| 00:00.00 | Max Shank | Ladies and gentlemen welcome back to Monday mornings with max and Mike Hope you're having a great start to your week so far and we're going to get going with drugs. This week we're going to talk about drugs drugs inside your body drugs outside your body when to use them how to use them and let's just start with the fact that you're probably using all kinds of drugs every day and the word drugs is almost a little bit taboo. But we're gonna break it down step by step and go through what the most common drugs are and how to use them to your advantage rather than have them use you mike thanks for joining me here. |
| 00:46.78 | mikebledsoe | Yeah I was yeah, thanks for having? Oh yeah I didn't have I had you or do you have me? we have each other. Okay I always find it interesting I I remember one of my favorite people. Ah, he's like 50 years sober and you know when I first found out he's like ah I've never had a beer I've never had a cigarette I've never had like I limit my coffee all this stuff and I was like he's like yeah I'm sober I don't do anything I'm like oh you so full of shit like year quick. It's just so funny where like people want to draw the line of like you're ah you're using chemicals all the time to change your state and a lot of people use something like sugar as a drug or whatever to say that you've never done that. |
| 01:33.75 | Max Shank | Oh. |
| 01:44.36 | mikebledsoe | Is is really ridiculous, but your state is always shifting the chemicals in your body are always shifting and ah some of these chemicals are going to have a much more noticeable effect than others and and it's good to just be paying attention. To what's happening in the body and I think some people just are drawn to more intense state changes than others and there's nothing wrong with that. So yeah, I'm excited to talk about this today because I think that even people who've never done. Quote unquote drugs would get a lot of benefit from this conversation. |
| 02:24.35 | Max Shank | Well we got to start with a little definition then because what's what's a drug are we saying any substance that changes your state set is that a truck Aspirin's a jut. |
| 02:30.60 | mikebledsoe | Um, do. |
| 02:37.49 | mikebledsoe | Yeah I would for me like um. |
| 02:42.17 | Max Shank | Aspirin's a drug does it really change your state though very much I mean it has an effect. No question that is the most used like if if it meets our definition I believe that's the most commonly used drug unless you start including coffee and then I think that might be. |
| 02:45.98 | mikebledsoe | Yeah, it does. |
| 02:57.39 | mikebledsoe | Yeah I think coffee is probably the most widely used drug. It's got psychoactive properties. Some drugs are not as psychoactive but even Advil is psychoactive just to a degree in which is not noticeable the average person if I take something like an Advil. |
| 02:59.15 | Max Shank | Even more popular. Ah. |
| 03:16.40 | mikebledsoe | I May note I'll I'll probably notice something whereas somebody most people just would never notice that and some people are gonna hear that and go you're crazy. No not like that. But I noticed well it's like um, it's like all these people that are taking you know they they. |
| 03:21.00 | Max Shank | So you take so you take Aspirin and you see purple dragons start flying around the room. |
| 03:35.38 | mikebledsoe | They take pain killers or whatever and it's like they don't realize how much of it's inhibiting their mental state their their cognitive ability. You know I'm just killing the pain. It's like now you're killing the pain and your cognitive ability right now. So ah yeah, so like there's there's. |
| 03:41.49 | Max Shank | Moon. |
| 03:48.71 | Max Shank | Yeah. |
| 03:55.11 | mikebledsoe | 1 thing I want to point out too is there's no such thing as side effects like this whole like ha but side effect the idea of a side effect is such propaganda. It's such. It's such a great marketing tool to make you believe that. |
| 03:57.69 | Max Shank | Oh I was just gonna say that go on go on. |
| 04:13.14 | mikebledsoe | We don't want this to happen and it probably won't happen but it could happen. It's some fucking liability deal. It's not true. It's like and if you go into Science Science people. Love talking about science but like in science there really is no side effects. There is they're just effects. |
| 04:19.60 | Max Shank | Well, it's marketing. |
| 04:28.23 | Max Shank | There are just effects well look at look at Viagra Viagra was heart medicine the side effect was hard cock now that's the main effect. |
| 04:33.30 | mikebledsoe | Had a side effect. It's an effect. |
| 04:40.11 | mikebledsoe | Yeah, yeah, so. |
| 04:46.10 | Max Shank | The marketing department got hold of this and we're like this ain't heart Medicine guys. This is our golden ticket out of here. |
| 04:53.11 | mikebledsoe | Ah, yeah, so ah so I think that and then there's people's perception of drugs is very interesting like I was saying in the beginning is there's like this line that gets drawn and of course there's the the personal line that gets drawn but it. It's always influenced by society's standard and so we have like this Fda thing the food and drug administration who ah the people there are responsible for telling doctors and and stores people who retail. But they can and cannot sell and also what kind of claims you can and cannot make and so a lot of times we go. Oh you know when it gets to the point where the Fda has to be involved now that's a drug or if it's a pharmaceutical now that's a drug or if it's illegal if the Dea which said. Different administration. The drug enforcement administration. But by the way was highly underfunded for decades and the only way they could make money was by stealing drug dealers money. But so their incentives for busting is a little going back to what you always talk about. |
| 05:48.78 | Max Shank | Oh. |
| 06:08.30 | mikebledsoe | The incentive set up so the Dea is in charge of putting certain drugs on a with on the schedule or schedule 1 schedule 2 schedule 3 so they're in charge of and there none of them are voted into office. They're all. Ah. |
| 06:26.43 | Max Shank | Oh. |
| 06:26.87 | mikebledsoe | Appointed and so you have this random group of people that are saying these are the drugs that are okay and these are the drugs that are not okay and the drugs that are okay aren't really viewed by the public at large as drugs and so people who are like oh I'm sober. Pretty much. It basically said I don't do the drugs that the Dea says not to do. But I'll drink my coffee. All you know this and that. |
| 06:56.50 | Max Shank | It's really interesting because the laws of the land or crime and punishment to certainly influence the culture to a certain effect right? and. |
| 07:06.69 | mikebledsoe | Well, some would say that that law is culture like it's It's the it's the basis of culture because it's it's using language to tell you what you do and don't do. |
| 07:14.40 | Max Shank | I Mean the chapter I mean isn't that kind of what religion is too. That's why that separation of church and State is so damn important right? because it's all what we inherited from the last guy you know it's this. It's this long chain. |
| 07:24.23 | mikebledsoe | Um, yeah. |
| 07:33.76 | Max Shank | Of parents and parents can be like ah a preacher ah Pope or a president and they're like this is good. This is bad behave yourself. We won't get mad kind of thing like and that's basically how it works right. |
| 07:49.33 | mikebledsoe | Right. |
| 07:51.41 | Max Shank | So we have this idea that there are some good drugs and some bad drugs and the best example because you got to know that there's a lot of things that are done in a very short-sighted fashion and it's really hard to. Calculate all the costs of certain things like I live in California and I believe up until like 3 to four years ago marijuana was like totally illegal right? something like that. Let's say within the last five years right |
| 08:26.77 | mikebledsoe | What was medical it was medical was it but it's been recreational flight maybe 3 4 5 years but before that was was like medical in the late 2000 yeah Yeah, 50 years |
| 08:28.16 | Max Shank | My friend who is a bouncer for. Yeah, okay, but let's say illegal for a long time and and like yeah and like a and like a pretty bad punishment I think too like you would go to Jail Yeah, that's whack yo. |
| 08:49.65 | mikebledsoe | There's people still doing time. |
| 08:53.94 | Max Shank | Ah, but my friend who was a bouncer at a bar. He said when there was a reggae concert. They would be full capacity and people would just be in a cloud of smoke and there would be no violence. There would be no car accidents and then when there was a country music band This is a guy who is bouncer there for 20 years at this local bar country music goes. Ah the bouncers are. Running around all evening. There's fights breaking out everywhere. People are beating each other up. There's drunk driving and it's like you gotta you gotta check reality a little bit because what is causing more immediate problems alcohol or Marijuana Now. That's what I'm saying. It's so hard to calculate right? because it's not.. It's not about the substance. It's about the behavior and I think that would be like a good thing to just remember regardless of whether it is a drug that daddy says is good or a drug that daddy says is bad right. |
| 10:01.57 | mikebledsoe | But but I yeah totally agree and I think that people and there's just a big problem in our society today is people. |
| 10:04.10 | Max Shank | It's more about the behavior than the substance itself. |
| 10:16.80 | mikebledsoe | Are more likely to judge something as good or bad based on what some authority figure has has to say than witnessing the results for themselves right? when it comes down to how much violence happens in regard to alcohol versus weed. It's it's incredible. The. |
| 10:20.24 | Max Shank | Of course. |
| 10:35.59 | mikebledsoe | The violent the aggression goes up with alcohol with we to go it tends to go down and ah you know I'll I'll take a high driver over a drunk driver any day of the week so I don't I don't drive I don't drive either way. But I'll tell you what. |
| 10:46.74 | Max Shank | Right? And both are fun. Um, right. |
| 10:54.64 | mikebledsoe | I'm pretty athletic when I'm high I'm not very athletic when I'm drinking and I'm pretty sure that carries over to you know maneuvering a vehicle. |
| 11:05.70 | Max Shank | Here's another here's another quotable phrase though. The devil is in the dosage if you want to do some endurance Work. You get a little high if you want to lift something real heavy. You just get a little bit drunk, not not over the top. But there's going to be a different effect. You're going to go sympathetic nervous System. You're going to go. You know, get ratcheted up into more fight or flight mode with a little booze in you a little liquid courage and if you light up. |
| 11:32.60 | mikebledsoe | Yeah, yeah. |
| 11:38.62 | Max Shank | The cannabinoid system by ingesting inhaling whatever some thccbd you're going to be able to push through those normal endurance plateaus that you would hit psychologically. So. There's a big difference between a. Using drugs and using drugs and that can be a fine line for some people but you know along with the devil is in the dosage and the substance is less important than the behavior you got to reconsider. Ah. Labeling some is good and some is bad and like does it really make sense to throw like a drug addict in jail or a drug user in jail I mean part of the reason you know I'm kind of switching topics here a little bit but a lot of reason that gangs have power is because. Certain special drugs are illegal and if they were legal there would they wouldn't have any there would be no incentive to go buy drugs from a you know a thug with a machine gun if you can go get it at Cvs like you got to imagine the. |
| 12:39.83 | mikebledsoe | No. |
| 12:55.91 | Max Shank | Benefit to society would be much better. |
| 12:57.34 | mikebledsoe | Yeah, people don't really think about that I I think a lot of people miss that and that making a product black market making it Illegal. You're gonna get arrested for it. It's hard to make that actually creates some some interesting variables. But. 1 of the things that it creates is it creates violence because now now you have to be secretive about It. You have to form gangs to protect Yourself. You've you've got to do all these things and then in addition to that The ah the. |
| 13:26.74 | Max Shank | 4 |
| 13:36.58 | mikebledsoe | Dosage starts getting really concentrated like cocaine becoming illegal. They were trying to figure out how do we? How do we make it more potent so that we can because shipping right? We got to hide it and ship it and so we got to make it more potent. The same thing is happening with weed over the years is an ounce today is not what an ounce was twenty thirty years ago because we can. We can you know, go further with this. So 1 thing I've noticed is when something's on the black market just becomes more concentrated a huge example of this right now. Which is in the news which is fentanyl and fentanyl I think is whether like the number one killer of ah of americans right now the number 1 or number 4 in certain age group. Okay, but it's it's in which is incredibly high but it's. |
| 14:19.98 | Max Shank | Ah, in a certain in a certain age group in a certain age group. Yeah, which is insane. No no one is thinking like I want to do some fentanyl today like. |
| 14:31.50 | mikebledsoe | It's probably because no one's thinking that but it's cheaper than heroin at this point right? So and heroin exists because Opium was yeah but. |
| 14:37.40 | Max Shank | Well and remember heroin is bad but diamorphine the prescription grade heroin totally fine, right? So it just like depends on the context huh. |
| 14:49.70 | mikebledsoe | But smoking opium was became illegal and so they had to concentrate it and make heroin and then just keeps getting more further and further concentrated because it's black market or or it's tightly controlled. |
| 14:58.25 | Max Shank | And that black market creates a lot of wealth too I mean look what happened I mean I I'm so skeptical of almost any of the history I read now because I just feel like it's ah it's a huge. It's probably a huge web of lies. |
| 15:11.20 | mikebledsoe | As you should be. |
| 15:17.54 | Max Shank | But I remember all these things that I've read anyway. So I'll just throw that caveat out there but the Kennedys weren't they huge bootleggers of alcohol. |
| 15:24.96 | mikebledsoe | Huge yeah, they were well. They were responsible for bringing from Ireland they they were like importing their big importers of ah I forget you know whiskey or whatever, whatever it is. They're they're bringing it from ah I think it was Ireland so yeah there. |
| 15:35.10 | Max Shank | That's what I'm saying. |
| 15:41.25 | Max Shank | I Mean one one. |
| 15:44.10 | mikebledsoe | And they had a they had like a a monopoly on it. So yeah, it built Ah ah, a lot of wealth. |
| 15:49.41 | Max Shank | Well and something about human nature people. Love booze that's been in our history for thousands of thousands of years we've been drinking booze and smoking different herbs tobacco ah hashish. |
| 15:57.12 | mikebledsoe | Oh yeah. |
| 16:07.96 | Max Shank | All these different things. So it's not like it's inherently good or evil it's it's what you do with it. It's not about the substance not about the behavior and if you have that kind of compassion for people who use drugs that you may be thought before are evil. Then you'll also be able to have more compassion for yourself when you start recognizing how many drugs you might be using that are like the good drugs or the okay drugs because frankly, if you give a 12 year old a 15 year old or a thirty year old ah, tiktok and they do a few hours of that every day that's probably more destructive than getting a little high and doing some yoga or something you know I'm saying so it's all it's more about the the context. |
| 16:56.14 | mikebledsoe | Yeah, well I think we're talking about there too is the difference between exogenous and endogenous substances right? So a behavior driven as an but it's not a substance. There's an external event. |
| 17:05.94 | Max Shank | Um, well it's still an external. Yeah, that right. |
| 17:14.83 | mikebledsoe | That's causing your body to create a substance if you sit there on Tiktok for 3 hours your your blood chemistry is likely looking very different 3 hours into it than beforehand. |
| 17:24.29 | Max Shank | There's serotonin. There's like a dopamine on and off you're just in this and oh like I call it story time roulette basically because it's 1 screen at a time you shut out the whole rest of the world you develop hardcore tunnel vision. |
| 17:30.58 | mikebledsoe | Yeah. |
| 17:41.19 | Max Shank | Your vision gets where vision like is going into the fucking basement because people are looking at stuff that is less than twenty four inches away from them a lot and look I'm I'm not one to say that's right or wrong. But if you don't start. Looking at things farther away and going on walks and taking in long distances your eyes will completely deteriorate anyway to your point. Yes, if you're consuming media and the hormone cascade is the result of that I would still call the. Scrolling media the drug that is initiating the production of endogenous compounds. |
| 18:26.50 | mikebledsoe | Yeah, yeah, and the same for the the runners high. It's like when those things where I meet someone's like oh I've been sober I'm like but you run like ten twenty miles every other day or every day to stay sane right? They're like oh I gotta like you know. |
| 18:32.68 | Max Shank | Yeah. |
| 18:43.23 | Max Shank | Okay. |
| 18:46.49 | mikebledsoe | I Don't work out if I don't get that hot and if I can't work out hard if I can't push it I got someone gets an injury and they they're you know they just they get depressed and everything just goes in the shitter because they can't exercise I'm like you are so addicted to those neurotransmitters and those hormones. Um, and one of them being a nadoide na nadoide is this is the substance your body creates when you get into that runner's high that that what most people call endorphins. It's not endorphins. It's a nadomite and. Um, it's part of the Endo Cannabinoids system and that's it's really powerful because it's it. Ah, it's very similar and it and it attaches to the cell the same way T Hc does and so. This is why you'll find people who like to roll jujitsu or go for long endurance events and they smoke weed Beforehand or have an edible beforehand because not you get that you get that runner's high immediately. So I get running and I actually everyone knows when they slip into that Groove. It's. |
| 19:57.33 | Max Shank | Like a flow. Yeah. |
| 19:57.98 | mikebledsoe | You know you get like five miles in you get into the flow smoke some weed beforehand you'll be in flow in about 60 seconds and then when your body also pumps out the nadomite on top of that t hc that's a it's a double dose of runner's high so you know ah that that. Nothing wrong with that I enjoy doing that myself. Another example of this would be I've gone to the peruvian mountains and I fly in and immediately someone hands me a big bag of coca leaves. So just raw coca leaves which is not cocaine cocaine. Takes coca leaves and they break it down into ah such a concentration that you know it's it's incredibly higher. But I take the coca leaves I I wrap some stuff in there. It's some enzymes that basically help it break down better I chew on it and now like it does elevate my mood. And I can deal better with elevation. It keeps you from getting elevation sickness. So little little things that ah that are just I think about those 2 things kind of together because. |
| 20:58.13 | Max Shank | Ah. |
| 21:11.70 | mikebledsoe | Ah, it's just a simple thing to add in. That's gonna give you more of what you already were We're gonna get or wanted. |
| 21:18.98 | Max Shank | Well and the devil's in the dosage. You know people are really fond of the term biohacker and I got to say it sounds like a really cool thing to be and I guess ah you know my. Natural state with things is one of mockery. So I like can't help but make fun of anything that sounds silly or you know people who say forward ambulation instead of walking it just like makes me laugh I can't take them serious. Ah, but the the nuance the context. Ah, using these substances to your advantage I mean imagine trying to build a business without a cell phone and imagine imagine imagine trying to build a business with a cell phone and a cell phone is another dopamine machine. You can use it or it can use you social media same thing you can use it or it can use you a little bit of Coca leaves boom mood elevator ah less sensitive to the higher altitude. Fantastic! ah. Tiny bit of booze wham maybe a deadlift pr a little bit of marijuana and maybe your best five mile runtime ever or flow state. You know, better music. Whatever um, so the context matters so much the dosage. Matters so much and recognizing that anything that is changing your state that way. It is a drug and the good and evils of it should be determined on an individual basis rather than like broad strokes with law in my opinion. You know that's that's my perspective is that the cost of having like a war on drugs which seems like it's just been a colossal failure to me is way lower than the benefit across the board. |
| 23:21.85 | mikebledsoe | Yeah I mean the the intentions of the war on drugs I mean there's a lot of speculation that you know had more to do with just suppressing minorities and and things like that and it's a great excuse to put people in Jail maybe shut up protesters. You know that went after psychedelics in the. |
| 23:32.45 | Max Shank | Yeah. |
| 23:41.22 | mikebledsoe | Sixty S because of the Hippie movement And yeah, there's a lot of that going on and the other thing. Um. |
| 23:45.80 | Max Shank | I mean it seems it just seems crazy that there's a such thing as a nonviolent crime in the first place but to have nonviolent crimes like go to jail instead of like compensate who anyway the whole thing is like. |
| 23:55.68 | mikebledsoe | Right. |
| 24:04.71 | Max Shank | Crazy to me. Yeah. |
| 24:05.20 | mikebledsoe | It's insane. It's insane. Well, the other thing is I wanted to mention this earlier which is prohibition people don't if we look at prohibition of alcohol that happened you know a hundred years ago in the us ah, it created Al Capone and all these gangsters and. All this and they were having shootouts with the cops they lift prohibition on alcohol. What? what happens the gangs just kind of go away like like they they may still be operating but they're not nearly as violent. Maybe they they probably moved to a lot of them that were in the business of trafficking. Alcohol probably moved into opium or something else that was illegal. I mean if you watch narcos which is based on true story. But you know obviously it's hollywooded up. Ah you know they basically go oh the weed's not paying enough. We'll move to cocaine and so. Those types of people who are always looking to play at the edges are always going to go there no matter what the substance is that that is black marketed. |
| 25:09.64 | Max Shank | No no question. It's hilarious that phrase crime doesn't pay but when you define something as a crime it pays handsomely like who's who's who's more wealthy than a Colombian Drug lord. |
| 25:17.60 | mikebledsoe | Ah, crime pays when you don't get paid Just don't get caught. |
| 25:29.59 | Max Shank | I mean unless you own a pharmaceutical company then you have legal drugs even more widespread use and you're even richer like those are some of the richest people on the planet. You know you look at you look at the different. Okay so is Netflix a drug is watching. |
| 25:39.83 | mikebledsoe | Oh yeah. |
| 25:47.96 | Max Shank | Media for hours and hours a drug. Yeah I mean there's no surprise that people gravitate toward maximum curiosity and maximum safety simultaneously. It completely satisfies our 2 most primal desires. Ah, that define human beings we want safety so you're inside your house or wherever you're in your own little world looking at your telephone or watching the screen and then you see the most outlandish you know game of thrones narcos like ah people like. Raping and killing each other and you're like I'm safe at home and I'm watching this like crazy dragons flying around everywhere. It's it's makes sense to me and look what are the the top companies in the world right now. It's ah like Facebook Amazon Apple Netflix. What's the g fang can't remember right now I should know that Google thank you I guess I could have googled it and figured that out. But that's so isn't that incredible. |
| 26:49.90 | mikebledsoe | Google. |
| 27:00.84 | mikebledsoe | That's now a definition in the there's else Google now made the dictionary by the way. |
| 27:03.90 | Max Shank | Well I mean what's incredible about that is that they have avoided um, being considered a monopoly that's that's incredible. We're gonna get too far off track I take it back. We'll save it for another time. |
| 27:21.71 | mikebledsoe | Alright I'll bring it back but let's get back the drugs so I like the classified drugs in the 2 categories. So when I talk to people and they get they they want to challenge me on like yeah I'm like. |
| 27:21.84 | Max Shank | We we can't do this. We have to stay on drugs. Um. |
| 27:40.57 | mikebledsoe | On on drugs and by the way I had someone on Instagram the other day just posting trolling me in the comments telling me I was ah was addicted to drugs and shit and it was pretty comical. They got blocked fuck them but they I mean you can talk a lot of shit to me in the comments I'll I'll respond back I enjoy. Back and forth. But when you just start when it starts getting ridiculous and there's not actually a conversation you're getting blocked. This person is probably listening to this I have a few trolls that know way too much about me which is which is a little creepy but um. |
| 28:04.53 | Max Shank | So. |
| 28:10.62 | Max Shank | Um, ah must make you feel pretty special. |
| 28:17.83 | mikebledsoe | not not the kind of special I want to feel but ah when I get talking to people and they go ah, you know they they start lumping in say alcohol and heroin and with lsd in the same category of drug and I go. These are not the same. They're the opposite of each other to to put them in the same category and the category is drugs and I think it's good that we're using that name for this show and using it in this way because it really should be normalized I think the only way is to do it is to say drugs are. Fine and we need to talk about the drugs inside this context when you're growing up. There's like don't do drugs and all these things fall into the same thing so we're programmed to drop everything in the drugs category and there's 2 different types of drugs. There's drugs that make you feel less and there's drugs that make you feel more. And there's a lot of those are just like two sides of a spectrum. It's a concept. There's so much in between I mean when I think about using drugs I think of myself inside of a sphere and I can go not just three hundred and sixty degrees but three hundred and sixty degrees times three hundred and sixty degrees go in any direction I want to push my state into but there's largely. There's feeling less drugs and feeling more drugs and the feeling less drugs would be heroin alcohol these things that sedate you in a way that that it it. Keeps you from having the full human experience right? right. |
| 29:56.79 | Max Shank | Reduces your sensitivity and others increase your sensitivity like alcohol and weed are the perfect examples that I think most people can understand. |
| 30:03.78 | mikebledsoe | And so most people I think they associate or I'll talk to someone about having mushrooms and they go why I don't want to like you know I blacked out once on alcohol and I'm like this is you're not going to black out on mushrooms for one and but you're. Your awareness on alcohol is being so depressed and your awareness on on mushrooms is being if you've never done it if you've never done any psychedelics. It's It's an expansion that you'll never you'll break through multiple levels of expansion of consciousness that is indescribable. And the to to put these 2 things in the same category I think is a a huge disservice and it's a great way to just not learn about it. You know people just they just would rather not know shit about it and just. Avoid it because someone told them to yeah, it is easier. Okay, um. |
| 30:59.36 | Max Shank | Well, it's easier to do that. Also right drugs are bad. Okay, you know, ah I mean the less nuance and context there is the less clear your understanding is going to be the more likely you are to just follow the closest. Authority figure. Um, so this this idea that we go into an a a meeting and then out in the hallway you got chain smoking and donut eating I mean look if you if you're an alcoholic and you. |
| 31:19.82 | mikebledsoe | Accurate. |
| 31:37.67 | Max Shank | And you like having that term attached to you and maybe you used to like beat your get drunk and beat your wife every night and now instead you chain smoke and eat donuts I think that's an improvement. Okay maybe we can do better but it's still a step in the right direction but this this whole idea. Of like substituting 1 addiction for another and that could be a whole um, different thing I've had some great talks with people about addiction and the hardest part is to define. It. The best definition I've heard is ah. Repeated behavior that gives you an outcome. You don't want that That's my favorite definition for addiction. So regardless of what the substance is go for it. |
| 32:16.51 | mikebledsoe | E. Well I would say yeah people are one of the things I've noticed in my coaching with people is they get addicted addicted to emotions you know they they get addicted to to guilt. And because they're addicted to guilt I mean just experiencing guilt a terrible outcome. But yeah I think was it a? Ah, What's his name toll. |
| 32:46.91 | Max Shank | It's like the familiar pain versus uncertainty a lot of people go into that. |
| 32:57.87 | mikebledsoe | Be here. Not be here now that's Ram Das Ah not Ram das the power of now. Well he talks about the pain body and basically there's certain things that you're basically getting addicted to this is I associate this with being accepted or loved or whatever it is or. |
| 32:58.60 | Max Shank | Ram Das Tolly is a power of now. |
| 33:06.41 | Max Shank | Threat. |
| 33:16.22 | Max Shank | Right. |
| 33:17.83 | mikebledsoe | This is how I learned to survive when things became stressful or I'm afraid that I'm not going to be loved so now I need to respond in this way and so we we get addicted to there's this emotional pattern that is wreaking Havoc on our lives and so we're addicted to it So there's it Oh fuck. Yeah. |
| 33:23.85 | Max Shank | Right? Well you ever met someone addicted to drama. You know what's you know? what's funny I've never heard. |
| 33:37.74 | mikebledsoe | Get away from them. But we're all dick. But. |
| 33:42.42 | Max Shank | A group of people who says I don't want any drama more than people who are addicted to drama like ah a person who's not addicted to it a person who actually doesn't want trauma doesn't even use that phrase but a person who's addicted to it. |
| 33:59.97 | mikebledsoe | Totally totally. |
