter. Read the book, don't believe everything you think, and see how it changes your life.
Speaker 1:Wow, amazing. Mike, you want to leave us with something.
Speaker 5:Yeah, no, appreciate it, appreciate getting to know you, and I think next time I'm going to have to make sure, because I packed really light, light, but had I known that I needed a pair of yoga pants, I would have brought yoga pants. But, um, I hear that really helps too.
Speaker 1:Yes, so yeah, yeah thank you thank you both it's been a pleasure. Um, I would actually like to get your contact information, if we haven't already. I'd like to do a one-on-one exclusive with you at some point in time, probably in the next month or so. But until then, you guys take care of each other. Thank you for joining us, and next week we'll have another special guest. I think it's April Hall from SRC. We'll be on the show next week and that's coming up soon. Src conference is coming up soon. So until next week, you guys take care of each other and we'll see you soon. Thank you for joining us.