| 34:02.10 | Max Shank | Always uses that phrase. It's one of the most and and I I'm like addicted to peace I like like drama is uncomfortable like I want to avoid it at all costs I don't mind a little confrontation but I don't want to. So for me I was just like whoa. This is insane that someone could actually want this like this and continue to either consciously or subconsciously manifest these situations of hardcore drama. |
| 34:34.76 | mikebledsoe | Yeah, well we're we're all addicted to drama I mean if you if you buy into any narrative at all. It's because you enjoy the drama of it people watch Tv because they enjoy drama yeah, where what. |
| 34:36.34 | Max Shank | Very exciting. |
| 34:48.98 | Max Shank | You. |
| 34:52.42 | mikebledsoe | What is the character they are playing in that story. They may be a more dramatic character. They may be emotional emotionally unstable. They may pick more fights but we're all living in a drama but you know what character are you playing in that drama and so. |
| 34:55.36 | Max Shank | So. |
| 35:02.42 | Max Shank | Right. |
| 35:12.25 | mikebledsoe | You're kind of like the sit back and probably only step in when it's absolutely necessary kind of character whereas Karen Karen is out there just yeah and then you got Karen out there picking fights in the parking lot. |
| 35:16.69 | Max Shank | I try to be like a Buddha guy. |
| 35:25.83 | Max Shank | Well and and that can make you feel like you are solidifying your self image or your ego right? So a lot of these back to drugs. |
| 35:34.96 | mikebledsoe | Yeah, all right? Let's get back to drugs. Um. Ah, the eye roll I don't think so I. |
| 35:41.98 | Max Shank | If we had just done some cocaine before this. We'd be more focused. Yeah I've never I've never tried it but I've heard. It's really fun. Um. |
| 35:52.25 | mikebledsoe | Yeah, ah and a handful of times. Ah I don't think the the repercussions aren't worth the fun compared to other drugs. Other drugs are just superior. It's kind of like when you start doing mushrooms. Why people start eating mushrooms like. |
| 36:01.15 | Max Shank | Oh. Yeah, ah. |
| 36:11.28 | mikebledsoe | Why was I drinking so much you mean on Friday night I could have eaten some mushrooms instead of drinking 12 beers. Wow the next day is that's pretty cool. |
| 36:16.96 | Max Shank | Yeah, yeah, the the when you when it comes time to pay the Piper mushroom certainly seems a lot kinder than alcohol. Ah, how about? So I mean. |
| 36:30.61 | mikebledsoe | Ah, just about anything's kinder than alcohol. |
| 36:36.86 | Max Shank | Ah, is sex a drug. What do you think there are sex addicts out there also known as males. |
| 36:40.20 | mikebledsoe | I Mean we're talking about it causes ears out, you know. Um, well you know, Ah, there's a certain chemical response happening in the body when you're having sex and you know sex with different people is going to give you different responses as well. So You know you might be addicted to a certain fetish or. |
| 37:06.27 | Max Shank | And. |
| 37:08.96 | mikebledsoe | Something like that. Yeah I mean I know people personally who identify as sex addicts and you know it was giving them a result they did not want and there's I shit man I I've had some sexual experience a lot of sexual experiences that ah. |
| 37:14.35 | Max Shank | Ah. |
| 37:28.19 | mikebledsoe | Would put in the psychedelic category of a lot I if you would ah if if you pulled the what's happening to my my dick out of the equation and I would say I don't know if I'm having sex or if I'm having a dmt experience. It's it's It's very. |
| 37:30.83 | Max Shank | Oh. |
| 37:46.99 | Max Shank | Sublime. |
| 37:48.80 | mikebledsoe | Very similar Actually the older I get the more similar they become which is actually really exciting because I can just take get a little hit. Yeah well part of it is learning how to channel that energy. So most dudes are just. |
| 37:51.59 | Max Shank | Um, it's an in intersection. That's pretty cool. Well, it's kind of like the meditation and mushrooms. Ah convergence right? like you were saying you can be. |
| 38:06.31 | mikebledsoe | Yeah, yeah. |
| 38:09.88 | Max Shank | On mushrooms can get this like crazy effect. But um, it's kind of like a shortcut in a lot of ways where you could get there with lots of meditation and releasing the ego and really being here now and being present. It's just that most people need a jumpstart of some kind. To allow themselves to get there to cut through all of the ego and trauma and things like that and that's why um, there are such big changes after just 1 experience right. |
| 38:41.48 | mikebledsoe | Yeah, huge benefit. There's most psychedelics and I like you you brought up meditation because you know you got this guy this monk sitting on a hill meditating for 30 years to achieve a state. Come back with some wisdom to share or just keep to themselves because I mean most of that's just for you anyway or you know I spent I spent a decent amount of time in South America with |
| 39:03.44 | Max Shank | Yeah. |
| 39:15.49 | mikebledsoe | Ah, the Ayahuascaros and what chimaro like healers down there is how they they go by by the way. The word shaman is ah is a northern europe like siberian word. It's not even south american so sometimes people give me like a shaman like you're appropriating I'm like no. |
| 39:27.16 | Max Shank | Oh. |
| 39:33.98 | mikebledsoe | You're appropriating. Are you from Siberia no all right shut the fuck up. But anyways, ah it's funny what it's it's mostly like white. Ah ah, whatever they call. Ah. |
| 39:40.20 | Max Shank | Where do you find all these people good god. |
| 39:48.92 | Max Shank | Hey I'm not white I'm pink Dude don't look at me. Yeah, um, yeah. |
| 39:52.28 | mikebledsoe | You are definitely pink. You're not white I'm pink too. Ah now the ah ah new ages. It's like all this the new age crowd. You know they it's like oh so worried about appropriating I'm like you're appropriating shit left and right more than anybody just chill out. |
| 40:11.70 | Max Shank | Um, isn't it isn't appropriation just called a appreciation or or sharing I mean like what if it's if it's good. It's good. |
| 40:11.11 | mikebledsoe | Ah, but ah, it's pretty. Yeah I'm like I'm like anytime and when I when I hang out with we'll we'll say quote unquote shamans in South America because that's what people are are gonna I think understand better when I hang out with them and I'm like oh I'm like I'm gonna take back what I learned to. So where I live and they're like perfect bring it back to where I live show people like oh you're appropriating I'm like the only people we should be caring about is the people who I got it from and they're telling me to spread the word like this is how culture works this is how evolution works evolution works by appropriating what someone else has created. And then making it your own so people ah people people get upset because some people are really good at making money off of the thing they learn from another tradition and those people are poor I get that that's a whole other but it's it. That's such a deep conversation. Maybe. |
| 40:56.14 | Max Shank | I Mean if you like it I think you'd probably do it. |
| 41:06.84 | Max Shank | Ah. |
| 41:13.97 | mikebledsoe | Maybe we just do a show on appropriation later. But ah so but I go down. Yeah yeah, but ah, you go down to South America they've been sitting with this medicine as thousands of years it at least if not longer thousands of years |
| 41:16.74 | Max Shank | Expect a lot of eye rolling for that one for me. |
| 41:33.21 | mikebledsoe | And you know they it's ah I equiate equate them that the knowledge that they get when um when a lot of these South American Healers have been introduced to Concepts of Buddhism and hinduism a lot of that they were completely ah ignorant of. Those philosophies of those religions and practices until the last couple decades because while the internet and people started traveling for these things and brought their own. They're like they like oh what we're doing down here is the same as buddhism like it's the same. |
| 41:58.70 | Max Shank | Right. |
| 42:10.39 | mikebledsoe | The the same wisdom is being accomplished in a much shorter period of time and ah, it's very interesting that people will will put meditation on this pedestal while using all sorts of drugs unknowingly and but. Using psychedelics as something is like oh you, you want to lean on that like human beings have been leaning on and evolving alongside psychedelic medicines for you know, probably tens of thousands if not hundreds of thousands of years so the idea of like. Not using this tool that we've been using for so long that's going to expand my consciousness seems kind of ridiculous. |
| 42:52.41 | Max Shank | Well, it's all ridiculous because everybody is trying to alleviate a pain that they're feeling and the most primal pains are ah hunger sexual desire. The desire for safety and then as human beings. It's even a greater challenge because we have to harmonize this concept of meaning and mission and perhaps legacy and so that's why there's such a huge amount. Written passed down for generations. You know you have the bible. You have the doo de jing you have the book of the buddha you have these ah shamans in different parts of the world. I mean we have been trying to figure out how to live for a very very long time. In a way that is is comforting that pain that we feel and that discomfort is the fire for achieving your goals also and if you squelch that fire with ah. You know, tiktoks or heroin. Well I mean I guess that's where you're going to go I mean there's no worries. That's just it's going to work out differently than someone who uses that fire of discomfort like ah a Martin Luther King right and he does he goes the complete opposite way and he takes that pain and he transmutes it into something that he can share with the rest of the people and and that's why the word appropriation makes me laugh so much because it's all about sharing. Ultimately, the reason we write stuff down is so we can share it and the different pains that people feel may have different specific origins but they'll they're all rooted in some of those primal desires your ah desire for acceptance. You know, childhood et cetera growing up attracting a mate like all these different things like how can you um, use that pain for action rather than just quench that fire in a destructive way right? So it's it's very It's very interesting to see why people use drugs and really how they use them. |
| 45:27.25 | mikebledsoe | Yeah, and this is why it's very important to pay attention and this is why I like psychedelics is because Psychedelics taught me to pay attention and in days after a mushroom experience and. Being concerned that I was going to lose whatever wisdom I had had ah received in that first ceremony and then days later still paying better attention to my state than I ever had before and that's that's part of the point of meditation too. |
| 46:00.96 | Max Shank | 20 |
| 46:05.43 | mikebledsoe | Especially if you look at something like Viposana Meditation it's all about being present with the sensations in your body being and that would be sight smell hearing as well and so most people when they start meditating me do eyes closed. But there's also eyes open meditation but it's ah it's a more advanced thing. Yeah, it's it's pretty advanced. Ah. |
| 46:22.72 | Max Shank | You can meditate with your eyes open that sounds pretty advanced. Maybe you can put a training course together for that level one. How to sit still with your eyes closed. Level 2 How to sit still with your eyes open. |
| 46:39.77 | mikebledsoe | Ah, yeah, yeah, So the the point is the point isn't the ceremony. The point is not when you're sitting in Meditation. The point is bringing that level of awareness and that ah being present with. Your body the the world around you and yourself and all these things as you move throughout your day and so noticing I'm not that familiar with Karma yoga. |
| 47:04.93 | Max Shank | That's karma yoga right? isn't that karma yoga. That's you as I understand it's bringing the awareness of meditation to every task that you do and the first time I really got it the first time I really got it was |
| 47:15.20 | mikebledsoe | Um, oh you're right. |
| 47:21.25 | Max Shank | When I was ah cleaning the leaves out of my pool with a long skimmer and I'm not proud of it. But you know just days before that revelation I had considered killing my neighbor's tree. So The leaves wouldn't fall in the pool I was like I was like what I was like why is this happening to me and anyway I didn't kill the tree I just started to really I I know it's ridiculous. It's all relative isn't it only absolute is relativity but I was really annoyed. |
| 47:47.20 | mikebledsoe | Why is this happening to me. Ah. |
| 47:58.55 | Max Shank | That the leaves were falling into my pool and the indignance of it all was in retrospect quite hilarious and so instead of like you know, murdering a tree. Ah I started to really enjoy the process of skimming the leaves out of a pool so it was like my little water Zen Garden and. |
| 48:13.51 | mikebledsoe | Um, yeah. |
| 48:17.59 | Max Shank | The more you can bring that awareness to everything you do the more clear you get on who you really are and what your mission is what you stand for you know what your value and values are the easier. It is to bring that level of awareness to all that stuff you do and. It's no surprise that we have figured out a lot of this stuff in the last several thousand years and I think if you can if you're looking for wisdom I would look at stuff that has lasted a really long Time. So if you take ancient, wisdom and modern Tools. You'll probably be at the most peace and very wealthy if you take modern, wisdom and ancient Tools. You will probably mess yourself up. Pretty bad. |
| 49:04.37 | mikebledsoe | Agreed agreed. Yeah so paying attention helps to know what drugs you may be taking whether it be caffeine or shallow or deep breathing or whether it's lsd. |
| 49:21.17 | Max Shank | A. |
| 49:22.60 | mikebledsoe | You're gonna if you're paying attention to your state from moment to moment you're gonna you're gonna know what you should do more of in less up or when you should do things and when you should not do things but I to me takes a lot of practice ah paying attention while intentionally putting yourself. |
| 49:41.25 | Max Shank | The modern tools can help my my favorite addiction I mean look food sex. Yeah I'm all on board. But Youtube is 1 of my addictions because you can have a true expert on. |
| 49:41.26 | mikebledsoe | And these state changes. So ah, the modern tools mean out. |
| 50:00.46 | Max Shank | Nearly any topic take you through their whole thought process on anything I can I can go down the Youtube Rabbi a hole for hours and hours. That's why I use the modern tech to ah, click it off at a certain timeframe. |
| 50:05.16 | mikebledsoe | Yeah. |
| 50:18.58 | mikebledsoe | E. |
| 50:20.31 | Max Shank | So you know when I'm on my phone. Ah 5 minutes only if I'm on my computer I get 15 minutes and that's it and at least that pause will allow me to. Ask the question of is this really what I want to be doing right now. So that pattern break alone can be tremendous. That's why I was telling you before we got started here um on the door of the pantry in the kitchen There's a little sign that says pattern break. |
| 50:38.56 | mikebledsoe | Yeah. Yeah, yeah. |
| 50:56.39 | Max Shank | So before you open the pantry with all the snacks in it. There's a little sign that essentially reminds you intention before ingestion like is are you going here because you're hungry. Are you going here because you're sleepy. Are you going here because you're bored. Are you going here because you're deeply uncomfortable. And I think food is the most difficult drug because you cannot practice abstinence permanently like you cannot quit cold turkey cold turkey you must continue eating food. So like you could quit heroin forever. But you can't quit food forever. There's there's a give and take there. So the fact that you always have to have a toe in there makes it very challenging and look It's no surprise. What do we have like over half of the people obese ah something like that I get I get it I get it hey we we won the game of life. |
| 51:47.30 | mikebledsoe | Something like that insane. |
| 51:55.94 | Max Shank | We're dying of being too fat instead of underfed in this country that's look we won nice job. Everybody now let's consider how how we can swing the pendulum back a little bit. Food is tough. Food is a tough one but it all comes down to a few of those basic principles. |
| 52:05.41 | mikebledsoe | Yeah, well said. |
| 52:15.40 | Max Shank | Intention before ingestion. It's not about the substance. It's about the behavior. Um, you had a couple good ones too. But it's community matters a lot I think who you associate with the the 5 |
| 52:30.76 | mikebledsoe | Um I I yeah I've noticed in the last couple years the impact of community because I I'm ah I'm a very social person by nature. But. |
| 52:33.58 | Max Shank | The 5 monkey rule. |
| 52:49.29 | mikebledsoe | Um, a very social person by nature and I've also just like the downfall of that is being too open at too many different energies and and a lot of times like I almost feel guilty about not almost I do there are times where I feel guilty about. Denying people my my attention knowing that by giving them my attention. It's bleeding me dry and ah yeah, just over the last few years I'd say I'd say like the last four years I've gotten |
| 53:11.00 | Max Shank | And. |
| 53:24.89 | mikebledsoe | Very intentional about my community and the people I surround myself with and not only does it change my experience from moment to moment as I'm in those communities with those people and and having my cup filled but my behavior that comes from being and and community with certain people is just. |
| 53:43.43 | Max Shank | Ah. |
| 53:44.77 | mikebledsoe | I Like how I am I like who I'm being I like my behavior much better when I place myself in certain communities and I so you know work with a lot of people and the thing that I've noticed you know people like I want to solve my. |
| 53:54.30 | Max Shank | Um, totally. |
| 54:04.90 | mikebledsoe | Financial problems by doing all these things I need more systems and business and I need no marketing and I'm like yeah you do need to know all that stuff. But you're not going to really be able to implement it if you're if there's no Community. You're not going to loan wolf your way into the good behaviors. There's There's some people that may be able to accomplish what they want as a lone wolf but it's not gonna be as enjoyable and and it's and it it may not they may accomplish their thing but may not be happy at the end. |
| 54:31.39 | Max Shank | Also Also, you don't get extra points for doing anything all by yourself as I once thought there are no extra points or Credit. You're given at the end I always thought if I did something all on my own people would be like wow. Look how amazing he really is he You don't get any of those extra points at the end. It's total waste. |
| 54:52.82 | mikebledsoe | No okay community is a huge leverage point I mean we see this in the gym people come in to lose £15 but they stick around why community they want to be around people who are like minded we have similar goals. |
| 55:09.10 | Max Shank | The the. |
| 55:10.83 | mikebledsoe | Have similar values and you know I like putting myself in community where they value something that I want to value more you know, ah people people say they value things They don't actually value. They. They they tell you they value things they want to value but most people if they haven't reached their goal if if their values were already aligned with their goals. They have had accomplished that or beyond such a trajectory reaching it. They would be obvious that it's just happening. But people want to be different which means they have to change their values. You have to change your values to reach your goals. So Yeah and I yeah you just go in their House. You can see and so community I like to choose to hang out with people who value. |
| 55:50.00 | Max Shank | Um I think actions speak louder than words in that case, you're hundred percent right like it's easy to see what someone really values. |
| 56:05.81 | mikebledsoe | Something more than I do that I that I want to value more and so I use community to shift my values because you know I hang out with people who make more money than me they they have spent more time valuing dollars than I have. |
| 56:21.19 | Max Shank | Ah. |
| 56:22.58 | mikebledsoe | They spend more time thinking about it and they think about it in ways that most people don't and so just by putting yourself in that environment. You don't even have to be talking about money. But you're just like it's the way they're being. It's there's an osmosis going on. |
| 56:26.89 | Max Shank | Oh my God oh. |
| 56:41.13 | Max Shank | Dude, that's so true I remember that was the first you were the person who mentioned that to me and it stuck with me was ah you know don't necessarily just listen to what people are saying notice how they are being. And I thought that was ah, an interesting distinction that I'd never really considered before and the atmosphere or the climate in the company you keep is totally different and money is a perfect example because you got to be so careful. Um. Hanging out with people who have a scarcity mindset around money like you probably want to hang around with people where five ten grand is not a lot of money if you want to be wealthy like if ah if people are telling you all the time about the thing they bought for. |
| 57:22.14 | mikebledsoe | Down. Yeah. |
| 57:31.70 | Max Shank | $5 off coupon I mean I'm not saying that makes you bad it just means that there's still like ah missing the forest for the trees or pennywise pound foolish kinda thing going on there like you don't want to be in that environment of scarcity versus abundance. |
| 57:40.21 | mikebledsoe | Yeah, when this goes back to yeah and this applies to you know drugs as well drug abuse. So if you around a bunch of drug abusers. You're gonna keep abusing. |
| 57:57.00 | Max Shank | Totally. |
| 57:58.20 | mikebledsoe | And the the money one I think is a good one because people can almost everybody can they understand it. They experience it and. |
| 58:04.52 | Max Shank | And. |
| 58:10.32 | mikebledsoe | I think I may have lost it. Maybe it'll come back. Oh yeah, that changed that that changes people's state Incredible. Go check your bank account. What's that experience like. |
| 58:12.61 | Max Shank | Well money is kind of a funny, a funny, a funny drug too like I see I see money as energy. |
| 58:29.50 | mikebledsoe | For the average person. You know the average person. Some people they they don't want to go check their bank account. They're afraid to look at it. Some people are excited to look at it. It's having an impact. |
| 58:37.83 | Max Shank | I Like to look at my bank account and whack off. Ah I'm joking that I don't really do that. But I actually try to look at it as little as possible to still know the direction that the ship is going because I I don't. |
| 58:53.10 | mikebledsoe | Yeah, yeah. |
| 58:57.39 | Max Shank | I never wanted to have to like make sure I had enough in the account to buy something essentially but you know you get to a certain point I don't know I think like by today's values or something like that if you make over a hundred k you basically have as good a life. |
| 59:01.57 | mikebledsoe | Yeah, yeah. |
| 59:16.88 | Max Shank | As the top 1% in terms of like the basic needs like you don't have to worry about food going out guacamole on your chipotle that sort of thing and then beyond that then it's just this new game like trying to trying to be a billionaire. |
| 59:29.61 | mikebledsoe | Yeah, well that. |
| 59:35.29 | Max Shank | Unless you have a solid mission that you want to use that fund those funds for like that's got to be some form of mental illness now. It's a very constructive. It's a very constructive mental illness. It's like how you think that you deserve love. |
| 59:44.14 | mikebledsoe | There's something else going on there. |
| 59:52.97 | Max Shank | You know I have that thing like people want love power attention in that order and so some people don't think they'll ever really deserve love because they hate themselves on some level or their mom did which is kind of like that you get the whole idea. So They think I'll just get as powerful as possible. And then people have to love me or fear me or whatever. So It's ah it's a very funny thing the different way we could do a whole thing about about money that would be kind of fun. Maybe we'll do that after business next time but that's a. |
| 01:00:22.31 | mikebledsoe | Yeah, we should definitely do that. Yeah I'm put in the notes right now I remembered we'll close this up soon. Ah, the the it came back to me the what I wanted to say about the money in community is. |
| 01:00:28.69 | Max Shank | Yeah, yeah. |
| 01:00:39.46 | mikebledsoe | I What I witnessed a lot of people struggle with is they need to find new community so they can take on these new habits and behaviors. But they feel guilty about leaving their old community behind they're like oh you know and and then your old friends are gonna call you a sellout and this and that and like. |
| 01:00:55.24 | Max Shank | Totally. |
| 01:00:58.10 | mikebledsoe | And so so many people are afraid of of leaving that community and like leaving them behind but the reality is is they're leaving themselves behind now they're they're happy where they're at you want to change, you got to jump ship and people are gonna judge you no matter? what. |
| 01:01:13.89 | Max Shank | No doubt. |
| 01:01:16.65 | mikebledsoe | And ah yeah, the more successful you become the more prominent you become the more of a target you become and so I have to say the more popular I become the more people I have to turn down to hang out and they may talk shit about me but I've only got so much time. |
| 01:01:24.57 | Max Shank | No question. |
| 01:01:36.27 | mikebledsoe | And the day and my energy is important to me and I'm gonna I'm gonna keep it that way. |
| 01:01:36.44 | Max Shank | Yeah questions. And that's great to hear from you because it sounds like you are just learning how to draw boundaries in the last few years that sound right? Yeah and it's funny. |
| 01:01:49.15 | mikebledsoe | Yeah, I'd say the last four years say it's been about yeah yeah about 4 years now it's been ah I had to like I did cut a lot of people off a lot of people are mad at me. Yeah. |
| 01:01:58.91 | Max Shank | I'm just learning how to be open. Yeah, Ah yeah for me I'm like coming from the opposite end of the spectrum you have like this super social like Chimp energy and I feel like I have this cat like a tiger type of energy where I like just. Have such hard boundaries drawn that if someone doesn't like it I'm like ah tough shit Basically but that also shrinks your circle so much. So finding that balance point or creating that balance that you really like is ah it's fun. That's why I like when we chat. |
| 01:02:21.57 | mikebledsoe | Yeah. |
| 01:02:28.47 | mikebledsoe | Mm. |
| 01:02:34.28 | mikebledsoe | Yeah. |
| 01:02:36.48 | Max Shank | Because we come at it from such different angles. But interestingly enough we still seem to agree on like almost everything because we really focus on the nuance and the principles and there are very few absolutes and that's what makes it so interesting. Same with drugs. There's no, there's no absolutes. It's like you either use them. |
| 01:02:48.62 | mikebledsoe | Yeah, yeah. |
| 01:02:56.25 | Max Shank | Or you abuse them. But I guarantee you're using them. |
| 01:02:59.98 | mikebledsoe | Yep yep, any final thoughts. |
| 01:03:03.41 | Max Shank | Maybe just that everybody uses them some people abuse them. |
| 01:03:05.89 | mikebledsoe | Sound are good. Ah, ah 1 thing I want to mention is set setting and dosage. So the set being your mindset. What What's your state of mind the setting. What's your environment like. And the dosage those are your 3 variables to pay attention to with everything but in regard to drugs set setting and dosage are the 3 most important things to focus on if one of those things are off. You may have a poor experience. |
| 01:03:30.95 | Max Shank | No. |
| 01:03:42.19 | mikebledsoe | You make sure that all 3 of those things are dialed in you're in for a good time and I'll leave it with that where do they find you max. |
| 01:03:53.60 | Max Shank | http://maxshank.com or at ma shank. |
| 01:03:54.77 | mikebledsoe | Excellent and I've got a strong coach summit coming up and marching go to http://thestrongcoach.com/summit and I imagine some people be doing drugs there as we listen to music at some point during the weekend. So if you want to hop in there come on over. |
| 00:00.00 | Max Shank | Welcome back to Monday mornings with max and Mike Hope you guys had a great weekend today. We're gonna cover a topic that I think I have the most expertise in as you know I've just been flying by the seat of my pants talking out my ass for the rest of these topics because. Ah, have no authority on them whatsoever. But today we are going to talk about the vulcan plan how to live long and prosper and there's going to be no bs here. It's not going to be a low salt diet. It's not going to be limiting the amount of eggs that you eat. We're gonna get right to the. Things that really make you live a long time and also enjoy those years the most I'm once again joined by my trusty co-host Mr. Mike blood so. How's it going mike. |
| 00:53.18 | mikebledsoe | It's going great I'm excited about this topic. You know there's a lot of information out there and as you were alluding to you know we won't be saying you to telling you to stop eating the egg yolks or whatever I know that everyone's. Probably so by this point seen the on Instagram or somewhere online the picture of the New York Times one month talking about how eggs are bad for you in another month how they're great for you and it's a prime example of just you could you can find evidence to support. Any health claim that you want to make 1 way one way or the other. So ah, what's exciting about that is that's ah, that's a huge opportunity for coaches and there's a necessity for coaches in the world because a coach our job is to help. Create the context we take the context of your life and then we take information that we've learned about such a ah topic that has an infinite amount of information and then distill it down for the individual. So I hope we can do that for you here on this. Show and it it's it can be It's a it's a heavy topic but the solutions are so simple I think that's what you're going to discover by the end of the show. Yeah. |
| 02:16.63 | Max Shank | But they're not going to be sexy. Yeah I got ah I got a lot of ideas about that. This is probably what I write about the most um because everything else trickles down from your physical and mental health. Which those together combine for your health and you can certainly have success in 1 area without being healthy necessarily. But that's not really a goal I would like to help people achieve. So I think about this a lot. You already mentioned one of the big problems which is infinite information and along with that information you have a whole bunch of people who have a certain authority and they want to maintain that authority um. You know? For example, the physical therapists and doctors want to maybe ah keep the personal trainers off their turf like we don't want you guys doing any corrective exercise. That's our territory and. There are stories about like the medical doctor boards trying to block acupuncturists and chiropractors and chinese medicine and things like that. So. There's kind of an authority give and take where everyone's trying to promote their specific solution to this. Health thing. So there's infinite information and you also have these different entities who are trying to prop up their authority whether they have the best solution or not and then another big one. We have talked about before is the difference between causation and correlation. It's it's really tragic because I have actually seen a news piece that said salt excessive salt causes. 10% of all deaths in America now that is outrageous to make that claim and I looked at the studies they were citing to do that and it was just a total embarrassment. It could be. That having a higher salt diet is correlated ah because a lot of junk food has high salt but it is just so ridiculous to say that 10% of all deaths in America are caused by salt I mean it's ridiculous. So getting back to. |
| 04:52.80 | mikebledsoe | And go. |
| 04:57.85 | Max Shank | What you said before which is that it's simple solutions. That's where I have this idea called the popular paradox and things need to look really fancy for people to buy into them. You know I realized as I've been. Promoting my own products and developing some products behind the scenes that people will do something that looks cool before they do something that is good for them if it doesn't look cool. |
| 05:26.98 | mikebledsoe | I think part of that is is that people when they when they think about their own problems. They've had such a difficult time solving their problem and so you know I've had this problem my whole life. The solution can't be simple. It's got to be complex and I really think that that's something that plagues people as they go you know I go well have you do drink is the first thing you drink in the morning water and do you go for walks every day. |
| 05:52.19 | Max Shank | Um. |
| 06:04.56 | mikebledsoe | Ah, go? Well no, but you know I'm doing the you know I'm monitoring my Hrv and I'm ah you know doing all this really complicated on this crazy training program and okay, well unless we and and and people you know just refuse to do it I think well there's 2 things is. Think that because they they haven't been able solved the problem yet that it must be.. It's going to require some Genius solution. That's just they could never have imagined so they're gonna again look for the authority just to tell them what to do whoever they assign that to be um, the other thing is I think that. In our youth for a lot of us. We associate effort with reward and a lot of people never outgrow that and so they think that it has to be hard if it's going to be effective and I think that if we. |
| 06:55.59 | Max Shank | A. |
| 07:00.97 | mikebledsoe | We take the approach that most solutions are simple and we put our attention on how to be effective versus the amount of effort we put into it people would would go a lot further. |
| 07:21.94 | Max Shank | You just said 2 things there that were really awesome. The first is the desire for a complex solution because if the solution is simple. They're like oh god I'm so dumb like how did I not know that if you say. Ah, yeah, double your water intake and walk for an hour every day they're gonna they're gonna go oh that's like I shouldn't pay you for that solution. That's like too simple, but if you have them. |
| 07:53.42 | mikebledsoe | I. |
| 07:59.50 | Max Shank | Get if if it's true if you have them get blood work done and you're like oh you're ah you're allergic to cashews or something The problem is you're eating too many cashews. Ah then it feels like. |
| 08:13.25 | mikebledsoe | Yeah. |
| 08:17.85 | Max Shank | Oh how could I have known that you know what I mean it feels like okay that they didn't figure it out themselves. So they're not afraid to feel dumb. Ah so complex solution else I'm dumb and then the next thing you said was. |
| 08:22.91 | mikebledsoe | Yeah, well I think I think that's a. |
| 08:34.47 | Max Shank | That effort is proportional to the reward. But. |
| 08:40.71 | mikebledsoe | Are you are you? okay. Are we on? Ah are we on a lag. Okay, what if your internet's just crawling I think I think it might have caught up. Sorry go ahead, go ahead cause I said something and then it took you like 10 seconds to. |
| 08:45.66 | Max Shank | Was that? yeah. |
| 08:55.39 | Max Shank | Maybe. |
| 09:01.59 | Max Shank | Oh man, it's possible. Oh. |
| 09:05.26 | mikebledsoe | Respond go ahead. |
| 09:11.16 | Max Shank | Oh no, yeah I just stopped talking. But yeah, basically then the second idea is that effort is proportional to the reward that you get. |
| 09:20.33 | mikebledsoe | Um, yeah, yeah, it's ah what it works it works for a yeah, it works it works for a while. Yeah I think our our shit's catching up. Um. |
| 09:29.90 | Max Shank | Ah, it's hard to tell if we're on pace right now. |
| 09:38.74 | mikebledsoe | Everyone listening I think we're having a little bit of a internet lag issue. Um, yeah, yeah, well you know I I know you and I both spent our youth living in a world where effort did equal reward and I think that there's like a. |
| 09:42.21 | Max Shank | Technical difficulties. |
| 09:58.59 | mikebledsoe | And and I think that in fitness, especially that definitely proves to be true until a certain point and ah you only know your own body for and so if you if you've been in fitness your whole life like max and I have been It's probably until the age of like 30 that. It almost didn't matter how what the quality of our exercise was to our knowledge from our perspective and then after 38 things start showing up for sure. But ah. You know going back I I look at myself and I and I can say oh I could have trained way more intelligently way more simply had fewer injuries and gotten a lot stronger and I'd be a lot stronger and healthier now. But yeah I there's no way I could hear that message when I was younger because every time I put in effort I got a reward and I didn't know that the reward could have been better but you know it was a reward nonetheless. So I think that I witnessed this and and entrepreneurs have a fitness or military background and. Usually they they choose the hard path a lot There's like a lot of hard path choosing in with in over time the harder the path the lower the reward and so there there's ah a point in time where it's you got to switch tracks. But the the thing that you were getting at or the thing you mentioned with the like the food sensitivity and so needing someone outside of yourself to tell you what it is is is interesting because these food sensivity tests aren't going to test for everything and then they'll tell someone like. |
| 11:28.21 | Max Shank | Well. |
| 11:45.12 | mikebledsoe | Food sensitive tests would tell me that dates are fine for me. But every time I eat dates I fart for two days they're not fine for me but like if I only but people will will take a test and then they won't analyze their own shit in a toilet and be like oh I'm fine I got the test I don't need. You know to watch my my intake of you know dairy you know every time it I eat it. It bloats me but the test said I'm fine. So but that's that's 1 thing I guess ah I'd like for people to take from this is. Tuning into your own body and knowing what you may have a sensitivity to how do you respond to all these different types of stimulus and it requires a little bit of living a little like habitual and systematic because if you don't systemize anything. |
| 12:32.30 | Max Shank | A. |
| 12:40.31 | mikebledsoe | You know, doing anything Systematically, you can't really improve it. You got to it. There's a way of decreasing the amount of variables in your own life. So that you can make those systematic improvements. |
| 12:53.79 | Max Shank | Man There's a lot to unpack here. Um number one effort is not proportional to reward but effort does bring reward so one of the big risks I think is you will. |
| 13:04.77 | mikebledsoe | Right. |
| 13:13.45 | Max Shank | Put in effort and you will get a reward and you will conflate more effort with more reward but in actuality the way the body works for athletic performance which I think is the most rational way to train. You want to give yourself more athletic ability more springiness more elasticity more resilience to injury. Um, you're not going to improve your athleticism. When you go into excessive effort. In fact, you're actually going to start taking away from your athleticism with excessive effort. You know the best athletes in the world are the ones who can cycle between tension and relaxation at the quickest interval and it's not about. Maximum effort. It's about maximum skill so you're far better off hovering around that you know 50 to 80% effort level most of the time. So the whole idea that effort is proportional toward is like ah basically a form of masochism. Essentially like if I'm not ah in some sort of physical pain then my workout which is another silly name is not giving me the results that I'm after so that's ah the the myth of effort is ah a huge one. For athleticism and for training in general and then touching on the nutrition thing. Ah there's a ah couple pages in Paul check's book where he shows like a. |
| 15:05.46 | mikebledsoe | The poopy police. |
| 15:04.54 | Max Shank | The the poopy lineup I don't know if you remember that one the poop. Well yeah, the poopy police and the poopy lineup is like what the different ones look like and what likely the problem is and that there's just there's just one. |
| 15:10.79 | mikebledsoe | Yeah. |
| 15:19.93 | Max Shank | On the next page which is just this basketball player who's this like gigantic log which is the optimal ah defecation essentially so being willing to like pay attention to that very obvious metric and. Ah, just accordingly is basically the type of thing that we are trying to avoid most people want to avoid paying attention. They just want someone to tell them how many almonds should I eat at nine thirty in the morning. should I have for lunch what should I have for dinner and the reality is people are just trying to get out of the responsibility of having to think for themselves and pay attention to what the fuck is going on and your body. Can survive on like bone marrow and bugs like our bodies are so crazy. Adaptable. We are omnivores. We have these sharp canines we have these grinding molars we have stomach acid. We're able to survive on a huge variety of things I'm not saying you should eat garbage every day. But if you did you would probably still survive as long as you didn't eat actual poison so trying to be perfect with nutrition. Silly, but um, you don't see a lot of obese people make it to ninety years old and we don't need any scientific study to show us that being too heavy is harder on your body like you just won't live as long so you're almost. You are better off eating more rich food that is to let you know a bagette and butter and lasagna. Whatever else gets labeled as bad now as long as you don't eat too much of it and as far as training is concerned. Ah, try to make it as effortless as possible and do something that you enjoy that gives you an expanded range of abilities so you have more options because if you're having fun doing what you're doing. It doesn't require any of that extra willpower. Um, you know that's a little suspect to your mood and the weather and things like that. But if you're really excited about something. You don't have to really think about it. So with the nutrition and with the exercise piece I would say um. |
| 18:09.47 | Max Shank | Consistency and effortlessness with your movement so approach it like a skill for movement and then with nutrition is like ah you got to pay attention to how food makes you feel and it's it's easy to want to outsource that to someone else just tell me. How many grams of chicken breast I need to eat. It's like that's not how it works man like you gotta pay attention to your bowel movements and check the color of your piss like if you don't drink enough water and go for walks. You shouldn't expect to get a good result with what you're doing and I actually wrote an article. A while back called are you healthier than a plant and it was one of my better performing ones because I gave people like four levels of health and plant level was the first level and it was are you getting adequate water and sunshine. And if you have made that level then you go to the next level the next level is like I think it was dog like are you getting water sunshine and going for walks and then like the last level was like a ah monkey like are you do you play? Do you do things like that and there are four I can't remember off top the head. But. Should Google it. It's a good little read. Ah, it's not complicated and you shouldn't feel like you have to find a complicated solution to health. You know we we were able to live a long time and happily long before the. |
| 19:44.00 | mikebledsoe | Yeah I want to dig into here in a moment by the end of the show at least I want to dig into what it is that you're doing and what I'm doing that is that we because I you and I have both simplified over the years. |
| 19:43.49 | Max Shank | Infinite information of the internet. |
| 20:01.74 | mikebledsoe | Ah I used to take a much more complex approach to things. Um and and you did too from what I understand but you know I want to really get to the remind people of the point you're making of it. It needs to be simple. It needs to be easy. It needs to be fun. And 1 of the things that I've been able to do in my life is create a lot of structures in my life that support the the habits that I that I want to put in place I tell people a lot you know I'll be at a party and there's brownies out on the fucking island. Counter and I put away more than most people at the party but and I'm also when a few people walk around with a 6 pack but the difference is is I don't have that at home because I don't I actually have a life where I don't have to practice that much willpower. There's a few things I have to practice willpower for but Jesus there. There was a time in my life where that was true when I was in my twenty s it I powered through everything I I did start creating structures that support me. |
| 21:01.35 | Max Shank | Imagine if you did. |
| 21:20.45 | mikebledsoe | But most of it was was I think being just a bachelor in some ways like at ah at a fucking heavy bag hanging in my living room and you know girls that come over and be like oh you got mats in a heavy bag in your living room. Okay weirdo um, but. When I like like putting those structures in place have been super super helpful and then it really does come down to lifestyle and the more I look at the the health problems in the world man there is. There are some habits that somebody could change like I think about my girlfriend's mom and you know we were talking to her about when she was here for Christmas we were talking to her about you know? are you going for walks. How much water are you drinking. You know, are you supplementing with magnesium before bed. You know there's you know I had to remind my girlfriend. She's like I want to have a ah really good impact on my mom while she's here I'm like okay, let's be happy if she leaves with like 1 or 2 things that she can improve. We don't need to go nuts because you have to restructure. |
| 22:29.84 | Max Shank | A. |
| 22:35.17 | mikebledsoe | Your entire life to just change one habit you move 1 thing and then that 1 thing moves something else and it's ah it's a big deal to create a new consistent habit and so I'm a big fan of seeing how effortless you can you can. Make a habit you know something like going for a walk in the morning is you know, put your change of like this this was advice. We used to get people that wanted to train in the gym in the morning, put your gym shoes and your change of clothes at the foot of your bed before you go to bed when you wake up, you know you got your. |
| 23:08.60 | Max Shank | Right. |
| 23:12.44 | mikebledsoe | Bottle of water on the counter you you walk out of your bedroom. You're wearing your workout clothes and you pick up your bottle like the next obvious step is you go to the gym or you you know you go for your walk or your run or whatever it is but I look at the society but then we're talking to her mom. And you know we had all these ideas about what she could do to improve her health and in in conversations I find out that she's in an office with no windows under fluorescent lights nine to eleven hours a day. |
| 23:35.65 | Max Shank | A. |
| 23:50.22 | mikebledsoe | At work and so she like she says why I do go for walks I get out of my office for like 10 minutes and then go for a walk and I go wow you know what? like that walk is actually not that like it's good that she's doing it. But it's not the highest leverage thing. And her arsenal. You know, just just putting a window in her office would be would be like a huge improvement and so it it does become very situational in a way but when I look at what's wrong with the health of. |
| 24:10.20 | Max Shank | Um. M. |
| 24:28.11 | mikebledsoe | Average American and then I hear stories like that and you know I try to think about what it's like to work at the grocery store when I go to the grocery store. What's it like to be a barber when I go to the barber a lot of the way these people are living their lives is just it's a lot of screens. It's a lot of artificial light. Um, and so I think that you know if for us to have a ah turnaround in Public Health. It's gonna require a pretty big shift in society at large and I well I was gonna say I don't want to discourage anybody because. |
| 24:58.24 | Max Shank | Um, well it's like addiction. It's just ah. |
| 25:07.32 | mikebledsoe | You do you do change the lifestyle one habit at a time but it's there. There's if you change one habit a month a year later you've got 12 new habits. Do you have a totally different lifestyle. That's that's very very possible. |
| 25:09.27 | Max Shank | The. |
| 25:20.10 | Max Shank | Um, yeah, boy you said a lot of really good stuff. There. Um, it's like addiction right? because 1 of the reasons I bring people back to fasting is not because it's the. Cure all um for every illness although it does seem to have like some of the best results in the cheapest way. It's funny that people keep looking for the fastest way to lose fat and it's literally called fasting it costs zero dollars |
| 25:58.37 | mikebledsoe | I knew a guy who was charging thousands of dollars for a fasting retreat I was like ah you your main thing that you do is you don't eat. |
| 25:58.80 | Max Shank | And people just keep looking for other things. But. |
| 26:05.45 | Max Shank | Amazing. Did he also provide free room and board. |
| 26:17.89 | mikebledsoe | Yeah, it's like a three day retreat thousands of dollars but you you know you're you're getting the equivalent of like one hundred and fifty dollars room but ah yeah. |
| 26:18.83 | Max Shank | Ah, ah. |
| 26:25.59 | Max Shank | Amazing. But that's exactly it is you need to the reason I say it's like addiction is um, what could be easier than to you know, stop drinking booze or stop doing heroin. Whatever it requires no effort whatsoever but the whole idea of being addicted to screens and you're substituting or you're using all of this time and all of this energy for things that don't love you back. Essentially. And I think of it like an intervention. The person has to be ready to accept that change first and foremost and there are other things that can help new lifestyle changes stick better. You can do it with somebody. That's huge, having someone that you go on walks with is definitely better. You know I have a standing ah exercise. Um. Session that I do with my friend Anders I have a standing weekly tennis session that I do with my friend Carson so it makes it a lot easier when you have someone else that you are ah doing it alongside your your vibe attracts your tribe right? So if you hang around. |
| 27:49.32 | mikebledsoe | M. |
| 27:52.91 | Max Shank | With people who tend to do more athletic things you're going to be more athletic yourself and if you hang around with ah food critics or something you're probably going to spend a lot of time eating too much so it's how do you get someone open. |
| 28:06.27 | mikebledsoe | Yeah, yeah. |
| 28:12.78 | Max Shank | To that change and then how do you make that change. Um take the best. How do you get it to stick. |
| 28:21.90 | mikebledsoe | Yeah I like this social component I I do a weekly workout on Tuesday mornings with some friends where it's been years since I've I've done a decent amount of intense exercise. But I rarely like pick up the heaviest thing possible. Or like or or push my ah my aerobic or anaerobic capacity very hard. But once a week I go train with a group of guys where everyone has got ah a decent fitness background. So no, one's moving poorly. But we're going to go in and push ourselves. And you know half the time. It's a crossfit style workout and I I get in there and I and I go do that workout because if I work out at home I'll just be moderate all the time I'll push it less frequently. But I go there and I push it really hard and that that. Is really a check-in with myself because I'm a decade older than almost all the guys at the session. So it's it's actually nice to go do that. So having that social component to do something you knew I think is is awesome. Um I'm curious. What is what are some of your like how does your week. Do you have like ah a typical week and do you have your week structured in a way sounds like you got you know that workout with anders and you got a tennis lesson. What's happening. What do you schedule in your week that. Set you up for success and and your day as well. |
| 30:22.67 | mikebledsoe | Can you hear me. |
| 30:32.55 | Max Shank | Hello hello can you hear me we should we should pause. Let me see if I can fix the the inner all right? So basically my weekly routine is what you were saying. Um. |
| 30:33.87 | mikebledsoe | Yeah. |
| 30:52.18 | Max Shank | Have my appointments that are set 1 training session with a friend one tennis session with a friend and my goals are longevity and tennis related right now. I was laughing the other day because I was watching a little tennis and I saw this guy there this professional tennis player and I was like oh my god that guy's got an amazing body for tennis and this guy is so skinny is like 6 2 1 70 meanwhile I'm five nine and I used to walk around £200 just like a jacked little like brick shit house essentially and that was how I wanted to be I wanted to be ah buff to the point where I was intimidating that was my that was my fitness goal at the time. |
| 31:37.30 | mikebledsoe | Yeah. |
| 31:47.99 | mikebledsoe | Ah, sounds familiar. |
| 31:49.32 | Max Shank | So My my training reflected those goals heavier weights more weights. Lots of food move bigger weights faster all that stuff and now my goals are completely the opposite. That I want to be able to move around quickly. I don't want to be carrying around a ton of extra weight and it's kind of the same thing that I tell people as far as my morning routine is Concerned. It's like my morning routine would kill you my exercise routine. Would probably not be what you want because you have different goals than I do So I exercise every day I go totally based on feel I'm still you know stronger than. 99% of people in most ways I find that if you don't push to your absolute Limits. You can handle a tremendous amount of frequency when it comes to training you mentioned that you have a heavy bag. |
| 33:02.40 | mikebledsoe | E. |
| 33:01.92 | Max Shank | Or had a heavy bag in your living room I mean my house is full of various gym equipment like I have a huge like Monkey Bar Stall Bar gymnastics setup in the backyard with several. Ropes and pulleys and a sled and all kinds of stuff and then in the garage I have different isometric trainers that I've built and balance beams and platforms and all this Stuff. So I mean I. Am an experimenter when it comes to this kind of stuff. So a lot of the stuff I do is just experimenting on myself. Um, that being set. |
| 33:46.50 | mikebledsoe | But sounds like you've created an environment where we're practicing movement and improving your skills is just so easy. There's there's no friction between you and jumping on the balance beam with a club. |
| 34:02.30 | Max Shank | Totally um I do hill sprints about once a week and it's not the most fun. Um, it's about 1% as fun as playing tennis but I still do it anyway. So I guess I do occasionally. Exercise a little bit of willpower. Um, frankly I think most of the exercise plans that people do really don't take into consideration the actual goals they want. It's kind of just parroting what the last guy said when it comes to exercise. I think people want to be able to move around. Um athletically and quickly that's the most important thing because that gives you the opportunity to try more things I think it's important for be. People to be able to carry something kind of heavy. You know a sandbag bear hug Carrie throw a sandbag on 1 shoulder other shoulder do a couple squats with it I don't get down with the super heavy squatting. Don't think the risk reward is really there I don't think it's appropriate for most people I think like a body weight sandbag squat for 10 to 20 will take you pretty much as far as you need to go in that type of leg strength. Frankly I see the squat as more of a resting position than a position that should be loaded extremely heavily the deadlift and sprinting are far more appropriate for loading up the legs single leg deadlifting as well. |
| 35:50.82 | mikebledsoe | I agree with that. Ah I've cut out I've cut out squatting I mean I might do some cattlebell squats. But yeah, the load you know it's single arm catabell Squat load is low Sandbag squats. But yeah, pushing on deadlives pushing on on sprints. |
| 35:53.51 | Max Shank | Ah, pushing pulling the sled and. |
| 36:10.35 | mikebledsoe | And just different plios I'm with you on that. |
| 36:10.99 | Max Shank | It depends on what you're trying to get right? What are you trying to get out of it. Um, you know I think of the said principle primarily specific adaptation to impose Demand. That's how you're going to adapt and you're looking for a couple things. You're looking for the actual tissue to adapt so muscle bone Ligament Tendon. So That's the stuff and then you also have. The neurological efficiency which is recruiting more motor units. That's why gymnast and Olympic weightlifter can do greater feats of strength and create more force and more attention more torque even with the same amount. Muscle So they're able to do more with less because of the neurological efficiency and then you have ah motor control which is also specific to the task. So um. Balancing ah targeting like boxing another good example I know you're into marksmanship so being able to hold steady while you move your body around is a pretty good skill as well. So There's the skill aspect. |
| 37:33.66 | mikebledsoe | Um. |
| 37:39.90 | Max Shank | And there's the stimulus for the adaptation of the tissue and the neurological drive. Let's call it like how much muscle can you recruit with your thoughts which is kind of a trip so to keep things pretty simple. Try to focus on isometrics explosive movements and then the pump which is not necessarily trying to get as crazy of a pump as possible but it's more about trying to maintain tension on what I'm working. For at least a minute plus so I'm not fully locking out. Let's say or I'm not resting in between repetitions. So. There's not really a rest spot. Yeah, exactly So Those are. |
| 38:27.59 | mikebledsoe | You getting that time under tension. |
| 38:34.72 | Max Shank | Essentially the 3 big things that I try to focus on as far as the type of stimulus is concerned. Um, it also maximizes risk reward so the safety is very high on all those. |
| 38:40.24 | mikebledsoe | On that that also. Yeah, listening to you makes me think about the the concept of minimum effective dose and like anytime I Yeah yeah, well, you're talking about. You know the the sad principle and. |
| 38:51.88 | Max Shank | Oh yeah, like I'm ah fully autistic with it now. Yeah. |
| 39:05.24 | mikebledsoe | Anytime I hear that I think minimum effective dose I look back on my weightlifting career and how many times did I do 2 or 3 more sets necessary to make an improvement between day one and day two and I actually. Diminish the amount of results I would get because I was again going back to what we were saying earlier in the show effort more effort equaled more reward and what would have been a lot better is a little bit of effort for fewer for less volume would have given me a much bigger bang for my buck. Yeah, and so like now when approaching exercise is did I go a little bit harder or heavier than last time. Okay, cool if I did I don't need to go another £10 I just did better than last time chill out I think I think the wendler. |
| 39:40.54 | Max Shank | The. |
| 40:00.30 | mikebledsoe | System actually does a good job of teaching that. |
| 40:03.70 | Max Shank | Yeah I think it really depends on the goal if you are professional then it might be worthwhile to sacrifice some of your health for performance you know sumo wrestler offensive lineman in the Nfl. You're not going to live as long but you'll be a professional athlete and get all this glory. But if you are an amateur that's a huge advantage you can do it for fun and if you are playing the long game. You won't put. As much pressure on yourself with each training session. You won't say oh I have to leave the gym in a wheelchair after leg day and like look the reality is if you exercise for 10 years you're going to be very strong. |
| 40:46.37 | mikebledsoe | Yeah. |
| 41:00.67 | Max Shank | As long as you are getting the stimulus ah required for a little adaptation and on the other side of that coin a lot of the strongest hands I've ever seen are attached to plumbers. |
| 41:17.99 | mikebledsoe | A. |
| 41:20.60 | Max Shank | Because they just like use their hands all freaking day they're like twisting pipe on and off and using a wrench and they're like doing hard stuff all the time and then you know there are all these myths that we perpetuate to try to maintain our. Authority somehow they're like oh you're overtraining and I'm like this guy just did 5000 repetitions of the arm exercise that you said the person should only do 3 sets of 10 on like it makes no sense. It's all relative to the individual and you know this nuance. |
| 41:49.50 | mikebledsoe | E. |
| 41:58.49 | Max Shank | Is what people are trying to avoid right? They're like don't make me think just tell me how many squats I should do on Monday Wednesday and Friday okay, and then we have all of these studies that come out which are fucking embarrassing where it's like oh. |
| 42:04.26 | mikebledsoe | M. |
| 42:15.40 | Max Shank | We proved that squats were better than leg presses. It's like over a fiveweek period like what are you kidding me like we didn't measure lunges. We didn't measure ah sled pushing. We didn't test sprinting and how are you measuring leg strength are you on the fucking leg extension machine or some shit like that. And what are these people doing when they're not in the and like I understand the desire to do that. But the most difficult cost to understand in anything is opportunity cost. It's very difficult. It doesn't matter whether you're exercising. Or whether you are investing. It's very difficult to say what should I invest in should I invest into ah you know Microsoft or Apple in the you know early two thousand s or something like it's really hard to say like because. You know opportunity cost is about the cost of everything else. You could be doing instead of that thing and that's how I became so hardcore in this philosophy that I've developed which is like what am I sacrificing by doing. Heavy back squats. What am I gaining from doing heavy back. Squats is this applicable to the broader population is it a good risk reward and what could I be doing instead and when you ask what could I be doing instead. It is a mind-blowing experience because you're like man I could like work on my footwork I could lunge I could pull a sled I could do step ups. You know, step ups are another exercise. It's like a friend zone exercise I called it in an article back in the day it was like side planks. And step ups and single arm rows. It's like so ah, that kind of leads me to my upper body training right now is like 80% um, pushing and pulling a cable or a band from a lunge position because it's very athletic position. It gives me the maximum carryover to being able to use that skill from a standing position and wouldn't you know most of the time. |
| 44:28.65 | mikebledsoe | M. |
| 44:44.66 | Max Shank | You need your strength when you are standing so it's shocking actually like I get some buff dudes coming in sometimes ah and they might bench like a lot of weight or something like that. But I put them in a lunge position. And do band presses at like a 45 degree and they have no rotational stability. They have no integrity through the foot and ankle to connect that entire kinetic chain and I mean we're talking like you know. £50 of force for one arm and they're like stumbling all over the place. They can't hold that position. They can't generate that force through the foot through the kinetic chain and finish it in their hand so being able to. Ah. Hold that athletic stance and shift the weight from a standing position while you push and pull with the upper body and it gives you a good opportunity to explore a diverse set of angles. That's that's like really sweet but it doesn't look that cool and it's. A little harder to measure like if someone says I yeah I benched you know 2 25 or 3 15 or whatever. There's like ah a certainty to it. It's like very cool if I'm like yeah a cable pressed £70 from a lunge position for. 1 minute using a sixty beat per minute metronome people are like I don't really know what to I don't really know what to make of that is that hard is that good and I'm like yes I also did some isometrics from that position earlier and the load didn't move at all. It's like. |
| 46:36.59 | mikebledsoe | I I did so good. |
| 46:39.54 | Max Shank | It's just not. it's it's it's um it's not quantitative in a way that is very satisfying so people usually avoid that and the same is true. Um in investing also a lot of the time the stuff that's really boring. Just. Quietly outperforms the market by like 20 to 1 you you get that kind of thing sometimes so ah, kind of went off on a good one. There. But basically there are fewer and fewer exercises that I gravitate toward. |
| 46:58.84 | mikebledsoe | Yeah. |
| 47:15.20 | Max Shank | In the light of athletic carryover and overall efficiency. But I I train a little bit every day because I recognize you don't have to like smash yourself to elicit that adaptation. And since I'm playing the long game. It's It's very psychological if I just train every day There's no confusion I can do what I want to but I'm not not doing nothing unless I feel really banged up which is. |
| 47:50.68 | mikebledsoe | Yeah, um, over the years I've I've gotten more into whole body training each day training for like like you athleticism and you know when you're training the whole body and you're you're approaching it from a minimum effective dose. |
| 47:51.24 | Max Shank | Pretty rare. |
| 48:09.86 | mikebledsoe | Perspective then you're going to get wrecked way less often and because you're not just blowing out 1 group of muscles which means that you can your your movement patterns are Goingnna maintain integrity if you got a wheelchair yourself out after leg day like you were saying. You're you're probably damaging your motor patterns for athletic ability because how many days are you gonna walk weird when you could have been walking walking normal but to get yoke bro. |
| 48:41.94 | Max Shank | Well and why are you doing that in the first place. It's a it's no, it's a but that's a trap like we think that. Ah, if we get all these muscles then the ladies are going to be like oh my god your muscles are so big. Ah you know, whatever, but that's not how it works at all. |
| 49:01.30 | mikebledsoe | Yeah, yeah. |
| 49:01.93 | Max Shank | Like nobody cared. It's only a small section of the other like we're talking to mostly dudes I would imagine to this but we've probably scared away but was it se twenty second episode we probably scared away like most of the ladies I think. |
| 49:10.75 | mikebledsoe | Um, I I so well I got ah I got a Dm the other day from a woman who listened to our our show on relationships and the one that I think we probably several times during the show said well now that all the women have left. |
| 49:22.73 | Max Shank | Ah. |
| 49:29.53 | mikebledsoe | She loved it and sent it. She's like I'm going to send this to every guy I go on a date with like I ah. |
| 49:35.84 | Max Shank | Whoa That's amazing. There must be something wrong with her. No I'm kidding if you're if you're listening. You're probably really great. Yeah, that's awesome. |
| 49:49.50 | mikebledsoe | She's listening for sure. We appreciate you. |
| 49:53.39 | Max Shank | Ah, no like if we're talking to dudes mostly like girls don't care about that like that is the trying to build big muscles to attract ladies is one of the worst cost benefit. You could do. It's gonna take so much effort to build muscle. And it's gonna have almost no impact on your love life. It's gonna have you should exercise because exercising makes you feel better about yourself. It makes you more physically capable but exercising specifically for larger muscles is. Ah, trap. You're not going to be as athletic and quite frankly, a lot of the way your muscles look is going to come down to your genetics anyway, I've seen some crazy examples where you get a gymnast I think he was the number 1 pommel horse guy. Can you think of like a more insane upper body exercise than the pommel horse like the pommel horse and the rings those guys are like freaks this guy can't remember his name I have it somewhere. Ah dude he couldn't sell protein powder on Instagram. |
| 50:56.94 | mikebledsoe | So crazy. |
| 51:09.23 | mikebledsoe | He. |
| 51:11.52 | Max Shank | His arms were so scrawny he looked like the before picture for a protein powder ad for like some high school kid but he was so crazy strong and I'm just thinking like man all these programs out there that are like trained like a gymnast and it's like. Now, you're doing pushups and pullups on the rings and that's going to that's good to suddenly turn you into like this jacked gymnast body and you know I understand it's the ah progressive promises of advertising. Right? not not 8 minute abs 7 minute abs not 7 minute abs 6 minute abs 4 minute abs and then it's like you're going to build £10 of muscle in a month and I'm like if you're hitting puberty and doing steroids at the same time that might be possible. But. You know it's just these ridiculous expectations and that's another trap too is don't expect like an 8 to twelve week solution for you know, athletics and muscle building like even the idea of that. Is. It's just crazy to me like if you want to have long-term success. You have to like go into it thinking I'm going to make a lifestyle change and I'm going to train until I'm dead. That's that's the smart play there not like I'm gonna try to you know. |
| 52:42.28 | mikebledsoe | Um, yeah, why that but the the further we look out and the further we set our goals the better. Our decisions will be from day to day you know people are setting a twelve week |
| 52:47.35 | Max Shank | Whatever in eight weeks I mean I could just go on a good one here but go on. |
| 53:01.77 | mikebledsoe | Goal which is you know? ah in twelve weeks I want a pr or I want to achieve this thing if you're always in a if you're always in a twelve week block and that does work when you're younger for sure. But if you're always thinking in twelve week blocks and you're not thinking about. |
| 53:08.37 | Max Shank | Can be good. |
| 53:19.14 | mikebledsoe | What about 3 twelve week blocks from now you're going to and you know you pick up well back in the day when I was a kid you know picking up a magazine. It's like you know a 6 weekek program or twelve week program to bigger pecs or whatever it is and if you're always training like that then you're. |
| 53:27.64 | Max Shank | 7 |
| 53:37.48 | mikebledsoe | You're not going to age well. But if you go what is my 10 year goal like I have I have an end of life goal I'm working 100 years into the future and I say I'm training for 100 years from now. And my my goal is to be able to wipe my ass until a day I die being able to get enough thoracic rotation and be able to stand there and wipe my ass. That's a lot of old people can't do it. They cannot wipe their own ass and so. I um, yeah, yeah, well you know I'm 40 now sorry my my goals have become more practical but ah these the setting a goal that's ten years out you know I look I go what am I gonna how do I want to be when I'm 50. |
| 54:13.53 | Max Shank | It's a very practical goal. |
| 54:31.80 | mikebledsoe | And it it's and I train how I want to be when I'm 50 I train like that today. Yeah I'm moving towards that which really takes the stress from off of trying to be in a hurry to achieve anything. Yeah, if you're if you. If you're trying to make improvements in twelve weeks you're go to be in a hurry. You're probably not going to abide by the minimum effective dose rule. You are going to give yourself a maximal dose you may value intensity over frequency. I find that having a longer term goal when I when I turned in my short term goals for longer term goals. Um I started seeing the value in frequency over intensity I saw it's like oh I would rather squat every day a little bit. Then to squat a lot a bit one day and then be too sort of squat for a week so um I really like that's another thing that really comes with longer term planning is like you were saying you work out every day you yeah you have a movement practice every day I have the same thing I move. Every day. Um I'd say about once a month I take a day where I just I get up and I don't move I just completely just let it all go which is fine. Um, which I think is pretty healthy. But yeah I value frequency over intensity and I think that. |
| 56:02.52 | Max Shank | Become the couch. |
| 56:05.89 | mikebledsoe | Yeah, and then that does I think that is impacted by having a longer term goal I'm like look I got 10 years this is more about and it's also a little bit easier for us because we're maintaining a pretty solid base so there's like um if I am as good as I am. |
| 56:21.64 | Max Shank | Yeah, yeah. |
| 56:25.32 | mikebledsoe | Now in 10 years I'm fucking excited about it. So there's also something to be set for that. No. |
| 56:30.90 | Max Shank | Right? Yeah, lots of good stuff there too I think pretty much hurrying or being greedy is what hurts people the most that might be the only thing that hurts people. |
| 56:44.60 | mikebledsoe | E. |
| 56:49.50 | Max Shank | They're greedy for more range of motion. They're greedy because they're not willing to wait for the results that will come if they're patient. That's true with so many things very novel concept. Um. |
| 56:55.50 | mikebledsoe | Um. |
| 57:05.50 | Max Shank | However, I would say that just the same way. You could take a year long goal or a 5 year goal and break it down into steps I think it can be beneficial to have a twelve week goal sometimes if you're approaching it with that patience in mind. |
| 57:20.53 | mikebledsoe | Yeah I mean I'm I'm a big fan of breaking down 10 years into 3 year to 1 year to twelve weeks same in in business. Um I just when I was younger I didn't have 10 year goals yeah I didn't have 10 year goals when I was 22 I I wanted to make it to. |
| 57:24.81 | Max Shank | Yeah, yeah, exactly I figured you meant that too. Yeah. |
| 57:39.87 | mikebledsoe | To get to national championships this year and which meant that I needed to qualify you know this year for for that and which means I need to boom boom boom and definitely wasn't planning like i. |
| 57:53.77 | Max Shank | Right. |
| 57:56.25 | mikebledsoe | In my head I'm like yeah I'll still be doing this in 5 years but I had 0 fucking plan on how to be how I was gonna be doing that 5 years ah yeah |
| 58:04.46 | Max Shank | Yeah, it's tribalism usually that leads us toward these very artificial goals like the whole idea that your self worth is somehow going to be influenced by the amount of pounds you can lift. Is one of those absurd things that would be so difficult to explain to an alien. It's like wait. What? like Yeah yeah, if I I if I lift ah a weight in this certain way then the members of my tribe will love me quite a lot more and I will be revered for this. And here's the funny part that 100 % happened with me 100% um, and I felt good and people were like wow max you're so good. Not verbatim. They didn't say that but essentially that was the message. Wow you're so good and I was like wow you know. |
| 58:44.82 | mikebledsoe | Yeah, yeah. |
| 59:01.23 | Max Shank | Feel really good now and I was like how about if I lift a few more pounds Next time they're like then you would be even more good and so it's just this self-fulfilling Prophecy even better. Ah yeah, ah well, it's like sometimes. |
| 59:08.23 | mikebledsoe | You be even better Will love you more. |
| 59:21.14 | Max Shank | When I'm doing Hill sprints I go I'm not even chasing anything or anybody like what am I doing out here shouldn't I be chasing something ah when I'm when I'm doing Sandbag carries. |
| 59:28.66 | mikebledsoe | Um, I used to I used to a warm up where I would chase my dog around the gym. |
| 59:36.97 | Max Shank | I'm doing Sandbag carries I'm like shouldn't I be building a wall. It just feels like very silly sometimes so that's if I'm going to be training if I'm going to be exercising. It should be extremely efficient. |
| 59:39.62 | mikebledsoe | Maybe maybe you should be. |
| 59:56.43 | Max Shank | You know I should be maximizing the amount of force that I can create and minimizing the risk of injuring myself otherwise I should like go play something that requires no willpower. That's fun I mean playing games. Like tennis or wrestling or something like that is like way more fun than lifting weights. But I just know that there is still a value in that minimum effective dose of training. |
| 01:00:25.68 | mikebledsoe | Um, yeah, it's actually kind of nice because training doesn't have to be as hard as it used to be getting getting in the gym is a lot easier when when you're thinking through that minimum effective dose mentality. |
| 01:00:33.97 | Max Shank | So what is it. |
| 01:00:40.16 | Max Shank | Oh my God Well I mean it depends What tribe you're part of dude. Yeah I mean depends which tribe you're part of if your tribe reveres a soul crushing effort. |
| 01:00:45.31 | mikebledsoe | Yeah, it's true. Yeah I'm part of a tribe where I don't really ah I'm I'm one of the most fit people. Yeah. |
| 01:01:00.97 | Max Shank | Well and our society already doesn't really revere people who are physically strong as much as people who are mentally capable who can deliver value right. |
| 01:01:12.91 | mikebledsoe | Yeah, why I I Um I've been in conversations with some people and I could tell that they really value I think we're our lag is fucked up again. |
| 01:01:20.16 | Max Shank | So. |
| 01:01:42.10 | Max Shank | All right? ah closing thoughts here's what I got if you want to live long and prosper. It's important to have friends. It's important to have. Ah, reason to get up out of bed. We didn't talk about that very much but it's very important exercising is important. But if all you did was walk and do taichi that would probably still allow you to live a very long time. It just wouldn't give you tons of options. For high level athletics like tennis surfing etc. As far as nutrition is concerned. Ah there aren't too many fields that have been more abused with misinformation outright lies and those damn statistics. And nutrition so I would focus on eating food that you like examining your bowel movements and just don't eat too much drink enough water get some sunshine not complicated stuff the more you. Engage with a tribe who also exhibits these healthy habits the easier it's going to be so don't make it complicated but try to make it as attractive and automatic as possible. Ah don't rely on your memory. To think of going for a walk if you are sitting in a desk for a long period of time set a timer like we have this divergence of people who have learned how to use the pocket supercomputers and people who are being used by. Pocket supercomputers so set an alarm 5 minutes is more than enough ah to break whatever pattern you're in to move lymph around There are all kinds of problems that are caused by the lack of lymphatic flow. Cause it doesn't have a pump I mean I could go on and on but I'm gonna go ahead and leave it there today. This is of course all the stuff we're talking about is the philosophy that I have had in mind as I've developed my training programs. So if you want. A more complete understanding of the athletics side of things then you can check any of them out at http://mashank.com. |
| 01:04:12.23 | mikebledsoe | Right on? Ah yeah, my my closing thoughts on this is have ah have a 10 year plan for your fitness goals and for your health goals and really avoid being in a hurry. So take your time go slowly I'd say 80% of my training is done moderately at a at a slow pace and then 20%. It's probably more like ninety ten but that ten or twenty percent is done. You know high intensity with some speed or something like that. |
| 01:04:31.53 | Max Shank | A. |
| 01:04:50.17 | mikebledsoe | And I found that to to treat me a lot better over time and one of the things I didn't mention that that I think is super important is one of the things that I do is I book myself first on Monday morning. So every day i. Log into my computer to look at what he and do for work but on Monday morning. The first thing I do is I book out what I'm doing for my training and what I'm doing for recovery and what I'm doing for my fun so I know and I block it on my calendar. No one can schedule anything during those times and so that ah. You know we do tend to live by the supercomputer in our pocket and I I will program in there like I don't take meetings before ten I don't take meetings after 5 and I have all my social activities scheduled in there and I have. You know I go do my sauna and cold plunge in the evenings and I've got that scheduled in I know what day I'm gonna go to the float tank I know when I'm doing what and if for some reason I mean I I can't remember the last time I sacrificed something that I had put on the schedule. So um I I become. Very protective of it over over the years and so I think that that's if I could advise people to do anything that I think is gonna have the biggest impact is put something in the schedule on your calendar that you're gonna do for yourself. Ah. Check in with that every single week and you're gonna make a lot of progress in that area. So thanks for joining us today really enjoyed having this conversation. We're gonna dig more into this in future shows and yeah. Your coach I've got a a live event coming up the strong coach summit and go to http://thestrongcoach.com/summit and check that out. We'll be doing some movement nutrition stuff there as well. I'm trying to get max out there I haven't gotten a definite answer from him yet. Yeah. But thanks for joining us today. Thanks for joining me max. Love you brother and we'll see y'all next time see you' all next monday. |
| 01:07:05.52 | Max Shank | Thank you buddy! Love you. |
| 00:00.00 | mikebledsoe | All right welcome to Monday morning with Mike and max Today we're gonna be talking about education and you know what this is a bit of a taboo subject because when I get in the conversations with the average. Person and I make certain comments about the education system a lot of people get very protective of it and they they get a little little scared around it and they want to reject things and and 1 of the things that I have to remember in those conversations is that. I am standing from a perspective that's very different than the perspective that they're holding and when that's the case we really need to stare step people into the conversation versus just saying well that's stupid so max and I are going to take a ah. |
| 00:47.90 | Max Shank | KA. |
| 00:54.75 | mikebledsoe | Stab at the conversation of Education. Hopefully we can help ah expand people's ideas about this and maybe change perspectives and maybe you're listening and you share the same perspective and we're able to help you put it into words more clearly so that you can share with others. As well and this was this conversation was inspired by the show we did last week where max was talking about how he would do things different with Education. So We decided to go deeper with it. Good to have you max. |
| 01:32.76 | Max Shank | It's great to be here Mike I think what I'd like to start off by saying is that there is a monumental difference between school and education education is the process of learning. Which is essentially like cheating. That's how humans have been able to become so dominant because we've been able to ah compound our acquired knowledge intergenerationally over long term I think schooling. Especially public schooling and even university has been a colossal failure in almost every way does more harm than good and I think the reason that people get so triggered and defensive when you make a comment like that is because they don't want to feel. Silly for having wasted their time having gone through that system themselves and especially if they have kids that they have put through that system. They don't want to feel like they have abused their children which they probably have so those are the 2 main reasons that people get charged up. When you make a comment like school is probably 5% efficient use of time. There are a few things that are useful about school but most of it is done in such a destructive manner for both the body and mind of a child. So those are the reasons that people get triggered schooling itself is a colossal failure education is the most powerful tool you have to increase your leverage which is going to allow you to have a greater impact in life with lower effort or less work There's a great. Mark Twain quote that says I never let schooling interfere with my education and I think that describes perfectly what we're talking about so there's a big big distinction big difference between school and education. So. Ultimately, it is your responsibility to educate yourself. It is your responsibility to educate your kids and then it is their responsibility to educate themselves beyond that and I think tying into our concept of freedom and personal responsibility. That's. 1 of the biggest errors is when you outsource your education you are priming yourself for propaganda and brainwashing and just essentially you end up in obedience school is what it becomes rather than an actual education that allows you to be more. |
| 04:19.91 | Max Shank | Self-reliant and contribute in a constructive way. |
| 04:24.29 | mikebledsoe | Yeah, when I think about I mean there's a few other distinctions to make here. So the distinction between education schooling you've made well another one that um stands out to me is Dr Andy Galpin he he always says that. Know the difference between education and training and the what he witnesses is the average student walking through the door at cal state is expecting training from a college university whose job is to educate. |
| 05:00.43 | Max Shank | A. |
| 05:01.88 | mikebledsoe | And and the point of education especially like a liberal Arts education is to is this is this is the way it was set up is that the wealthy would send their kids here so they could broaden their horizons. They could broaden their their scope of knowledge into many different areas. And then after they attended University They then entered the workplace and they were able able to enter the workplace being more cultured having more total information but not necessarily going to school unless you're going to become a doctor or lawyer or or something like that. Ah. |
| 05:37.18 | Max Shank | No. |
| 05:39.13 | mikebledsoe | A lot of so a lot of people have basically ah in in regard to college. They've confused education with training and it's not training and so some of these expectations around. Oh I'm going to go to college and then I'm going to get a job that's paying me close to 6 figures. |
| 05:46.42 | Max Shank | H. |
| 05:58.46 | mikebledsoe | You have 0 training All you have is education and so it's ah the the learning is going to happen when you start training or when you start actually doing so I like to have that as a distinction. As well. The just because so many people think they should should have that job and yeah, you're gonna have to get your training after college and which also brings me to ah a. A phrase. That's really stuck with me for a long time which is learning is behavior change and there is ah there are so many the education system the way that people have been educated have been really rewarded for memorizing and regurgitating. And they've mislabeled that as learning. So What I notice is a lot of people. They'll you'll start talking to them. They go I know I know I know we know this because max and I are both Educators. We tell somebody and they go I know I was like why aren't you doing it if you know it. And it's because they read it and they know it and so they almost get they the problem with education system is it rewards you with good grades a pat on the back like you did something good by memorizing it and then you go Oh I should get a reward for memorization. |
| 07:27.81 | Max Shank | Right. |
| 07:29.45 | mikebledsoe | And so people are very confused about why they're not getting a reward in the real world for just knowing shit and you be if you really live your life which I've really taken this on for myself that learning is behavior change if your behavior didn't Change. You don't get to say that you learned it. |
| 07:47.70 | Max Shank | Um, yeah I Really like that a lot I think the collapse distinction between training ah and education was that what you said between education and training. |
| 08:01.19 | mikebledsoe | Education and training. Yeah. |
| 08:05.32 | Max Shank | That's huge. That's huge um because you can go to welding school and you will learn a craft and you are now trained as a welder but the concept of broadening your horizons or as Charlie Munger calls it. The mental lattice work which I really like so you can borrow. Different ideas from a variety of topics and subjects and sources is really beneficial to your overall knowledge. But I also like the concept there of if the behavior doesn't change. You didn't really learn and it. Kind of makes me think of bf skinner classical conditioning right? If you if the behavior changes then learning has taken place. But if the behavior doesn't change then it has not ah that's. |
| 08:55.64 | mikebledsoe | Right? And and going to your point in the beginning is the school has become Ah, it's ah it's obedient school because what's the primary thing that people are learning. And they're learning to follow directions. They're learning to be at a specific. Yeah, be here at this Time. Don't do all these things do all these other things. Ah yeah, there are like you. So. Also said there's 5% of it is useful information. |
| 09:14.86 | Max Shank | Repeat What I say when I say it to you. |
| 09:33.78 | mikebledsoe | And I think that people tend to focus on the 5% because they want to protect I mean their identity right? because if you come out and say hey you you got screwed over by this education system which you believe so strongly in. |
| 09:41.13 | Max Shank | Exactly. |
| 09:52.00 | mikebledsoe | Because it's the only thing you know? Ah yeah, it could be. It's It's a blow to the identity Ego does not like to have that conversation and I'm curious max. What was what was your education. What was ah what was your education experience like. |
| 10:02.62 | Max Shank | Yeah, and. |
| 10:11.12 | mikebledsoe | Growing up. |
| 10:11.25 | Max Shank | Oh hellacious of of or pertaining to hell. Ah it. It was awful. Um, you know when you're a child the last thing in the world you want to do is sit in a desk and listen to someone who you don't like. Try to teach you something you don't care about for long long periods of time so it was horrible I almost got held back for bad bad handwriting ah made me think I was stupid and I mean once again I don't remember. 95% of the stuff I learned because that's not how that's not how memory works you know, even if you read a book and enjoy the book. You're not going to remember most of it unless you start using it and applying it in your everyday life and it is a tough pill to swallow. To recognize that you may be wasted 12 years of your life having your creativity and critical thinking skills essentially beaten out of you on some level but conversely. If. You don't accept that then you won't change your behavior so you have to sort of accept that before you can move on in a new and more constructive way. That's like that sunk cost fallacy. Oh well I did this for so long. Let me just do it a little bit more. So. Elementary school. Ah really traumatizing high school all the way up I did go to college before dropping out and it was it was really smart I didn't even have much left. To finish my spanish and economics degree. But I'm really glad I dropped out because it just proved ah how true that sunk cost fallacy is and it was almost better in terms of my actual learning and belief in that reality like. Am I going to spend another semester and a half to finish this degree when I have no intention of using it and I realized no so I went full hog into the career that I did enjoy that I was enthusiastic about and the gym that I had opened up. |
| 12:28.50 | mikebledsoe | Beautiful. Oh we boat dropped out of college to run a gym and. |
| 12:30.89 | Max Shank | Yeah, yeah, yeah, well and I I you know I I bought my house Thanks to book sales but I also failed English in high school. |
| 12:46.90 | mikebledsoe | You know? yeah I think that um. |
| 12:48.60 | Max Shank | So clearly I don't know how to write. |
| 12:52.71 | Max Shank | And the incentives the incentives are backwards right? So we've established that it's obedient school but there's no incentive for the teacher to do anything other than get you to behave yourself while in class and repeat back through rote Memory. Wrote memorization what she taught you. There's no advantage.. There's no incentive there for her to teach you. How to think critically because of the way that we measure is kind of like ah yeah, whatever, whatever way that you measure is. Going to affect the tactics that you employ. So if you're measuring Memorization. You're not really going to be incentivized to build critical thinking skills or expansive questioning. Um same as the incentive for college. You know there's no incentive for them to ensure that you get a good paying job and actually the only incentive there is to continue to increase the price of college because student loans for college are one of the only things you can. Get a person that young with that bad of credit to engage into a contract in I mean they're essentially like raping kids of their future by getting them to take out huge student loans that they can never default on due to bankruptcy So The incentive structures are. Um, completely backwards through the entire schooling process. |
| 14:31.67 | mikebledsoe | Yeah, by the way if if it sounds like we're just doing a lot of bashing we we do have solutions for each one of these things that we're gonna discuss we want to. We want to get all the problems out there first and one of the things that struck me is you know. The the rope memorization regurgitation is a really strong focus on what to think and as you were saying you know critical thinking skills. That's more about how to think and how to work your way through problems and we have an entire society that. Is easy to control because they're just told what to think if you if you log into Google Apple Facebook watch television listen to radio. They're repeating to you what to think about, but they're. Not telling you how to think about it. It's usually ah telling you what to think and then why you should worry about it and why you should be afraid of it and so this is it's a very fear drivenve experience in our culture right now and recognize this with. |
| 15:34.92 | Max Shank | 11 |
| 15:47.32 | mikebledsoe | My girlfriend especially she. She's got a master's in psychology and she's a certified you know, Psychotherapist and she did all the education racked up the student loan debt and she's very good at what she does like there. There's there's a lot of benefit out of it. But she's also since since her and I met and she's been swimming around the world of coaches who may not necessarily have finished their degrees which I know some coaches that were psychology majors but then just decide not to you know, go all the way or whatever it is and so. |
| 16:14.74 | Max Shank | And. |
| 16:25.44 | mikebledsoe | Um, now we get into this realm where people don't have you know certifications that fall under a board of ethics run by a bunch of academics and there was so much she I've heard this from her and many other people who have ah. Ah, ah, not certifications. But they have these credentials that could be taken away by a board. You know like a medical board or this or that and so what she shared with me is being in college. There was so much emphasis on. |
| 16:52.30 | Max Shank | Right? well. |
| 17:02.73 | mikebledsoe | You could lose your license for this. It's license not certification. You could lose your license for this lose your license for that like all the she said there was just so much fear and there was like if you don't follow these very specific rules then you're gonna lose your license and then you won't be able to work ever again and then she starts meeting everybody who. |
| 17:04.23 | Max Shank | Small cut. |
| 17:20.96 | mikebledsoe | Nobody has a license and they make good money and they get great results for their clients and she experienced ah ah quite a bit of frustration around that and ah, you know and there's so many things that she has because she went through. Like it was the perfect way for her to go she needed to go through that for many reasons part of it is you know, no one in her family had gone to college and her finishing at College made a big impact on the family you know and and there's there's all these. There's all these. |
| 17:42.67 | Max Shank | No. |
| 18:00.30 | mikebledsoe | Cultural narratives that really drive that but what I'd like for her to get to and I think she's getting there which is being really appreciative for the education she received but also recognizing it that its limitations and and going beyond. Ah. |
| 18:09.42 | Max Shank | And. |
| 18:17.97 | mikebledsoe | Where those limitations were at which which I've witnessed her due and I I hope that most people can do that? Um, yeah. |
| 18:24.12 | Max Shank | That's a tricky thing is changing resentment into gratitude when you know, full well with the benefit of hindsight that there was a much better way. But if you're not feeling that way your whole life. You're probably not paying attention. Like if you can never think back and go like there was a better way I could have done that than I want whatever you're having this can you imagine. |
| 18:46.70 | mikebledsoe | Yeah. Yeah, yeah, and one of the things that I also see missing in school that that really occurred to me after I got out of college was I remember taking a counting class in my first semester back to school after I was in the Navy and. I got a quarter away of the way through and the and the drop date was approaching and and I dropped the accounting clause because I was gonna get like a d in it or something and I had never gotten such a poor grade on anything and then um I go and i. |
| 19:16.44 | Max Shank | Ah. |
| 19:25.56 | mikebledsoe | Go on to physics you know a couple semesters later and do just fine which if you talk to most people accounting is way easier than physics for for most people. What I recognize when I look back? Ah what I really enjoyed about physics was the there was so much Context. This is why we're doing this. This is the practical application of this This is why we're learning this and when I sat down in the accounting class I was like all right. These are credits and these were debits. There was no and this this this teacher was so this accounting teacher was so. |
| 19:55.71 | Max Shank | Context. |
| 20:02.48 | mikebledsoe | Ah, popular for having it being a difficult class or you he was like pride prided himself on weeding people out of business school and I look back I was like it's just a bad teacher like come on you So proud of you Idiot like. |
| 20:11.72 | Max Shank | What an asshole. |
| 20:20.93 | mikebledsoe | A good teacher would be educating their students really well and giving them the tools to succeed but this is I think this is one of the dangers of you know I met a lot of ah I'm not saying that they're all like this but I met a lot of people who were. In the education department so they went to school specifically to become a teacher so we have to remember that the education system. It's not one of those things where we could just introduce new curriculum into the system and it would solve it because part of the problem is the teachers grew up in a. Memorize and regurgitate environment. They don't have the critical thinking skills in order to pass them down and I think that's at the core is really the problem. Um, you know there's a lot of problems but like. You can't expect the teacher that doesn't have critical thinking to be able to teach critical thinking. |
| 21:20.83 | Max Shank | Right? And unfortunately because the system is so entrenched and there's 10 year and there's um teachers who do really well actually become ostracized by the rest of the teachers. And I think the core problem with schooling the absolute core problem is the lack of incentive because if we talk about what the purpose of education is which is what the purpose of schooling should be It should be that you are. Self-reliant able to contribute understand value and values and because there's no connection. There. There's no incentive for the teacher to be able to do that. There's no incentive for the college to. Do a good job. Once they've gotten your tuition money. That's the biggest problem is there's ah, no incentive or sometimes there's actually a backwards incentive so you need to allow competition to happen with education. And there was actually a really good um thing that John Stossel did about education with regard to letting the free market help elevate the best teachers to the chop and I guess there's this. I want to say he's like a south korean guy. Um, who is a multi multi-millionaire I think like tens of millions of dollars because his lectures are so well attended both in person and online and actual learning is happening and. So that's part of it. But also if there was some correlation to how well the students do afterward. Um, just like if you offer coaching I'm sure you've offered coaching with a guarantee before hey I guarantee and yeah I mean that like like ah right. |
| 23:20.33 | mikebledsoe | Oh yeah, yeah, it's a conditional guarantee so you have to show us the work you did that we prescribed. Otherwise you're not getting your money back. |
| 23:28.54 | Max Shank | Yeah, right? But imagine though like that is that's an insanely good deal like if you pay me five k for coaching I guarantee that if you do what we say that you will get 10 k back like whoa. Are you kidding me. You have all the incentive to do a great job. They're bought in so they have all the incentive to do a great job I mean talk about a win-win and so that's my core point is the incentives are backwards and people respond to incentives more than anything else and that's why I like the. The ancient ah Roman ah bridge builder having to stand underneath the bridge when the first guys drive over it and they're like ah carriages I think that's that's essentially. |
| 24:16.42 | mikebledsoe | Seeing him. |
| 24:22.94 | Max Shank | How everything should be done. Is there needs to be an incentive for the people who are doing the work and the reward needs to also go to those who are incentivized to do so that's the core problem across the board. |
| 24:34.20 | mikebledsoe | Yeah, on your point 1 more out which is cost and the cost is soared and the quality has diminished over time I think it's at least in the the college university experience. The the government came in and basically subsidized through grants and they ah they stood behind loans. They guaranteed loans so that these banks would start lending money to people that have poor credit scores or have no credit. |
| 25:10.34 | Max Shank | Their children their children. |
| 25:10.60 | mikebledsoe | Or just too young to even know what they're getting themselves into yeah and so the education loans are predatory in nature for one they predatory loans I everyone I know that's got over $ $100000 in debt when I talk to them about. Experience of going into the financial aid office. It's always the same They're just always trying to max them out and the people in the financial aid office. They don't know any fucking better either. They're just doing what they're told they're not thinking they didn't they weren't taught to critically think they don't understand what's going on. They think they're doing a good thing. |
| 25:41.83 | Max Shank | It was just following orders. |
| 25:46.66 | mikebledsoe | Um, and and the the ah the cost as skyrocketed because these are guaranteed by the government. You can't be Bankrupt. You can't bankrupt your way out of these. So It has incentivized the schools to raise their rates because more people can get loans so simultaneously. Yeah, so the schools have raised their rates without actually making improvements to the education at all I Imagine it's just made the administrative. |
| 26:12.73 | Max Shank | Guaranteed. |
| 26:22.73 | mikebledsoe | Portion of the school much fluffier. Um, there's tenured professors that are in ah in a fluffy environment and in some way due to these things. So The football teams are probably getting you know, really great stadiums built who the fuck knows but um. Yeah, the the cost is to me is really disgusting in how much people are spending on education with what they get out of it and that is just long term debt. So it's. Pretty sickening. |
| 27:00.87 | Max Shank | Predatory is the correct word I think use the word predatory I think that's exactly what it is I think the guy Mike Roe who hosted dirty jobs and now has a foundation called micro works. Really has done a good job in illuminating the destructive cultural expectation that says oh going to university means you're good and if you're a welder and electrician that makes you bad and I'm falling back to the same examples. But. You know plumber there's nothing wrong with being a tradesman shoot I knew a guy who became a truck driver when he was 18 by the time he was 27 he owned like 3 or 5 semi trucks and he was basically retired you know so this whole idea that you need to be part of the intelligentsia is. Such a fallacy and it's very destructive because of course children they just want to be loved they want they want to get positive attention. So um, kids will do whatever gets them positive attention I mean the more interviews you listen to the the great people. In their fields. It's usually that they got positive attention for whatever it is they were doing. |
| 28:19.63 | mikebledsoe | Yeah, and another part of um, you know the the grants and the guaranting of the loans has basically made it possible for people who would not normally go to college to go to college and. With that has been the lowering of standards for accepting people to schools and so college education hasn't become special and it used to be special and now because everybody's going and the standards are lower. It's just kind of. It lowers the overall experience of what colleges it no longer stands out like the batch but the Bachelorsard's degree is what the high school diploma used to be.. It's It's not. It's not anything that's gonna make you stand apart and so we end up with just people that are in school into their mid 20 s or. Early 30 s just putting off actually getting their life started. |
| 29:19.15 | Max Shank | And with the exception of a few careers. It's totally worthless. It's for most careers, you'd be better off working and earning money when you're like 1412 1416 you know you can you can become an apprentice. For something when you're in your teens and by the time you're 18 have lots of money saved up and have a valuable skill and if you have a good mentor a valuable skill that you know how to sell and there's no better security than that. Ah, valuable skill that you know how to sell. |
| 29:59.30 | mikebledsoe | Yeah,, let's let's get into that So What are the now. What I want to do is I Want to talk about the important things that are that we should be learning So What should exist and. Education and then after we talk about the different things that are important. We can roll into how we would design an education system that included these things and excluded all the bullshit. So. What do you got Max. What are the important things for us to learn. |
| 30:30.96 | Max Shank | First off I just want to reiterate why? what? What were you trying to learn. Why is it important we have self reliance and contribution. We have value and values and we have physical and mental health. I think that pretty much covers what you would hope to learn right? Is there anything else. You can think of I think that's basically it. |
| 30:56.42 | mikebledsoe | Um I like that as ah as a context I started thinking about the things that like specifically when I think about what's commonly thought of being created in school is reading writing arithmetic. Ah. |
| 31:10.90 | Max Shank | O. |
| 31:14.38 | mikebledsoe | If you can if you can read and write you can you're going to be able to and if you can comprehend what you read at a high level you become more literate so that the more you can comprehend the better. You can comprehend the more literate you become which allows you to grasp information at much faster speed. But also be able to produce it and share it. So um, the reading and writing are super important there if you can I Really think I mean this this trumps math if you can read, you can learn anything. You can go anywhere if you can read really? well. Um, that's. |
| 31:46.49 | Max Shank | Agreed agreed. |
| 31:52.67 | mikebledsoe | To me is the primary thing I'm a little biased I'm sure because like I I have ah a super high reading comprehension but I look at my life and I see how beneficial that has been It's probably because I was homeschooled. And basically around seventh or eighth grade I was learning everything on my own so it was was kind of like forced into reading comprehension. Um. |
| 32:15.72 | Max Shank | Whole words usually make or break your life your ability to communicate with other people and cooperate with other people is totally dependent on your ability to express and interpret both. Ah. |
| 32:20.81 | mikebledsoe | You know. |
| 32:35.49 | Max Shank | Actual language and body language. So it it is the ultimate skill and we are the ultimate social emotional creature. So there's no question that word is important I have it split up into word number and movement basically and. |
| 32:49.63 | mikebledsoe | E. |
| 32:54.10 | Max Shank | That will give you the mental and physical health that will also allow you to understand the concept of value and if you understand the concept of value. You know that value is relative to the individual like you know, bottled water at Coachella. Is very valuable but bottled water on you know, an iceberg is is next to a ah pure stream is not that valuable at all. In fact, it might even be detrimental. You'd pay nothing for it. So that's really the the crux of it. So. With number I have it split up into economics engineering and music is how I would teach numbers econ so you can learn about risk reward cost and benefit. There's some accounting in there of course and then engineering. Would be where like physics and geometry and structures would come into play. So I think that covers most of the practical uses for numbers and I'm sure that our listeners would have other ideas of how that work I think music is. Ah, really good thing to ah teach people because it's actually pretty easy and the amount of effort required versus the benefit you get both ah psychologically and physically is very high so that would be number and then for words. You would want logic and rhetoric history to know what worked and what should be done differently Ww and Dd and then ah learning about programming. Learning about how humans are programmed learning how to program yourself using language learning about the power of stories and storytelling and maybe most importantly, learning how to craft an offer and sell that offer. And I think that really covers a lot of the word skills that a person might need. And lastly we have under movement I have meditation under movement because it's sort of the um I think stillness is actually a pretty useful. Exercise and then we have wrestling striking gymnastics and Ballgames and I think that would cover like 95% |
| 35:41.39 | Max Shank | Of what you need in order to be able to deliver value which allows you to be self-reliant and contribute and it would also enhance your mental and physical health and still leave lots of time left over for. Recreation and leisure and rest and play which I think are also non-negotiables. |
| 36:06.61 | mikebledsoe | Yeah, one thing I would add to that be law I think there's yeah, no manmade laws. The um, those. |
| 36:13.36 | Max Shank | Law like physical laws or so so crime crime and punishment. |
| 36:25.30 | mikebledsoe | Yeah, really I mean people people be don't understand how law works They don't understand I mean going back to because that falls under the the word category for you because law is just an opinion. |
| 36:38.94 | Max Shank | Yeah. |
| 36:44.32 | mikebledsoe | By a certain group of people that they then Hire Policy. You know they create a policy Hire Policy enforcers to make sure that everybody complies. Um. And most people are very confused about the law so it leaves it leaves law in the hands of very few people people people get involved politically in ways that they don't understand. |
| 37:11.36 | Max Shank | O. |
| 37:18.77 | mikebledsoe | Don't understand the implications of what's going On. Ah and they don't know how to make a change. They don't know how to how to change the law or take advantage of the law or to interpret the law and I think this is something I started learning some of that when I was in high school. I was I was blessed enough to have been exposed to constitutional law and take that high school and I was homeschooled so I got to study a bunch of shit that other people never I talked to anyone who went to public school. No one talked about constitutional law. Even though that's the entire basis of our culture So culture is made up of language in the most concrete version of culture is the laws that are written down and people are going around enforcing those laws I mean it doesn't get more concrete than that outside of. |
| 38:12.54 | Max Shank | Or else That's a strong incentive. |
| 38:15.79 | mikebledsoe | Yeah, or else. So I think that I think that law is is really powerful to to learn and another thing is most of the things that people avoid in this world that keeps them from being wealthy I had this conversation with one of my friends this weekend. Is people are scared to learn anything administrative in nature people due to avoiding administrative load ah remain poor They they don't engage with what's happening financially with and with their taxes. They don't know how to. |
| 38:49.31 | Max Shank | So. |
| 38:52.36 | mikebledsoe | They're afraid of it and they just you know whatever the accountant says I don't really know how to how to engage in that administratively and a lot of people confuse law with Administrative. There's a lot of administrative stuff going on if you just do these things that you're not going to be subject to certain laws because you went through these. Certain administrative Processes. So this happens with real estate this happens with what what we're seeing in the the crypto markets right now there's a lot of there's a lot of really complex and sophisticated administrative things that are built in a society right now that. |
| 39:11.40 | Max Shank | Ah. |
| 39:28.85 | mikebledsoe | The only people who really get the benefit of it are the people who are willing to engage in that administrative load and are willing to learn the complexity of it and so I see the administration falls under government and governance and law. Whether it's coming from a government or the governance is coming from a smaller institution. These things are all important to know about if you want to participate in society and make a difference in it. |
| 39:50.27 | Max Shank | The. |
| 39:58.98 | Max Shank | It's like how you want to? It's like how to manage your life. Basically right? because you know don't hate the player hate the game better yet. Just ah, don't hate anything just ah play the cards you're dealt. But you're right I mean law is so deliberately complex to obscure the truth accounting rules are so deliberately complex to obscure the truth tax rules, etc. But you can complain about how it's unfair. Which it is or you can learn the language of those pursuits and I think the fact that we don't teach kids about accounting and taxes and law in high school is a frigging crime. |
| 40:50.69 | mikebledsoe | Yeah, well be too many people learn it. They might get they they might start thinking for themselves. That's a problem so we won't go. |
| 40:59.71 | Max Shank | Well, they might realize how bad everyone's being screwed I mean that's why we also that's why we also don't get ah a transparent pie chart with a list of how tax dollars are being spent because we would all go like are you fricking kidding me. Like you couldn't you couldn't imagine a more egregious misappropriation of funds. But once again that is taboo because people are under the fantasy. That it's being spent well if their tax dollars are going to a good cause and so in order to come to the realization that they're being catastrophically mismanaged wasted or maybe even ah used for ah sinister acts. |
| 41:51.57 | mikebledsoe | Um, yeah. |
| 41:53.53 | Max Shank | Right is horrifying. |
| 42:00.63 | mikebledsoe | So horrifying. Alright, so we know we know what we want to learn so I don't have children yet. But I'm planning on it. Um I was homeschooled I feel very blessed for that I think. 1 of the things that people are mostly concerned about and it comes homeschooling is you know the social interaction piece and I said this last week is you know the 3 big things we want to learn that the reason we want to learn things is so we can benefit our health our wealth and our relationships. And ah, you know a lot of times people think about you know, homeschoolers being isolated and and I had plenty of opportunity I my parents hired tutors along with some other parents. So I would go to a latin teacher with 3 other guys once a week we would study latin. Um I had an algebra tutor I had a spanish tutor and I was getting little social engagement in these small groups throughout the week so I wasn't without a social structure. It was just different and I think I actually developed very well because of that because I actually spent more time. Amongst adults that I did with kids who are my own age who probably weren't as mature and had I been in that environment I would have behaved less maturely as well. So I had ah I was able to mature pretty quickly due to that. Um. And I know one thing that's really emerged. That's really exciting is this past couple of years. The kids weren't allowed to go to school and they all had to sit at home and and ah, they're basically being homeschooled. |
| 43:46.12 | Max Shank | Right. |
| 43:54.49 | mikebledsoe | By parents who may not even be interested in it or they're having to work a job and can't give them the attention and it just created this this whiplash in a way and you know they they started letting kids go back to school here in Texas and Florida you know the kids. Everything's pretty much back to normal when it comes to going to school sometimes I have mass sometimes they don't depends on the school here in in Texas and ah, but my friends in California who have children what they've done because California laws are so insane. Ah. Is ah a lot of these teachers have left these these really great teachers have left these amazing schools because they're tired of all the mandates as well and these parents have gotten together and they go oh there's 6 families. Getting together. We're all going to contribute $20000 to this teacher for the year the teacher gets paid more the kids get more attention that the ratio of parent a teacher is just right? The parents are in a constant conversation with the teachers. And there's not just one teacher to 1 group of kids. There's multiple teachers that have specialties and different things and so these kids are are and it's and it's very it's become very communal and what we're gonna what we're gonna be witnessing over the years is there's a ah decentralization of. Everything everything's being decentralized and so a lot of people are not going to like that because it's so different than the way it's been but education is becoming decentralized and it's gonna be very community oriented and when things decentralized things tend to become tribal and what I mean by that is. There are small cultures. There's these subcultures that start forming these bubbles I'm part of a subculture where I live we all have you know we we all share the same beliefs and all that kind of stuff and when you know we have kids and bring them up through that culture that's going to be that way. And we need to be good with other people having their own bubbles and their own beliefs and their own cultures. That's perfectly fine. That's what makes this world such a beautiful place. Um, but what I I see in the future is the reason this teacher can get paid much more. You know it could be making 6 figures and. Not working for the school. So the teacher makes more money it costs the parents less money to send their kids to school because're not paying for all this administrative bullshit and the administrative bullshit basically gets in the way of having a direct relationship with the teacher and it gets in the way of community because it's sets a centralized humane and control. |
| 46:35.28 | Max Shank | Right. |
| 46:42.61 | Max Shank | And no direct incentive either yet, you need to have um, correlated incentives. Otherwise you're always going to get a worse result. You're always going to get corruption. You're always going to get. Ah. |
| 46:47.34 | mikebledsoe | And the incentives are yeah are broken. |
| 47:02.44 | Max Shank | Like lobbying. For example, we're we're going to. We're going to convince the rule breakers to give us better rules I mean that's just that's just crazy. |
| 47:05.19 | mikebledsoe | Yeah, yeah. |
| 47:13.45 | mikebledsoe | so so I started throwing out a solution. that's that's 1 big broad solution. We didn't talk about how kids should be school choice. |
| 47:19.84 | Max Shank | School choice. Yeah school choice is the ultimate solution because if you want to send your kid to public school and you have what you consider a good public school and you're well-informed then hey you know more power to you but you have to have that choice. Which allows for competition so that the let's just say like the destructive schools don't have a monopoly on the hearts and minds of kids. It's ridiculous. |
| 47:49.98 | mikebledsoe | Um, yeah, how would you handle the 8 hours of sitting in 1 spot as a child. |
| 47:57.10 | Max Shank | You you don't I mean what could possibly be worse than sitting in a chair that is horizontal with a desk that is horizontal. It's catastrophically bad. You're looking straight down all the time. Or you're looking at the teacher talk. Ah I think for the body. It's awful. You know you could you could do you could do 100% of schooling outside if the weather was good. You could do most schooling outside depending on the weather just with like a. A notebook or a tablet of some kind I mean it doesn't have to be a fancy ipad or anything like that. You know we forget that you pay a premium for a luxury brand like that. But you could go to Walmart today and for like eighty bucks get a tablet that can connect to the internet. And write notes and has a little pen on there. So. |
| 48:55.83 | mikebledsoe | For all my friends kids were the school gave them Macbooks once covid hit like all the kids got macbooks I know well you're welcome kid. |
| 49:05.43 | Max Shank | Wow you and I paid for those. Ah, yeah, and obviously someone won big on securing that contract too. So that that's that sort of ah backwards incentive is par for the course and a lot of it has to do with transparency. |
| 49:18.51 | mikebledsoe | Oh yeah, for sure. |
| 49:29.19 | Max Shank | I think that's the main attraction of cryptocurrency. For example, especially like blockchain technology is that it's so transparent. Ah there isn't anyway, we don't want to get on that topic too much but when it's transparent and you know where everything's going. It's really difficult for there to be those. Dirty dealings behind the scenes and those backwards incentive structures. So I think that sitting in a desk, especially ah a single desk most of the day is. 1 of the worst things you could do to a kit to their posture to their eyesight to their skin to their body I mean it's horrible. You know if you don't see it as child if you don't see it as child abuse then you like don't understand physiology. |
| 50:12.84 | mikebledsoe | Well, the other thing is is. |
| 50:21.37 | mikebledsoe | Yeah, and the other thing that I've done a lot of work in the emotional realm and one of the things that I recognize is the emotional body and the physical body are so intertwined These are not different these are and. |
| 50:21.90 | Max Shank | At all. |
| 50:41.36 | mikebledsoe | And if you put kids in an environment where they cannot move and they're experiencing anything emotional that they're not allowed to express because you're not allowed to express yourself emotionally in class you gotta be quiet. You can't you know if you're crying. We're gonna. |
| 50:53.91 | Max Shank | And right? yeah. |
| 50:59.33 | mikebledsoe | You You know, get rid of you somehow or get you to settle down if you're if you want to be happy and Laughing. You can't do that either. So Not only is there this retardation of physical movement but ah of being in touch with the emotional body. So What I see. Problem with the desk is it's yeah, it's the the emotional body also gets stunted in this so you get the the physical body and the emotional body are suffering by being in this and while the physical body and the emotional body are being minimized. |
| 51:17.99 | Max Shank | Eq goes down. |
| 51:35.57 | mikebledsoe | We are then putting most of our attention on the memorization and regurgitation and so we end up in honoring and really I guess holding on a pedestal. The. The intellectual part of being human as being the most valuable so we've got 20 years of education telling us that what's in our mind is what's truly important and that our body and our emotional body are not as important you won't be valued in Society. If you have that So what we have is a bunch of people who have very poor development physically poor development Emotionally who have an overdeveloped psyche in a lot of ways that is that they identify as who they are and that that. Creates a very controllable population. It's a very,. It's very easy to create sheep in that in that case. |
| 52:41.60 | Max Shank | All being taught by an obedience teacher who has no skin in the game for how well they do in life. |
| 52:51.11 | mikebledsoe | Um, yeah. |
| 52:52.80 | Max Shank | Even even with the best of intentions I've I've met teachers who are amazing I've also met teachers who couldn't be worse and even if you have really good intentions. It doesn't mean that the action is good I Think that's. |
| 52:57.84 | mikebledsoe | I. |
| 53:11.00 | Max Shank | Something that I've really come to think about a lot as I study history as I Observe what's going on in our culture Good intentions doesn't doesn't make the action good if your intentions are good. It doesn't mean what you're doing is good. So Even with the best of intentions you can like horribly abuse a lot of people. |
| 53:29.65 | mikebledsoe | Yeah, yeah. |
| 53:35.33 | mikebledsoe | The the truth is in the results I talk to people about this which is somebody wants to start getting defensive of you know I speak frequently about the the medical system being fucked up and you know what people refer to as the health care system. Being fucked up and they're like well you know and they want to defend it I'm like all we have to do is look at the results I don't want to hear about why you think this is a good idea or not or people want to defend very specific actions when I go look I don't I'm not look. That action. You know was a good theory and it was put in place and all that but it didn't work out the way we wanted to work out. You know the american healthcare system is failing. How do we know? record breaking diabetes cancer mental health the heart disease people. That ah number one killer in the United States right now. Fentanyl overdose. So ah, prescription drugs. |
| 54:37.86 | Max Shank | Number 1 even above and beyond like heart disease that would surprise me. |
| 54:44.30 | mikebledsoe | I I Saw a new thing I think it became number one definitely beats Covid but um. |
| 54:50.44 | Max Shank | Maybe number one? No well, there's ah, there's a lot of iffy numbers around testing and things like that and the amount of deaths and cases there but we don't want to get ourselves censored. |
| 55:01.35 | mikebledsoe | Everything? Ah yeah, all arms. Ah yeah, if you're getting censored. |
| 55:09.50 | Max Shank | That's always a good sign by the way if ah if someone's trying to censor certain topics. They're probably doing it with good intentions. |
| 55:16.98 | mikebledsoe | Ah, yeah, so so we really got to look at the results and so anyone who still is hesitant to agree with us. Ah just look at the results you know or the results of the education system. What kind of what kind of people are going out into the world. Seems pretty chaotic to me at this point. Um, what I mean I too many too many kids to one teacher these classrooms with 30 kids 1 teacher. What? What's the number you'd like to see. |
| 55:46.28 | Max Shank | I well here's the thing I think if the structure were different that would be fine that'd be fine if if kids worked with each other in groups and they were learning things that were useful. Things that were important and interesting to them. Um, then you wouldn't need to have that teacher giving one thirtieth of her attention to everyone all the time it could be done in more of like a ah circuit style. |
| 56:20.70 | mikebledsoe | Um. |
| 56:22.54 | Max Shank | So I think the number of students to the teacher is relevant but it can work a lot of different ways. Ah no question, no question if you have ah a 1 on 1 relationship you're you're gonna get more. |
| 56:29.36 | mikebledsoe | You. |
| 56:41.19 | Max Shank | Information transmitted there you're going to get more direct and immediate feedback which can be very beneficial. Um, ah so I think 1 to 30 is not necessarily a problem but it is a problem especially with the structure that we have it in. You know everybody in an individual desk. We got 95% fluff. The rest of it is not really um, taught in a way that is principles based It's more rote memorization based so um, yeah, part of the reason that's no good is. Because of the structure we have in place ah school school choice though is the solution and unfortunately the worse we like dumb down the. |
| 57:20.81 | mikebledsoe | Got it? yeah. |
| 57:38.17 | Max Shank | School system the more ah like pork belt barreling the more like fluff we throw in there due to lobbying and teachers unions and stuff like that and the less incentive at play you just create are ah wider wider and wider chasm between the haves and the have-nots because if then. You know going to public school is actually worse and worse and worse for a child that makes the gap between that and a private school or a free choice school bigger and bigger. |
| 58:09.43 | mikebledsoe | yeah yeah I think about how I teach and we break you know Um I'm teaching adults so they learn the information on their own. They they try to apply it. Um, but then they also meet with a pod I put people in groups of a pod of 6 and that pod of 6 is led by 1 of my coaches and you know they're usually got more than no more than 25 or 30 people they're managing at a time but only 6 at a time. |
| 58:32.57 | Max Shank | This. |
| 58:48.20 | mikebledsoe | Is what they're managing and so I really like that that group of 6 I I grew up learning in in groups of 6 or or less I see a lot of value in that I do like what you were saying you know one teacher could be handling 30 kids if there was a certain rotation going on. But I think most teachers are managing like 150 kids and 30 at a time. So I think that and and the other thing we have to also think about is you know the age if you're if you're 3 4 5 6 7 eight years old you probably need that constant supervision. There needs to be a teacher all the time present or most of the time present you know I think it's really silly for thirteen fourteen Fifteen year olds to be under constant supervision of a teacher for 8 hours a day. It's I'm a big believer in. |
| 59:31.71 | Max Shank | A. |
| 59:45.69 | Max Shank | But. |
| 59:46.61 | mikebledsoe | Like let's sit down for 60 to 90 minutes to focus on a topic as a group and then go go fuck off for an hour. You know, go go ah go to recess. Go move your body go play. Do something you enjoy. If you want to study more if you want to learn more about it and continue to have the conversation. Great. But I'd like to see an environment where like as kids get older that they get more autonomy over their time and how they spend it and. Giving them the space to research and learn about things that they're curious about instead of having this need to cram all this useless information in your head so that you know the teacher can meet their quota the way to pause it real quick. |
| 01:00:31.50 | Max Shank | Um, yeah, sure. Yeah, so what we need is interest and incentive. Basically. |
| 01:00:40.12 | mikebledsoe | Hear the door knocking go. |
| 01:00:49.19 | Max Shank | Like if if you're interested in something and you're incentivized. You'll do it. That's that's what I've noticed with coaching adults as well is if you're interested and incentivized. There's no limit to the energy and enthusiasm that you'll have and if you. Reinforce that sense of ah contribution that good feeling you get when you share with others. It allows you to have this abundance of psychic energy which I think you and I agree you and I would agree is 1 of the main roadblocks. For adults in success in their business. It's not because they don't know how to do arithmetic. It's because there are personal blocks. Ah psychologically and emotionally right. |
| 01:01:42.64 | mikebledsoe | Yeah, absolutely absolutely. Um, how how do you approach teaching children to we. We talked a lot about memorizing and regurgitating as as not learning, but just as it is what it is. |
| 01:01:54.65 | Max Shank | Right. |
| 01:02:00.54 | Max Shank | Right. |
| 01:02:02.19 | mikebledsoe | How do we teach like what would be your idea of how to teach kids. How to think for themselves. |
| 01:02:07.31 | Max Shank | So I have ah I have a very controversial method. What I do is I have a pocket full of marshmallows and then I carry a long stick and if they do something I like then they get a marshmallow and if they do something I don't like then I hit them with the stick and I'll. I'll trick them. Ah, into just blindly believing what I say and if they do blindly believe what I say then I hit him with the stick and if they ask for context then they get a marshmallow I'm a little bit old school. Ah no I mean I. |
| 01:02:45.13 | mikebledsoe | Yeah, yeah, yeah. |
| 01:02:49.75 | Max Shank | I Think ah, encouraging curiosity and question asking is very valuable. Um I think relating everything back to how you're going to be able to liberate yourself and contribute. Is very important there needs to be context with the content. You can't have just content. You want to reinforce how learning to read will allow you to learn anything Else. You have to reinforce how ah economics and accounting are. Going to help you become wealthy so you don't have to worry about living paycheck to Paycheck. So I think having context with content and encouraging curiosity are probably the most important things when it comes to teaching kids. Um. The other thing is trying to have something physical in the world rather than just ah, verbal or visual something that they can hold in their hands I think is really valuable and making it a little bit more kinesthetic. |
| 01:03:58.40 | mikebledsoe | Yeah, there's ah ah well the the interesting there is um I read I read this book last year called Metaphors that we live by and it Yeah, do you. |
| 01:04:11.60 | Max Shank | I have that book. Yeah. |
| 01:04:15.61 | mikebledsoe | And it does a really good job of mapping out how the the mind works in Metaphor. So ah, the when we when we talk about if we talk about inflation the way that it's structured in a sentence. Makes it out to where we're creating inflation as a person you know inflation is bad and it's gonna come get you and all these types of things just as an example and so we tend to take Concepts and we we say the mind is a. Is an engine or a machine.. It's like that's not actually True. You know we we could think about it as a process but most people don't That's too conceptual So Most Concepts are made that we make sense of those concepts by ah, assigning Them. Ah. |
| 01:04:58.40 | Max Shank | Right. |
| 01:05:13.25 | mikebledsoe | It's a metaphor to something we can physically see and touch and and feel and all that kind of stuff and so to your point if there is a lack of of 3 D experience if there's a lack of what's going on then. I Think these when you when you're learning Concepts and you don't have the metaphors locked in well enough you you are going to you. You run the risk of just living in the conceptual world which I call the fifth dimension and. |
| 01:05:49.10 | Max Shank | Yes. |
| 01:05:51.19 | mikebledsoe | World of concepts the fourth dimension being our 3 dimensions that we exist in in this particular moment and then add time and for the fourth dimension fit dimension being concepts and so what we end up with is a bunch of people who are lost in their heads. |
| 01:06:10.34 | Max Shank | And. |
| 01:06:10.71 | mikebledsoe | And just doing you know mental masturbation that never know how to to practically apply these things and I have suffered from that a bit myself. So I I get it. But that's something that I think you're spot on I think the solution to that is a lot of hands On. Learning like I learned geometry and trigonometry in my high school years but the real application which was way simpler than what I was learning in the books by the way was going on the job site with my dad and renovating houses and having to cut pieces of wood that were going to fit. |
| 01:06:45.50 | Max Shank | Okay. |
| 01:06:49.79 | mikebledsoe | This angle over here and this angle over there and we were doing the math it Trigg made so much sense to me being on the job site. You get me in a book and all of a sudden. It's stop it. It doesn't it doesn't mean as much but again because I have the I have the carpentry background. |
| 01:07:05.69 | Max Shank | It's not rich. |
| 01:07:09.11 | mikebledsoe | I do understand trick really well I was able to get into physics really well because I I so I can take the conception when I and I've had practice making it practical. |
| 01:07:19.84 | Max Shank | Well and you know you bring up a really good point like pract I'm one of the most practical people I've ever met because I tend to think that if something is superfluous. You can do it for fun but otherwise it should be. Cut out like there's no reason for any of that unless you're specifically like trying to just have fun. So when I have the 3 categories of you know, word move and number there's a lot. You actually still have a lot of time left over so you could have part of schooling be woodworking and plumbing and learning a little bit about electric circuits and having these very practical schools like how about cooking and once again, we don't want to. Rely 100% on the state to teach your kid because they will ah do the worst job possible because there's no incentive for them to do a good job so having practical skills acquired that are not only. Ah. Applied in that moment but also applied for the rest of your life is hugely valuable. So I think um, that idea of no content without context would be. Like 1 of the most important things because you need someone to emotionally and intellectually buy in and apply that knowledge once they've realized that it's valuable. |
| 01:08:59.99 | mikebledsoe | Yeah, that also solves the problem of the fluff. The the useless information that is made important when you have context I think about history and how much history is taught and it's like. |
| 01:09:10.34 | Max Shank | A. So much fluff. |
| 01:09:17.62 | mikebledsoe | This battle happened at this point and whatever and you know on the test you got to make sure that you got the right battle in the right year and all that kind of shit and it just makes no sense and um. |
| 01:09:24.18 | Max Shank | Right? It's ridiculous. It's ridiculous. It's rote memorization with no idea for like why are we learning this. It's so we don't repeat the mistakes of history and history is all about how human beings clump together and cooperate or. |
| 01:09:35.26 | mikebledsoe | Right. |
| 01:09:43.56 | Max Shank | Or don't cooperate how they resolve their differences How you know that that kind of thing I agree. |
| 01:09:47.79 | mikebledsoe | Yeah, and so we could study the the purpose of studying history. The the grand context there which isn't taught school is yeah, don't repeat the mistakes and what's made us better. How do we do more of that and how does this. Why are we learning what we're learning today. How does that apply to today's environment and where we're going and what what are the pitfalls and and I I would you know when I have kids that conversation is gonna it's gonna be a conversation. You know what do you think about how that applies to what's going on in our world right now. |
| 01:10:10.44 | Max Shank | Right. |
| 01:10:23.52 | Max Shank | Hello text. |
| 01:10:24.85 | mikebledsoe | This and that and and talk it through. |
| 01:10:29.89 | mikebledsoe | Um, how would you incentivize creativity. What do you? What are you laughing about. |
| 01:10:42.50 | Max Shank | I'm just thinking about ah the the teachers who hear this who are going to hate my fucking guts and yours too probably, but but they'll hate me more after I say this next thing is it doesn't seem hard. It actually doesn't seem difficult at all. Once you add context to every piece of content and once you cut away all the fluff. There's not that much. You need to know to understand value and values and when I say value and values I Basically just mean understanding that value is relative understanding that you have to deliver value. To be able to exist within this societal framework and values to me essentially means like volunteerism like non-coercion Morality like we talked about before like if you if you don't like someone that's fine but don't punch them in the face. |
| 01:11:28.89 | mikebledsoe | Oh. |
| 01:11:39.20 | Max Shank | Ah, however, if they attack you then ah go ahead and make sure you win that battle in some way, don't steal. Don't lie like it's very simple stuff. But. |
| 01:11:46.10 | mikebledsoe | Yeah. |
| 01:11:53.29 | Max Shank | It's not a lot of stuff. It's more important to reinforce those things with practical application and context. That's what I was laughing about. |
| 01:11:58.12 | mikebledsoe | Yeah I on that I want to make sure that we have ah some type of solution for each thing we we named as a problem we we're talking about ah the the school system is stifling creativity. So. |
| 01:12:06.54 | Max Shank | Yeah, can you repeat it I I was off in my own little world. There. Those are the. |
| 01:12:17.28 | mikebledsoe | What? Ah how would you enhance? what would you do to help enhance creativity in children you were teaching. |
| 01:12:22.66 | Max Shank | I Suppose asking leading questions to how you could apply something. You know that seems unrelated to something that we're learning right now would be a good way to do it. |
| 01:12:38.70 | mikebledsoe | Yeah. |
| 01:12:42.10 | Max Shank | Um, asking what other ways could you try to solve this problem. Um I think music and art would be Useful. Creativity is a tricky thing because. If we try to nail down a definition. What does creativity really mean um, like an unexpected solution like if you say in sport someone came up with a really creative play. It would be something that you haven't really seen before it would be. Something that maybe you've seen elsewhere applied in a new way right? So I I think encouraging knowing what that means and then encouraging that behavior and recognizing that's what innovation is would be useful. |
| 01:13:24.90 | mikebledsoe | Yeah, one one of the ways I like her. |
| 01:13:35.59 | mikebledsoe | Yeah, yeah, I like the idea of well you know I train entrepreneurs I train people to be entrepreneurs basically and an entrepreneur is just a problem solver at the end of the day is. |
| 01:13:44.50 | Max Shank | Right. Yeah. |
| 01:13:53.49 | mikebledsoe | A problem in the world and you're gonna create a solution. So I really like the idea like creating an environment where creativity is enhanced by putting problems in front of them without the without saying solve it inside of this context but obviously. |
| 01:14:10.74 | Max Shank | 2 |
| 01:14:13.24 | mikebledsoe | This problem solving this problem it. The problem itself creates its own boundaries and so if I'm solving a very specific problem then I have to take all this creative energy that might be going in random directions and then focus it down into this one solution and I think that. |
| 01:14:25.85 | Max Shank | The. |
| 01:14:32.62 | mikebledsoe | Being able to approach different types of problems and then apply all this other knowledge that that exists in other Contexts and then see the the principles overlap and the relationship of those principles into this New. Ah. New context if you can do that then you're you're gonna be really well Off. So It's I think putting a I think putting problems in front of kids and letting them work it out in their own way and just see what happens also allowing them to be. |
| 01:14:57.69 | Max Shank | Ah. |
| 01:15:08.12 | Max Shank | That's that's a great point. |
| 01:15:10.69 | mikebledsoe | Kids just allowing kids to be curious and study what they want I mean ah the way I've thought about approaching is like you know what? I'm gonna make sure that my kids do math for like twenty thirty minutes a day I'm gonna make sure they read and write for twenty thirty minutes a day. It's like reading writing arithmetic. |
| 01:15:12.84 | Max Shank | Right? okay. |
| 01:15:20.39 | Max Shank | The. |
| 01:15:28.18 | mikebledsoe | And we'll cover some other stuff along the way. But you know what do they want to do you know? Let's ah, spend the first couple hours studying and on the stuff that I want them to learn they they may not want to but after that is like oh there's a piano right here. There's there's some guns over there. There's. Ah, you know we could build something over there. But there's a whole library of books like is there a topic that interests you and I think letting the kids explore get a lot of reward while learning for themselves is. |
| 01:15:50.60 | Max Shank | Right. |
| 01:16:04.67 | mikebledsoe | Is going to help improve creativity as well. |
| 01:16:05.71 | Max Shank | Just giving them the space and less coaching with these things I thought of ah you know how would you encourage creativity. You give them a problem. They solve it and you say okay could you solve it in a different way. |
| 01:16:09.54 | mikebledsoe | Okay. |
| 01:16:21.65 | mikebledsoe | Um, on her name. |
| 01:16:22.89 | Max Shank | Like that's one way you could do it? Okay, could you solve it in a different way and then also just giving them a task with no coaching whatsoever like I just had this vision of giving each group of like 2 or 3 kids like a huge rock and like asking them to move it to the other side of a field or something like that. |
| 01:16:39.18 | mikebledsoe | Man. |
| 01:16:42.37 | Max Shank | And you know just trying to figure out like how they could do that like what tools could you use? what? how could you get that to happen if you were teaching like a physics class and you wanted to learn about ah force and mass and friction and work. |
| 01:17:00.10 | mikebledsoe | Beautiful. Sounds like the school we would design be a lot of fun for a kid to attend So what's easier than a job teaching kid. Oh yeah. |
| 01:17:07.54 | Max Shank | I would kind of want to go there. It's way easier than a job if you do it right? going to the school that we're inventing. |
| 01:17:19.57 | mikebledsoe | You know to my point last week you know I think there's I was hanging out with some ah crypto entrepreneurs this weekend and a handful of guys who ah who understand blockchain way better than I do And yeah, the. I Mentioned the dow last week and I still like it's still hot on my mind. There's there is a way to create a decentralized education system that ah where we get to learn best practices. Best practices are kept and shared. And worst practices are just removed from the system altogether but there's always choice. So for me the bottom line for education is it's It's much more than Schooling. Ah. Kids who tend to be pretty bright. This isn't always the case. Some kids come from from pretty rough backgrounds all the way around. But you know the education's happening in the home. It's not very little education is happening in school aside from the obedience training which kids are also just getting at home. And ah so it's to me. It's about what's happening in the family unit. What's happening communally I know that when I have kids they will have a lot of aunts and Uncles not not blood aunts and Uncles but they will they will go hunting with my buddy manzel who who is a. |
| 01:18:47.42 | Max Shank | A. |
| 01:18:54.29 | mikebledsoe | Who is the best hunter I know and they will go. You know wherever with who like there's gonna be a It'll be a community thing and I imagine some people will. It'll be an official role for them and for other people it'll just be like oh yeah, he's really good with plumbing over there. So. Make sure to go to spend a few days with him and really putting putting them in the the world of of really amazing men and women to me is the the future and the big win got a last. |
| 01:19:27.37 | Max Shank | Ah. |
| 01:19:29.64 | mikebledsoe | Last thoughts on this max. |
| 01:19:34.46 | Max Shank | Incentives drive behavior. It's it's not that complicated actually and when you have the incentives in the wrong place things go really bad. Ah, you don't need to know that many things to live well you don't need to know that many things to be self-reliant and contribute. So ah, lastly accept the reality that school is. Mostly a waste of time mostly obedient school but don't be resentful of it be appreciative of the experience and recognize that education is an ongoing process recognize that if you're learning about something that you are truly interested in. And incentivized to learn. You will never feel a lack of energy I mean unless you're deeply sick. But even people who are deeply sick if they are enthusiastic about what they're learning and enthusiastic about the prospect of getting better better. Getting better and sharing that information then then you will create a surplus of enthusiasm which is essentially psychic energy. You know when you're interested in a project you work on it all day. And suddenly it's 10 pm and you're like oh I forgot to eat today and if you're doing stuff that you don't want to do you will jump at any opportunity to go mindlessly eat some snacks and I'm I'm the same way by the way this is not like a. |
| 01:21:17.10 | mikebledsoe | Right. |
| 01:21:18.59 | Max Shank | Pointing the finger I'm pointing the finger at at myself because I know that within my own self I'm a collection of stories and sensations and I have that 3 hree-tiered mind the lizard the mammal and the wizard and I am I'm part. Neocortex wizard able to imagine different probabilities for the future and I'm also a half retarded monkey who just wants boobs and snacks. So I respect. That reality and try to engage with things that I'm both emotionally invested in intellectually interested in and also incentivized by it. So if you care about something then you will do whatever it takes to learn it. I mean just an example I was reading a eo wilson textbook on genetics and it was fascinating I spent like 2 hours yesterday morning reading and watching this interactive textbook and it it was fascinating. Because I was interested in it because I'm incentivized within the context of my career. So ah, develop a love of education enhance and nourish that love of education. But um, bring it back to. Context so content and context go together interest and incentive go together and everything should help you live better and be able to contribute more That's it. |
| 01:23:04.56 | mikebledsoe | Yeah, well said well said where can people find you. |
| 01:23:10.48 | Max Shank | You can find me at http://mashank.com or at Macank where can they find you. |
| 01:23:16.73 | mikebledsoe | They can find me at Mike Underscore bloodso on Instagram and http://thestrongcoach.com I also want to remind everyone that I have the strong coach summit coming up March third through Seventh. So if you want to go check that out. Go to http://thestrongcoach.com/summit and you can get your tickets there. Thanks y'all. Love you max. |
| 01:23:38.97 | Max Shank | Thanks! Love you buddy. |
| 00:00.00 | Max Shank | Welcome back folks to Monday mornings with max and mike hope you are kicking your week off the right way I'm excited to have you here I'm excited to have my buddy mike here with me today. We're gonna talk about something which I think is a pretty cool thought experiment which. Will lead to your greater action. It's what would you do with a billion dollars and 1 of the things that's useful about this is that it gets you to think about mission instead of business it lets you think a little bit bigger and then. Ideally, what you'll do is once you have a clear set up for how you're going to use that billion. You redo the thought experiment on a new sheet of paper with what would you do with 1 million. What would you do with 1 hundred thousand. And you work your way down into what the core importance overall is and then what the core important thing for you to work on right now is so thank you for joining me mike what's up. |
| 01:07.55 | mikebledsoe | Yo? Yeah, ah this is a fun is a fun thought experiment. It reminds me of a similar thought experiments I've done in the past and usually it's at a conference where there's some speaker on stage that's trying to inspire you to to. Higher action and it works um another couple other questions I've heard is it that are in the same vein but are different so we're gonna run with this but a couple I'll throw out there is what would you do? if you couldn't fail and then what. |
| 01:41.22 | Max Shank | The. |
| 01:45.39 | mikebledsoe | On the flip side of that. What would you do? if you were going to fail no matter what? So if you were going to fail no matter what? what would? what would you do? and so I think a combination of these questions really can fill in a lot of gaps around. |
| 01:50.66 | Max Shank | Well. |
| 02:03.70 | mikebledsoe | You know what you stand for and what you're excited about and I especially like the 1 you know what would you do? if you were to a billion dollar question is really fun because I think as kids we we all thought about you know what? if I won the lottery. What would you do with the lottery winnings you know I remember doing that as a kid. |
| 02:18.22 | Max Shank | Right. |
| 02:21.99 | mikebledsoe | And ah, but the if you're going to fail no matter what is like well now you really have to go after what? what? you just truly enjoy So Not as dark of a. It's not.. It's much darker than the billion-dollar question. |
| 02:40.72 | Max Shank | I Mean what would you do? if you couldn't fail I mean I suppose I would appoint myself God King of the earth and then ah everything else would just boil down from that pretty naturally. |
| 02:55.13 | mikebledsoe | It's it's kind of like the you know if you had 3 wishes first wishes and limited wishes. Ah problem solved. Ah yeah, so what would you do with a billion dollars max. |
| 03:00.94 | Max Shank | Right? That is kind of like a top out. |
| 03:08.40 | Max Shank | Well, ah you know of course you have to set aside some of that for filling your yacht with the venezuelan gymnastics team. But then there's still plenty of money left over to. Ah. To invest into Steady. So this is where the practical mind comes in right? Is you you put you got to put some of it away and you figure out what percentage you're comfortable with ah in my case I would say you got to I would probably take 1 hundred million of that. So ten percent and I would invest it into. Um you know power companies food water maybe some sort of technology as well and probably I would have that managed by someone else. So I would have like that investment professionally managed and then beyond that the question really gets me thinking about what I can give to the world and usually what you think you would like to give to the world stems from what you think is wrong. The world and so the things that come to mind are sustainable communities and also schooling because if anyone has listened to any of our shows so far I think it's pretty clear which side my bread is buttered on. When it comes to schooling especially public schooling especially K through 12 or specifically K through 12 because I think it is such a colossal failure and such a waste of 12 years of your life. So I start thinking about how I could. Implement a different system of schooling that would be based on using simple language and learning about values and creating value and I would really have to rebuild it from the ground up so that kind of goes. The reason I don't do that now is it's a tremendous amount of work that requires a huge amount of capital. But I think as a kid you probably need to do more playing you need to do more wrestling you need to do more basic movement and gymnastics I hand coordination. I'll tell you what you would not be sitting in a desk for long periods of time. No chance you would learn history only within the context of why history is important. You know I think that history is done so badly because it's just a bunch of. |
| 05:59.89 | Max Shank | Random facts to remember with no reason why we're remembering them because history horrifically bad right? It's not practical. You know, ah a pie Chart fractions percentages. Ah you know eat That's like ah. |
| 06:03.44 | mikebledsoe | Well mathematics is taught the same way. Yeah. |
| 06:19.32 | Max Shank | Even with how you would invest. You know? what's the yield on what you put in versus what you get out and that should be applied to how you use your time how you use your money all of these different resources. Um, how to interact with other people. The difference between. Voluntary action and coercion. These are things that are like really really important and of course the purpose of turning a child into an adult or the difference is that an adult can take care of themselves and a child is dependent. Essentially so. |
| 06:51.80 | mikebledsoe | I Like to say it as it. Ah, you're not an adult until you can parent yourself and that's that's who's parenting you. |
| 06:57.30 | Max Shank | Ah, well then I guess I'm not really an adult. Ah anyone ah I'll take anybody. Ah no, 1 ne's been able to do it yet. Um. |
| 07:12.90 | mikebledsoe | Well the the education thing is interesting because the there's 3 categories in all of ah, the capitalist world that are the most that people spend the most money on as Health wealth and relationships And. Ah, So if you're for instance. Ah a coach. There are coaches for those categories and and the reason is is because well the fastest way to learn anything in my opinion is to hire a coach to teach you and the a good Coach. Ah. And the reason these categories are so popular if you're if you're a health a wealth or relationships Coach. You can charge premium dollar and the reason is is because no 1 was taught that shit in school and if they had that edge. Yeah. |
| 08:02.30 | Max Shank | And those are the only important categories like what else is really important. |
| 08:08.64 | mikebledsoe | Everything that you learn in school should be in should ah be ah the context should be set by Health welfare relationships I don't think there's much else in that context is missing. |
| 08:18.81 | Max Shank | It should be yet. It should be clear what the value is of what you're learning like we're learning this because blank blank blank in your life is going to improve your life in this specific way. So just to. Wrap up what I was saying about history is history is the story about how humans clump together pretty much how they group together and then they divide apart so with regard to history like most of it is a waste of time. The specific examples should be given. To reinforce principles and I think principle based learning is what's actually important because then you'll have a framework for where to put all of these examples the difference between anarchy and totalitarianism and the pros and cons of both of those things. So it would really I would want to prepare more for this conversation to specifically lay out how I would change schooling but that would be how I think I could make the biggest. Improvement because I think that the only the only like true war or the only true battle is within the hearts and minds of people. You know everything else is a result. Of that lost battle. The fact that a person can't sit quietly for ten minutes means they're going to be easily um, distracted by something else. The fact that a person can't think critically is the reason they're going to get easily swindled and the more you look to an authority. To compensate for the fact that the individuals are let's say stupid or gullible or whatever instead of buy or beware and a fool in his money are soon parted now. You have this gargantuan bureaucracy who. Only will grow in size and that's where that's where like all of the evil stuff actually happens. It's not jeffrey dahmer it's the stalins and the mao's and the things like that like no no serial killer even though it sounds like viscerally bad has. Even come close to the damage that authoritarian governments have done to people. |
| 10:52.90 | mikebledsoe | Yeah, they're responsible for the murder of the the most amount of people homicide outside of War is minuscule. |
| 10:57.76 | Max Shank | Um, and not just murder not just murder like huge amounts of suffering like a lot of people survived, but it was horrific suffering. |
| 11:07.33 | mikebledsoe | Right? right? Yeah things that people should learn. You would you would improve the education system come. |
| 11:11.78 | Max Shank | So that's what I would do to 1000 million hundred I would create a new 1 I wouldn't try to repair the old 1 I I don't think there's a chance to repair the old 1 There's so much. |
| 11:22.11 | mikebledsoe | That's ah, that's a good idea Buckminster fuller would agree with you. |
| 11:29.63 | Max Shank | Ah, special interests at play and so many Palms being greased through Nepotism I don't think Prussian you told me this. |
| 11:35.42 | mikebledsoe | Well you know school was I think the the the modern school was ah russian. Yeah yeah, and yeah, the the yeah the King at the time was. |
| 11:45.48 | Max Shank | Convince the troops to go to war. |
| 11:51.15 | mikebledsoe | Was trying to figure out how do we get these peasants to fight for us because every time we try to recruit them to fight for us. They kind of just run away. They don't really care. Um, and yeah, if you can indoctrinate somebody from as early as the age of five I mean I know I know parents that put their kids in school 3 or 4 years old |
| 12:08.74 | Max Shank | Her. |
| 12:10.29 | mikebledsoe | Just the you know I'm ah I'm a patriotic guy I love I love american values and principles I believe that the you know the the founding documents and philosophy that the United states was founded on are extremely sound I don't think we're really. Anywhere near what was intended. Um, but when I look at schools and I see people you know pledge allegiance to the flag. You know it's very very interesting because you can go all over the world and find them doing that in every school to their flag and. If you do that every day you're programming the mind to be in agreement with whatever the government says so it doesn't I think I think the education system you know, ah people always say that. Ah you know the the. Children are the future and we need to invest in them. Ah, but I don't think really people people don't actually understand what that means they usually just think that they need to throw more money at the situation but the reality is is yeah something completely new needs to be built because yeah, there's a. It's a system of memorization and regurgitation versus the actual understanding of of principles and the beautiful thing about principles. Yeah yeah, well how would you incentivize better learning. |
| 13:29.31 | Max Shank | Well the incentives are in the wrong place. |
| 13:38.32 | Max Shank | Um, there has to be some correlation with the performance of the students to be able to take care of themselves after the fact. So if you focus on those important skills and then you demonstrate like let's say you know. |
| 13:48.99 | mikebledsoe | So but. |
| 13:57.48 | Max Shank | Ninety percent of our graduates are self-sufficient by age 18 ah, that's that's really something because there are a lot of ways to make a dollar I don't understand why it's set up so you you just enter the workforce at eighteen rather than. Like you could become an electrician in like six months if that's how you want to go about it and right now there's such a bougie ah disdain for crafts and trades not everybody has to be like a ah. Professor of some kind you know what I mean so I think the the idea should be helping kids become valuable teach them about it's it's really value and values and so that would probably be the best way is if. There was some sort of and incentive structure based on the ability of the students to be able to be self-sufficient and something like that I'm just riffing here. But um, you need you need incentives. In the place of those who are responsible for the actions. |
| 15:13.83 | mikebledsoe | Beautiful. That's how you do with a billion dollars. |
| 15:19.30 | Max Shank | Um, yeah, ah a yacht with the venezuelan gymnastics team ten percent professionally managed put in safe investments and then the rest of it to develop ah sustainable communities and better schooling and that could all kind of. Work together. But I think it so the reason I think that way is I think most adults are too far gone to like really change. Um, they're like a little bit too stuck in their existing beliefs and it's it's just a harder battle. You know, um. I think Dr. Seuss realized that he started out with political cartoons and then switched over to children's books he has a lot of funny political cartoons about world war 2 that are worth checking up if you haven't seen him. Ah yeah, oh yeah. |
| 16:02.19 | mikebledsoe | Um. |
| 16:09.39 | mikebledsoe | Interesting. There's there's a there's a company called tuttle twins that you can check them out on Instagram I invested in 1 of their movies at or it's a tv series. Ah yeah, yeah, ah they they teach. Ah. |
| 16:17.39 | Max Shank | Very cool. Yeah. How cool. |
| 16:29.21 | mikebledsoe | Kids the value of capitalism and how to thrive in this world and and and and ah educates them on the dangers of communism socialism and things like that. Ah, anyways, anyone should go listen. Go follow their Instagram account they put out really good stuff. Yeah, but I saw that and I go this is this is something I believe in I don't know if I'll get my money back them being capitalist I bet I will but the I find it really cool that they're there. Breaking these concepts down into picture books and cartoons and things like that that kids can can digest because I mean I'm fortunate enough that I was I was raised by a father who had he understood principles and so ah. |
| 17:06.73 | Max Shank | Ah. |
| 17:18.81 | Max Shank | H. |
| 17:22.78 | mikebledsoe | Didn't matter the topic that came across my plate I understood what rights were and what rights were not and I was able to smell bullshit from pretty far away because of that. |
| 17:33.75 | Max Shank | Yeah,, that's pretty cool I think there are so many lies told all the time and you need to understand that every interaction between 2 people is either going to be a win win a win lose or a lose lose. And when you have voluntary action. It's always a win-win. Otherwise the person doesn't make the choice like if you get to say no, That's essentially what freedom is dependent on the freedom to say no or yes. |
| 17:59.63 | mikebledsoe | Right? but. |
| 18:07.80 | mikebledsoe | Yeah, if everyone has that power then the world's a much better place but most people don't even know they have it. |
| 18:13.42 | Max Shank | And and you get a lot more variety too. I mean think of all the wonderful different types of cuisine. There are think of all of the different types of exercise that you can do you can dance you can do Pellotis you can do Crossfit you can do Kettle belt I Mean. You have just a much wider range of choices and and you also have more um agency you know like the locus of control is something that's closely correlated with ah happiness and meaning and things like that and if you are. |
| 18:36.40 | mikebledsoe | Yeah, yeah. |
| 18:51.93 | Max Shank | In control over your resources which are both um, energetic time financial. Um, you'll feel a lot more empowered and you'll feel a lot less hopeless. So. |
| 19:03.92 | mikebledsoe | Um, you know. |
| 19:08.45 | Max Shank | Yeah, it's kind of like teaching someone anything you know if someone tries to learn a language as an adult. It's a little harder. It's possible. But if you learned it as a kid. It becomes a bigger part of you. Yeah. |
| 19:18.73 | mikebledsoe | Absolutely less less deprogramming needing needed. You got to unlearn a lot of stuff start a religion. |
| 19:24.75 | Max Shank | Maybe your religion would be better. Maybe your religion would be better. Maybe I'm like ah yeah, maybe school is not the right word for it. |
| 19:34.50 | mikebledsoe | Ah, yeah, it's got to be a whole new. You know, just create a new word I Think that's the way to go? Yeah, new word for a new system. Yeah yeah. |
| 19:38.72 | Max Shank | Yeah, and a new word. Not a school or religion. Okay I like that off to think about that a little bit anyway. So That's my my billion dollars is about safe investments a splash of hedonism and then the lion's share to. Writing what I believe are the wrongs which seem obviously wrong and pretty easily Solvable. You know, physically mentally spiritually things like that. So anyway, what about you? mike. |
| 20:04.00 | mikebledsoe | Yeah. |
| 20:11.54 | mikebledsoe | Oh mean I we're aligned quite a bit but um you and I are aligned on a lot of things. My approach would be a little bit different and ah so I would take ninety percent and put into to save investment so 900 million dollars. |
| 20:15.66 | Max Shank | You and I think. |
| 20:30.63 | mikebledsoe | And a safe investment something that would guarantee at least a ten percent return |
| 20:31.29 | Max Shank | Um, you greedy bastard are. |
| 20:37.47 | mikebledsoe | Ah, well I've got a good explanation. Why so. |
| 20:43.10 | Max Shank | Ah, explain to the folks at home. Why you're such a greedy bastard. |
| 20:48.94 | mikebledsoe | Ah, well because if I invest ninety percent with a guaranteed ten percent or greater return. That means that I'll have a Hundred million dollars deposited to me each year is is what's possible. So ah and I doubt I would need. |
| 21:00.70 | Max Shank | To the. |
| 21:05.45 | mikebledsoe | All hundred million dollars every year so some of that would compound and so um I would well the thing is is I think I would have a hard time even knowing what to do with 100 million dollars. So billion dollars seems a little outrageous ah but i. |
| 21:22.16 | Max Shank | That's the whole point. That's the whole point is it's supposed to be. You can't just be like I would invest nine hundred and ninety million and I would spend 10 million on a ranch where I teach kids how to raise cattle. |
| 21:26.46 | mikebledsoe | Me. |
| 21:31.96 | mikebledsoe | No, no, no, but this there's there's a strategy here. So the strategy is I may I may dip into that money. But here's the thing is 1 thing I've learned in business is if you can't manage a business that's doing a hundred thousand dollars a year well |
| 21:38.46 | Max Shank | Um, like. |
| 21:49.44 | mikebledsoe | You're not going to manage a business that's doing a million dollars a year will and it's better to make the mistakes and learn things with a small amount of money and and have all the it's a less expensive expensive lesson if you do it that way. So I would want to do a lot of innovative things. And so tying the money up and something ninety percent of the money and up in something that's going to guarantee me a Hundred million dollars. A year is very very attractive because with 100 million dollars I could do a lot of things 1 of the things that I would would do that 1 hundred million dollars with the if I if I achieve. Massive success and having more money helps us move faster I'll start sweeping that money that's invested and is something that is so I have more direct control over. But yeah billion dollars in my account I would I wouldn't do anything but I would I would start. Interviewing the the best financial consultants and and create some type of accountability with those things because people get shady sometimes um and have it invested safely but take the other 1 hundred million would buy a home I'd get like fancy. Fucking penthouse here in austin texas just overlooking the City. So I'd be 1 um, and then I would get a ranch outside of town about forty five minutes away then I would get a home in the mountains maybe flagstaff arizona get a home in the mountains. And then get a beach house in in Florida and probably some type of property down mexico probably somewhere like wahaca or something like that. So ah I would get I would have my four new homes and then and some some rovers at each 1 and pools and indoor pools and all that stuff we just go into I mean I get I could talk for hours about what I would put in my home but we'll leave that alone and. |
| 23:56.31 | Max Shank | Full of all the adult toys. You could possibly want. |
| 24:00.63 | mikebledsoe | Yeah, that So that's my that's my hedonistic desire is is multiple homes different locations being able to fly private to from 1 place to another seems like the way to go. Ah. Yeah, just like basically like Swedish spas set up at every single 1 of them and and then I would I would invest in Community I would buy properties for the purpose of of putting ah people that I that I hold dear and in the same location. Ah, and ah be self-sustaining. |
| 24:35.70 | Max Shank | So a concentration camp for friends and family. You group them all together. Ah. |
| 24:40.84 | mikebledsoe | Yeah, whether they want to or not, they're coming. Yeah so I would I would do that and and for the purpose of um, what I'm really interested in is I as I look at the world is how do we decentralize. Food distribution. So 1 of the things that have become very apparent to me in the last couple years and and I've gotten on the phone and discussed this with you before max which is there's a there's a lack of high quality food distribution and so we have a. Ah system set up where due to subsidies. It makes it more difficult for someone who's doing good farming work to get their food to market and it makes it easier for shittier product to get to market and so it it makes some food. Ah, artificially. Inexpensive and cheap and it makes other food artificially expensive and so what I would really like to see is to empower people who want to get into sustainable farming and sustainable regenerative farming practices. Creating land for that giving them a place to do that I would love to invest in Blockchain technologies for the purpose of removing a lot of the administrative load that that comes with food distribution and yeah would I would. Like to create some type of crypto token that people could use to buy their food and and fund the farms and things like that. So I imagine to kickstart a project like that you really need. Farmers and some land and distribution channels set up first. So that's that's 1 of the things I would like to tackle when I look at when I look at the world I'm 1 hundred percent with you on the education front like when I have kids they're gonna be homeschooled and they're gonna be learning from a very principal. Perspective and always having context and they're gonna be my kids will probably be adults by the time they're 12 so ah, the that's the plan who knows until you have kids I don't think you can really tell. But. Education's important, but like you were noting trying to get adults to change behaviors via education extremely difficult. They're they're very entrenched in what they want and 1 way that I've seen to make both adults and children move but especially adults. |
| 27:27.27 | mikebledsoe | Is just economics. There people are driven by this exterior environment of economics where things are incentivized and certain things aren't incentivized so I would really like to go to work on how to create an economic structure. That is that will Improve. People's ability to make good decisions. So Good decisions around food would become easier and more convenient because the the reason a lot of people choose what they choose is because simply convenience so that would be. |
| 28:03.90 | Max Shank | Oh really I don't know if I agree with that I know that people choose based on convenience but I would argue that it's maybe even more convenient to buy in bulk and eat healthy. |
| 28:06.33 | mikebledsoe | That would be that would be my main. You don't think people choose based on convenience. |
| 28:22.54 | Max Shank | Than it is to eat crap at the drive-through. no no no no no I think both like I think um, if you if you put like 6 or 8 cups of rice in an instapot with some. |
| 28:24.80 | mikebledsoe | Well I mean short term convenience. Not. |
| 28:41.55 | Max Shank | Bulk chicken. It requires no effort but you have you know, maybe 10 meals available for the average person and requires no extra dishes or anything like that I think it's kind of a fallacy that eating healthy is more expensive. It's just that you have to learn the skill of cooking and back to the economics point I think that's where seeing the difference. Like cost per meal and cost per calorie.. There's actually a funny website I can't remember the name of it off the top my head but this ah this really? um, Clever nerd. Put together this whole website that was like cost per calorie cost per gram of protein and he took like all these different foods and put them in like a big old ah spreadsheet and it it was really illuminating to see how you could. Eat the cheapest and then there are different levels in terms of how much you want to spend so I I think food is ah crazy important because we need food and in fact, we are food so it's it's 6 what?? What's a more important lesson. |
| 29:59.57 | mikebledsoe | Yeah, well I think the drive throughugh is more convenient I mean if you have to cook either the the energy cost of of cooking people don't have the foresight. |
| 29:59.71 | Max Shank | Than that. |
| 30:08.95 | Max Shank | But it will require you less time it will require you less time and less money like you just have to show the math to someone you buy an instapot at 60 bucks. 1 time you buy 25 pounds of rice you buy twenty pounds of chicken at a time and you throw it in the pot. And you slather it in spices and maybe cheese and it's delicious and it's much cheaper per meal and it's less time investment per meal but it does require? Yeah, but I mean it's still going to be a better result. It's just like a savings account. It's the same idea. |
| 30:35.59 | mikebledsoe | Big guy playing ahead. |
| 30:46.68 | Max Shank | As a savings account. Are you going to save the money. Are you going to spend the money on bullshit. |
| 30:49.24 | mikebledsoe | Are you definitely going to get a better result and and I remember. |
| 30:53.13 | Max Shank | But is all I Just want to be clear that it is cheaper timewise and it is cheaper moneywise to eat healthy if you buy in bulk than it is to do the allegedly cheap convenient thing. |
| 31:07.33 | mikebledsoe | Yeah I was at a nutrition seminar once where 2 people left the ah the the venue at the same time 1 went to go get a fast food item another 1 popped in the grocery store the closest grocery store picked up strawberries almonds and. And some meat some deli meat because they were they were going for. You know the convenience and not having to cook and they show back up and ah the woman who was getting healthy food showed up just a couple minutes before you know it was a little bit faster and the price was the price was about the same. |
| 31:40.46 | Max Shank | Ah. |
| 31:46.00 | mikebledsoe | And because you so I bring that up because I mean you're not wrong, but the idea that I think the the thing that's expensive to people is that they have to think in order to to make their own food. Get their stuff so education has to be a component to that. |
| 32:00.40 | Max Shank | Earth. |
| 32:05.42 | mikebledsoe | Because if you do just get people healthy food at ah at a better price then you know they still don't know what to do with it I mean they put I remember I was studying in school I was taking like ah 1 of those health classes like Health For. Um, what they called like health administrators people who who try to impact the health of entire populations cities and stuff like that. There was an experiment done where they put a lot of really healthy produce into the poor part of town. They go Wow. All these all these. |
| 32:32.46 | Max Shank | Yes. |
| 32:43.86 | mikebledsoe | Poor people are in this food desert and you know when you go into the convenience store where they're doing their grocery shopping. There's no produce. There's nothing healthy, no hot healthy options available and they put a bunch of produce in there and it went rotten and. People just chose not to buy it and I think a large part of it has to do with a lot of people just don't know what to do with food. They don't know how to prepare it. They don't know um and the idea of having to learn how to do that or the fear of screwing it up. Is is really huge. |
| 33:20.27 | Max Shank | Well and of course that's not 1 of the subjects that's taught in school and you know if you blame there's no end to the blaming. But if somebody has a problem ninety nine percent of the time. It's the parent or whatever authority figure taught them beforehand right? so. |
| 33:36.60 | mikebledsoe | Yeah. |
| 33:40.90 | Max Shank | If You don't have the understanding of food like look you can eat garbage food and as long as you don't eat too much. You won't be obese you might not be healthy, but you you can eat the worst possible. You could eat big Macs every day. And not be obese as long as you don't eat too many of them like there's there's a it's like I say all the time you know 99 percent of people's problems come from having bad security at their lips. The words that get out and the food that gets in. |
| 34:00.87 | mikebledsoe | Yeah, what. |
| 34:14.63 | mikebledsoe | I yeah, that's very true. It's very true. Yeah, so I think that yeah you say you bring up that good point. Lot of it's education is not necessarily not cheaper or less convenient. Um, and I think that some people are just Goingnna be That's just where they're gonna be they're they're never going to change. Yeah and and. |
| 34:41.42 | Max Shank | And I don't think it's wrong to let them choose that be obese eat fritos and big macs all day like you you die in a blaze of glory like chris farley on cocaine with a couple of horse like there's no shame in that game. |
| 34:56.78 | mikebledsoe | Yeah, yeah, so I think that. Ah yeah, I'm not here to save the world but I do think that there's there could be ah I look at the landscape of what's happening in the food industry and I see you know. These really big corporations that make really port food and do a lot of gmo and they're they're robbing the soil of minerals and and they're doing a lot of mono cultural crops and it's just not good for the soil. Um and some people suspect. That you know we're just creating deserts here in the United states and a lot of deserts around the world. There's been um, stories of there was a huge agricultural boom that preceded it being a desert. So. |
| 35:53.77 | Max Shank | Huh. |
| 35:55.59 | mikebledsoe | Places in like egypt and where there was a massive amount of people a lot of monocultural farming going on so I don't know here's the thing is we don't know if that's actually true or not but it's ah it's a compelling story. And I can tell the difference when I eat food in other countries versus the Us. So I really? Ah what I see is we're going into a dangerous zone of having too much monocultural farming happening too many pesticides being used all these things. |
| 36:18.82 | Max Shank | E. |
| 36:33.71 | mikebledsoe | That are harmful to the the soil and the environment at large which we live in that environment so we're going to poison ourselves. So I think that systematically creating 1 being decentralized is important because you want. |
| 36:38.46 | Max Shank | Ah, right. |
| 36:52.42 | mikebledsoe | You don't want a single point of failure with your food system and decentralization will allow people to have more to be more empowered to make the food choices that are good for them instead of being given the limited food choices that are delivered to them I think it also put people more in touch with their food. Um. People people who who tend to shop local when it comes to food and other other items too tend to be more they care more about the product that they're getting and so I think that there's a really cool incentive there in and making it decentralized and local. Ah, and I would really like to proliferate the regenerative farming movement as a whole to offset some of the the bullshit that that I see as bullshit going on and I think also a lot of young people want to get into. |
| 37:38.23 | Max Shank | The. |
| 37:49.73 | mikebledsoe | They they feel the same way they want to get into regenerative farming and want to be closer to nature and things like that. But they don't have the money to buy the real estate and the way that the economic system set up right now is about to get very difficult to come by real estate because the big boys are. Buying it up as the interest rates will be going up next year |
| 38:10.79 | Max Shank | Oh we'll see how that goes. Yeah I got a friend in Montana actually who's working on some of that regenerative farming including like a little power plant. That's the centerpiece. It's like a biological power plant centerpiece. |
| 38:22.40 | mikebledsoe | I Know a guy is doing it wyoming I don't know no Evan. Ah yeah. |
| 38:28.42 | Max Shank | His name Eric Oh well, we should link him up then ah yeah I agree with you I mean look I think ah farm subsidies are bad just like ah most things with good intentions. Ah, end up being destructive I think having lots of options is always better. Um, some of the best meat some of the best produce we get now is from Walmart so just being attached to a big corporation. Doesn't mean the quality has to go down In fact,, um, yeah. You know, certified organic Grass-fed Beef grass-fed bison at Walmart That's organic I mean that's um, pretty cool I think um I think food is such a big part about the health of these society So I'm definitely with you on that and it does. Come back to education I Like the idea of like I I guess crowdsourcing or crowd investing ah with with the sustainable agriculture would be a really cool idea. I Could totally get behind something like that. |
| 39:43.48 | mikebledsoe | Yeah, 1 of the things I've been looking at closely are Das daos decentralized autonomous organizations and um, when I first learned about ethereum the cryptocurrency and I started understanding what smart. Smart contracts were I started imagining what may be possible that now that that I didn't there's no way that I with my knowledge base I and going to go in there and be able to create something off the backbone of Ethereum I'm not that level of engineer I'm not sure I'm any level of engineer. |
| 40:18.19 | Max Shank | Um, doesn't seem like it. |
| 40:22.38 | mikebledsoe | But the ah no I you know I'm an audio engineer I can engineer audio and that's about that's where that that ends I'm a relationships engineer like that. |
| 40:32.11 | Max Shank | Um I can make noise is that the same thing audio Audio engineer. |
| 40:40.73 | mikebledsoe | Ah, ah so ah like I can play with audio and postproduction that's about it that would be an audio engineer. So. |
| 40:48.81 | Max Shank | But you could find an engineer to help you with that if you if you so desired. |
| 40:52.80 | mikebledsoe | Totally but 1 of the things that's happened with these daos that have come out is there's a platform called aragon where you can start your own decentralized autonomous organization and then now what they have is like oh do you want it to be a membership. Oh. Do you want it to be. Ah, ah to build your reputation in the market. Are you doing fundraising so they've got about 6 different categories of really popular tas that you can start and then basically um, it works with Nfts so I'm sure. Everybody's heard about and nfts at this point and the a lot a lot of how these das work is you have to buy an nftt in order to say it to membership because that's what I've been looking into the most is how do you create a membership dao. And people would purchase. There would be a limited amount of tickets to be a part of the dawo and say I'm looking at starting 1 with 100 and fifty members. There'll never be another once these 1 hundred and fifty nftts are Meanted. There's no more. And nfts that will be created and if you want to be a part of this club or whatever it is you buy this nft. It might cost 25000 dollars but it's a lifetime membership if you ever want to sell it in the future you can sell it on the market and the idea is that you could purchase a membership to be a part of a club. |
| 42:16.40 | Max Shank | P. |
| 42:22.92 | mikebledsoe | And you can also and an investment You can also sell that later so you own a part of the ideas you own a part of the organization. You're not just you're not just purchasing membership. You're you're purchasing ownership in a way. So yeah. |
| 42:35.87 | Max Shank | So it's kind of like a corporation selling shares a little bit. Yeah. |
| 42:42.42 | mikebledsoe | Yeah, and so what it what it allows for is things that would if if done by a business by with with typical technology would be a really heavy administrative load there would to account for everything. So. |
| 42:56.75 | Max Shank | Right. |
| 43:00.88 | mikebledsoe | The the cool thing about the blockchain and smart contracts is you can create a lot of if then rules in the real world and and as these things are met things like accounting like the modern accounting like what we're using in like the conventional accounting and baking when you look at what's possible with blockchain seems very ridiculous. |
| 43:05.74 | Max Shank | Ah. |
| 43:19.79 | mikebledsoe | Like Wow this is really antiquated by Comparison. So when when I think about accounting and well when most people think about Accounting. It's like Okay, what's the what are the financials and that's usually what's being accounted for but true Accounting. Um, a more global accounting is are you accounting for everything. Are you accounting for things that may not necessarily be monetary in nature even though you know. |
| 43:42.33 | Max Shank | Well like a farm for example, right? like the whole idea of let's say having 1 hundred and fifty shares of a farm and having a bunch of if then rules so conditional rules for if this then do this? um. |
| 43:55.88 | mikebledsoe | Me. |
| 44:01.70 | Max Shank | You know that it it probably does get pretty tricky like you have to be very clever to figure out how to run that organization. Um, autonomously and you probably can't account for everything which is funny like you can't account for all of the um potentials. Well and that's um. |
| 44:09.39 | mikebledsoe | Yeah, and I Think. Now we can try. |
| 44:21.37 | Max Shank | You know it kind of shows the evolution of computer science in the beginning there was if then and ah, it's very similar to the way that law has developed from the code of Hammurabi which was if you blind a man's eye then. |
| 44:26.84 | mikebledsoe | And. |
| 44:41.18 | Max Shank | Then your eye shall be blinded as well and I don't know hardly anything about computer programming. But I know that if you relied only on if then it's kind of like a caveman style programming where it's going to be so many conditional statements. Rather than the more elegant and sophisticated rules and algorithms and operations that they have available Now. So um. |
| 45:07.81 | mikebledsoe | Yeah, Well yeah, and that's the 1 thing I see about the dao is like I'm I'm watching and I'm not hot to get in right now because I think that a lot of people 1 of the the really big mistakes that I'm seeing being made in the. Consciousness of a lot of people who are excited about this and taking action on it as they go decentralized autonomous Organization. We don't need hierarchy anymore. There's just gonna be. We're gonna be able to vote on everything and I'm going. Oh you guys are go for it and you know watch us watch this go? um. And I had ah I had a woman that was wanting to do ah a dow that was wanting to do community and all this I'm like cool I'm interested and then she was like all right and we don't need any hierarchy and I was like whoa Whoa Whoa Whoa. Ah, you're defying nature. |
| 45:55.25 | Max Shank | Impossible. |
| 46:01.22 | mikebledsoe | By by saying that we're not gonna have a hierarchy. You trust me, you don't want to define nature she will slap you like a bitch you got to ride what is right? So yeah, there's somebody needs. |
| 46:13.11 | Max Shank | Someone needs to have the call someone needs to be able to make the call. |
| 46:20.32 | mikebledsoe | There needs to be response and and um. |
| 46:23.31 | Max Shank | Roles and responsibilities operating agreement. You know a lot of the things from more traditional. Yeah more a lot of these things from right? but a lot of these things from traditional organizations still ring true. Um. |
| 46:25.73 | mikebledsoe | Well they think they can have a lot of that without without the hierarchy. |
| 46:40.69 | Max Shank | For something that is as autonomous as possible like I think you might agree that a lot of the role of a leader or manager is to delegate and automate and. The more you automate the less you have to delegate but it still has to be somebody's Responsibility. You know, even when you're putting together a phone call script or something like that. It's going to be if this then this if this then this and the more you can automate that process. |
| 46:57.84 | mikebledsoe | Most. |
| 47:12.95 | Max Shank | The more you can multiply that process that you've created and that's why computer software ah has such a huge premium because the exponential val the exponential return is so high just the same as um. You know selling ah a program. You know it's it's no coincidence that it's called a fitness training program when I write 1 I think about I am literally um, uploading a program and you are installing it into your brain. And you are executing that file. And for example, if you execute the ultimate athleticism program you're going to get better at handstands deadlifts airborne lunges front levers that sort of thing if you execute the primal athleticism daily practice. You're going to get better at bouncing rolling. Um, carrying things crawling climbing these you know wider array of things. So it's no surprise that it's called a program because that's literally what you're doing is you're implanting a program and that's also why it's so Scalable. You know I can sell. Um, a million copies of simple shoulder solution and there's no extra administrative cost to doing that. It's still just a few percent for the the credit card fee essentially so that's why software so is so powerful and. |
| 48:44.38 | mikebledsoe | Yeah. |
| 48:50.69 | Max Shank | It can be code or it can be like a written program. You know even religion you can think of as a program. |
| 48:54.55 | mikebledsoe | Now. |
| 49:01.62 | mikebledsoe | You're gonna freak some people out. Ah so totally it is. |
| 49:02.18 | Max Shank | I mean it. It is a program is it not I mean some of them are some of them are effective like I think mormonism is an effective program. It even has like a built in um generator which is the mission that they go on. I mean look mormonism is what like a hundred ish years old more less, not sure 200 can we get a fact check around this. Okay, so let's call it 2 hundred. Let's call it 1 hundred and 50 years right yeah please |
| 49:27.30 | mikebledsoe | I'm not sure I think it's the late Eighteen hundreds. No I'm not yeah, there's a mormon listening please let us know. |
| 49:41.19 | Max Shank | Yeah, we can't google right now. Ah that religion has more members than judaism and judaism is like 10 times longer. Okay, and it's because that that program is more geared toward. |
| 49:52.68 | mikebledsoe | Yeah, like twenty or 30 times longer. Yeah yeah. |
| 50:00.84 | Max Shank | Toward Growth. You know what? I'm saying So Um I think both of those religions are yeah are typically like pretty effective at making people wealthy so that program is effective from that standpoint it. I'm not saying it will necessarily make you the happiest because Mormons seem a lot happier than Jews but I Also don't think they're as funny and this is these are just my ah, ah blind observations right? Jews seem funnier Mormons seem happier. They both seem pretty Wealthy. So I just look At. Whether the program is constructive or destructive right? So Religion Fitness training program. Ah actual code or a dao or something like that. It's all it's all programming humans school. Programming humans and if you're able you said that an adult is able to parent themself. Maybe that's also a good analogy for the master slave if you are the administrator of yourself then you can program yourself as well and that's. Really high level. Um adaptability. |
| 51:16.57 | mikebledsoe | Yeah, and you can't program yourself. You can program your own subconscious mind these are there's countless techniques for doing that I think it's the most effective way of making progress towards what you want is if you're not if you're not doing something. |
| 51:24.12 | Max Shank | Tap. |
| 51:32.65 | mikebledsoe | To program your subconscious mind. You're really missing out. Ah oh I brought I brought the dow up because I brought the dow because we're talking about what would we do with a billion dollars and the. |
| 51:38.39 | Max Shank | Absolutely. |
| 51:47.14 | Max Shank | Is that what we were talking about I forgot. |
| 51:51.40 | mikebledsoe | Something like ah so so it got me if this takes me back to a conversation you and I were having a year ago or or more and how do we have a a community and and. Decentralized communities that can interact with each other so they're all, there's these sovereign little cities and they can interact with each other and do trade with specific cryptocurrencies and all that and what I what I'm seeing with the dao is the real possibility because before I was thinking. I would need a billion dollars or I would need a hundred million dollars in order to start this project but now with the these fundraising dows and and all what I'm seeing emerge I don't know if it's quite ready for what I want to do with it yet. What I'm seeing emerges. Maybe if you have a solid enough vision and you have a good enough program then you can get your investors and now you can make it you can make it happen so it's very exciting times a little bit different than a business. |
| 52:55.76 | Max Shank | Oh yeah. |
| 53:02.92 | mikebledsoe | Ah, typical business that gets investors I think that there's a lot of excitement around right? This is just like it's the future. It's how things will be managed in the future will primarily be through blockchain and so I think if you do something in blockchain people are more likely get on board. The other thing is. Ah, you're less likely to have ah, it's a lot easier to have visibility of what's going on and there's a lot less opportunities for Fuckery. So I think it it makes it for an easier thing for people to invest in because ah. Things are so transparent with a lot of the blockchain technologies so you can set things up where everything's just very visible. So I think that raising money for those types of ventures are a lot easier, especially when you look at some of the you know what's happened in the last couple decades with. |
| 53:46.79 | Max Shank | Oh. |
| 53:58.83 | mikebledsoe | You know enron and that guy who was it that did that ah Bernie madoff and he had that dude that the fire the fire festival guy. Ah, who actually did some time but all all those things had had it existed in. You know a dow instead. |
| 53:59.91 | Max Shank | Bernie made off made off with all their money. |
| 54:18.83 | mikebledsoe | Would not. It would probably just wouldn't have even happened because people would have been able to spot it and I think that there's gonna be a lot of people and people have done this with cryptocurrencies they they write a white paper and they launch it they get investors and then disappear. So I'm not saying that that there's no fraud. |
| 54:35.71 | Max Shank | Oh yeah. |
| 54:38.63 | mikebledsoe | There's no fraud in these things but over time what I see happening is the fraud will will become minimized because people will know what to look for and there's also the the ability to create transparency where it's necessary is also going to be there. |
| 54:54.23 | Max Shank | Oh. |
| 54:59.73 | mikebledsoe | So yep, crowd crowdsourcing that's the way to go. |
| 55:03.87 | Max Shank | Yeah, if you have a good enough idea and a clear plan. Um I don't think it's difficult to get investors. Um. |
| 55:12.30 | mikebledsoe | Yeah, all right? Well it sounds like it. We don't need a billion dollars for ideas. So we just need to create it now you get? yeah, get you start working on yours I'll start working on mine. |
| 55:18.33 | Max Shank | Now you just need other people to have a billion. |
| 55:32.61 | Max Shank | It's interesting. How a lot of it comes back to education a lot of it comes back to it doesn't necessarily need to happen in a school but a lot of it comes back to educating people. And a lot of similarities with food I think we both realized just how important food quality is not having a single point of failure having um you know that decentralized decentralize is a way better word than. Not having a single point of Failure. It's much more exciting right? now is decentralized. Ah. |
| 56:10.30 | mikebledsoe | Um, but decentralized means a lot of different thing like it. It encapsulates that plus many other things yeah increase in choice. |
| 56:14.95 | Max Shank | Yeah, yeah. Um, yeah, um, so as far as how to execute this strategy for our listeners. Um, what's a good way to go about it. |
| 56:37.28 | mikebledsoe | Ah, you know I think I think write write down what you would do with the billion dollars and I would also there you go. |
| 56:44.99 | Max Shank | And then maybe write down what you do with a million after afterward I think that's the way to do It is start out with a billion so you're like in the blue sky version and then you snap back to a little bit closer to reality with the million unless there are any ah billionaires. Listening in which case ah get in touch with us. We have plenty of ideas for your money. |
| 57:07.69 | mikebledsoe | My mike at the strongcoach dot com is my email. Yeah, yeah, and I think it's also worth you know do the I like doing the pie in the sky first billion dollar million dollar and then what would you do? if you were guaranteed to fail no matter what you did you were gonna fail. What would you do so. |
| 57:31.44 | Max Shank | Ah, what I don't understand the question but I do like it I I don't even know how to if I was guaranteed to fail Fail Why would I do it at all I Would if if I knew I was going to fail. |
| 57:38.67 | mikebledsoe | Yeah. |
| 57:45.26 | mikebledsoe | Ah, well a lot of things you wouldn't do Well I think that gives insight into what you enjoy not necessarily what your purpose or mission is but what what you like is like all right if I was gonna fail I might as well just set myself up in baha on the beach and surf you know, like if I'm guaranteed to fail. |
| 57:50.40 | Max Shank | I Would do nothing. |
| 57:53.97 | Max Shank | Oh. |
| 58:04.63 | Max Shank | So so what? what would I do if I'm guaranteed to fail is more like what it. What would I do if I could do like nothing ah professional is that is that what it is like how would I fuck off. |
| 58:04.91 | mikebledsoe | Least I'll you know live life like that. |
| 58:17.97 | mikebledsoe | Ah, yeah, yeah, that's where my mind goes when I hear that question. Well yeah, what would I do if I was guaranteed to fill. |
| 58:26.67 | Max Shank | I've never heard that question before um, maybe it what it really is what would you do? if you could never work again. Does that sound like ah the spirit of the question. |
| 58:33.75 | mikebledsoe | Um, yeah, doesn't sound as exciting. Yeah, same spirit but the other 1 seems a little more jarring. |
| 58:43.33 | Max Shank | Well, the first 1 I would do nothing the first 1 I don't understand it makes no sense to me. What would I what would I do if I knew I would fail if I knew I would fail I would not do the thing like the only reason you would do something is if you thought it had a percentage chance of success and that's. |
| 58:59.70 | mikebledsoe | That. |
| 59:02.15 | Max Shank | That's human nature that's desire. That's hunger. That's that's hope that's the only reason anyone ever does anything is because they think that there is at least a chance that it will be better if they do that thing. So if you know you're going to fail. You would never do it to. Non -question as far as I'm concerned. However I'd be happy to replace it for it. I think everyone will agree with me on this 1 um I think I think what would you do? if you could never work again. |
| 59:22.99 | mikebledsoe | Ah, it hit me up. Let me know let's see if everyone else receives it that way. |
| 59:39.56 | Max Shank | Is a good way to identify how you like to spend your time though. Um, and and do it detached from the result as much as Possible. You know, maybe you would sing. Maybe you would do some woodworking. Maybe you would do. Ah you know you would just surf all day. Maybe you would play music something like that I think that's a really good. Um I Think that's a good way of looking at it is like what would you do? if you couldn't work and what would you do. If ah, you could only pick 1 career and do that those ah those extremes feel like a good way to sort of surround your your truth. You know what? I mean. |
| 01:00:16.12 | mikebledsoe | Um, like that. |
| 01:00:29.80 | mikebledsoe | Ah I don't have a truth. No. |
| 01:00:30.94 | Max Shank | You don't have a truth I mean I think the truth is that we're the most adaptable creatures so you can change any time. It's just scary. It's just scary. That's that's the truth that I live by. |
| 01:00:41.93 | mikebledsoe | Our graph. |
| 01:00:48.71 | Max Shank | You know I see people do it when they're under huge amounts of strain they change dramatically and unless provoked that way they often don't people just ride the momentum and that kind of goes back to that programming thing because what we're doing is we're talking about programming ourselves for. Ambition essentially with this question and we're setting that ambitious intention and if you are able to program yourself every single day but you choose not to then you are relegated to. |
| 01:01:09.69 | mikebledsoe | Yeah, yeah. |
| 01:01:27.51 | Max Shank | The momentum of whatever the stories and stimuli that you've had and believed up to now. Yeah, anything you'd like to ah yeah, anything you'd like to add. |
| 01:01:34.70 | mikebledsoe | Well said wrap this bad boy up. |
| 01:01:47.28 | mikebledsoe | Ah I Love this exercise. What would you do with a billion dollars, get this dream. Big can be fun, especially if you're looking at the hedonistic aspects of what you can do with it. But when you get into the purpose and mission of Things. Ah. And like what max said going from a billion dollars to what we do with a million dollars and then looking at Wow is is this something that enough you know it being 20 coming into 2022 ah it being something that. You might be able to fundraise through a dao. Ah you know, maybe it's possible. So Hopefully this inspires you to do something that that ah excites you and and helps other people. All got how about you any final thoughts we good in. |
| 01:02:40.90 | Max Shank | Cool. Um, program yourself or pick a good program I think the exercise will help you discover where your ah truest desires really are and yeah, that's about it. You can find me at maxshank dot com at Maxshank. Mike you work and they find you. |
| 01:03:05.11 | mikebledsoe | Ah, mike underscore Bletzo on Instagram and the strongcoach dot com. Ah yeah, and you can jump in my program if you want if you want to program your business there. You go all right brother. Love you. |
| 01:03:18.00 | Max Shank | There you go Awesome! Thanks brother. Love you Bye everybody. |
| 01:03:24.39 | mikebledsoe | Enjoyed the talk. |
| 00:00.00 | Max Shank | Hey, everybody welcome back to Monday mornings with max and mike hope you guys had a lovely weekend today we are going to talk about the greatest invention in the history of mankind which. Is the written word. It allows us for intergenerational communication that compounds over time that sentence is insane when you think about it that is the reason that we were able to jump out of the food chain. Entirely it is because of the compound effect of our acquired knowledge and the fact that we were clever enough to write it down. Ah orcas for example, have their own language but they have to teach it from scratch every generation and. Are limited by what they can store in their brain and of course they have the second largest brain in the animal kingdom as I understand it and their brains actually are more wrinkly they have more folds ah than ours which is an indicator of ah more. Neurological connection. So imagine if they had thumbs and pen and paper they would probably have overcome us at some point so today we're going to talk about books why you should read how to read a book what you should read and maybe maybe even when to read so. Mikey. Thanks for joining me again. I'm looking forward to this as always. |
| 01:27.65 | mikebledsoe | Oh yeah, I'm excited about this topic I I was actually I suggested this topic and 1 of the things that inspired me was the my marketing team wanted the the top 10 books I read in the last year and ah that I that I'd be willing to talk about in an email or or something like that and so I go to make the list and I go I don't know if I read 10 books I ended up reading 14 books and I was actually surprised because I didn't feel like I was reading that much. And I think that happens when you and you're enjoying yourself. So ah yeah, I've not always been somebody who is an avid reader I used to go months without reading books I would read a chapter out of a book and then forget that I was reading it and it was. It was something that I stayed away from when I got out of school so coming from a place where you know in school we have to do a lot of reading if you're if you're actually doing the work which I'm 1 of those crazy people who who is a good student. And I was so sick and tired of reading and I my experience of reading was that I did not enjoy it and what I realized is a few months after I got out of college so I had I had done high school went in the Navy for 4 years |
| 02:45.69 | Max Shank | A. |
| 03:00.10 | mikebledsoe | Then started college so I got into reading a bunch of stuff I didn't want to read and I had this experience both times where I got to read some stuff I enjoyed and then when I started reading things that I had to read I stopped reading so much so I I did realize at 1 point I go oh. |
| 03:10.80 | Max Shank | Ah. |
| 03:18.57 | mikebledsoe | I I love reading when I'm reading what I want to read I don't like reading when I have to read it because it's signed so having been out of college for shit 13 years now I've i. Learn to really enjoy the process and sometimes I like to listen and sometimes I like to to read with my eyes depending on the topic usually. And yeah, it's it's been 1 of the biggest I mean you you hit the nail right in the head. It's a great way to gather information. And knowing which information to keep and which to throw out and being able to apply it to different contexts that is that is the skill in a time where information is at an all time high. So I imagine as we go through this. This conversation today. Some of what we'll be talking about is ah you know when we talk about how to read a book. It's how do you apply? it? How do you consume it? How do you digest it and how do you make sense of it because it's the it's the sense making. |
| 04:31.61 | Max Shank | No doubt I liked what you said about how many books because when I first came onto the scene as a fitness entrepreneur. |
| 04:31.87 | mikebledsoe | That is such a big challenge these days. |
| 04:44.82 | Max Shank | I Wanted to hang out with that cool crowd of people who are also fitness entrepreneurs and they were like hey I own a gym and I was like hey me too hey I wrote a book hey me too and we would like you you know that whole thing where everyone's like comparing what's going on. Oh I've been doing this many seminars. Ah I've been. I Read this many books I Just remember a conversation I was a part of where it it was like um it was like a dick measuring contest for how many books we had read and I just remember that it it struck me that I was like right right in there with that game. Um. |
| 05:09.82 | mikebledsoe | Yeah. |
| 05:19.51 | Max Shank | And it's interesting because that idea of more books is better is totally ridiculous because in order to succeed You don't need to know that many things and in fact, you're probably going to make more forward progress if you. Use what you know rather than getting more information I think almost anybody listening to this would agree that they know enough to be probably twice as successful or maybe even 3 to 10 times as successful as they are now. It's just that they don't. Ply those things So I remember when I was I Just remember when I was speaking at a seminar ah over the course of a weekend and it was a bunch of really smart guys and at the end there was a panel and we're up on stage and they're like what. |
| 05:56.86 | mikebledsoe | Got go ahead. |
| 06:14.65 | Max Shank | What book would you recommend we read and everybody's got their book recommendation and I'm listening to these recommendations and I was like oh hey us? Yeah I like that book too. That's pretty nice and then it got to me and they're like well max what book would you recommend I was like I would recommend that anyone who attended this seminar not read anything. For between thirty to ninety days because the whole reason you came here was to listen to our summary or our synthesis of everything we know so the last thing you want to do is deviate from applying what you've most recently learned and I like. Reading for entertainment as well. But it's important to realize that when you're reading something you're not living your own life either. So the amount that you read is certainly a good shortcut and I have read ah a ton because I'm naturally a curious person and I like. When things are synthesized and summarized in a very cohesive way. It's 1 of the reasons I don't listen to a lot of podcasts actually because it's very meandering and I would rather have the nice concise block that is the let's say summary. Of you know a 50 year career in psychology or training or something like that and that's where you get the huge leverage from a book. |
| 07:41.78 | mikebledsoe | Yeah I think it's a great point I remember hitting a point myself where I I had a I was in a meditation and there were no substances involved I know everyone's wondering. Ah, and I was in this. |
| 07:47.58 | Max Shank | What. |
| 07:58.98 | mikebledsoe | Meditation I was doing a bunch of ah Joe dispensive meditations actually and I was weeks into it and I had this meditation where I where I got a peek inside of my own mind and my own mind was a library with really high ceilings and just rows and rows of books. And it was dusty and there were cobwebs and it was hard to get around and it it was ah it was a movie that I was watching inside of my own mind it was I was in this observer state and I kick over 1 of the shelves and it hits another shelf and. It clears out the entire room the entire library just collapses and the dust settles and I have this incredible sense of relief that I I don't need to know anymore I don't need. |
| 08:49.16 | Max Shank | And. |
| 08:57.66 | mikebledsoe | There's nothing else I need to learn and I realized that the majority of the knowledge I had accumulated at that point I'm a very curious person as well. But there was also something else driving that. Um, which was I wanted to appear smart from when I was a little kid I. Wanted to avoid appearing to be dumb so because I because I felt like I was an idiot and I was homeschooled on top of that So I didn't have anyone actually compare myself to there was no reality check it was ah it gave me an opportunity to. |
| 09:18.26 | Max Shank | Same oh. |
| 09:34.32 | mikebledsoe | To really go deep into feeling like an idiot because I didn't know if I was smart or not and I I overcompensated and I read a lot and I think that that I already had some curiosity built in because that was my compensation. You know some people feel like an idiot and they. |
| 09:37.29 | Max Shank | Hit the. |
| 09:53.20 | mikebledsoe | Just go all in on being an idiot and decide not to learn anything. So what I what I realized in that moment was oh Wow A lot of what I've been studying is stuff that I don't actually enjoy learning about because I. |
| 09:54.14 | Max Shank | The. |
| 10:11.38 | mikebledsoe | I Think it's something that would be really good for me to know just in case. So I can appear to be smart. So I ended up studying a bunch of subjects that actually didn't matter to me at all and after that moment. Um, well I'd gone deeper into a lot of. |
| 10:19.68 | Max Shank | What were they? what were they. |
| 10:30.56 | mikebledsoe | Ah say exercise physiology I had gone deeper in a certain subjects where like I was I was pounding the same subject even though I already had what I needed to know to be able to operate the you know I needed I knew way more than I needed to know to do the thing like it'd be like ah. |
| 10:31.76 | Max Shank | Ah, yeah, right. |
| 10:45.74 | Max Shank | Totally yeah. |
| 10:48.68 | mikebledsoe | Being an astronaut and learning not an astronaut being ah being ah, a fucking you know single prop pilot and you know going and learning about what it's like to fly in space cause yeah, it's like it's like you don't need that I'm just flying around you know from City to City not to the moon. |
| 10:59.54 | Max Shank | Right. |
| 11:06.27 | Max Shank | Yeah I totally relate with you because it's almost as if in my experience the male ego maybe female ego also being stupid or not knowing feels vulnerable. |
| 11:07.52 | mikebledsoe | Or Mars or whatever. So. |
| 11:20.10 | mikebledsoe | M. |
| 11:22.61 | Max Shank | So it's like you're you're suddenly in the dark you're like in deep water and you're like oh my God I I don't know what I don't know what they're talking about I'm going to look so stupid and then I won't have any respect and then no woman will ever love me. Whatever it is right. |
| 11:35.18 | mikebledsoe | Yeah, well in the and the result the result after that was I didn't read anything for about a week and then I started I go oh I want to read this book on. It's a spiritual book I want to read this. |
| 11:43.97 | Max Shank | May. |
| 11:50.76 | Max Shank | Ah. |
| 11:53.60 | mikebledsoe | And before I wouldn't let myself do it because I didn't you know I was like ah had a lot of practical applications should I really spend the first hour of my day reading this thing that like's not going to make me more money when you know that's where I was focused at the time. |
| 12:03.20 | Max Shank | How dare you how dare you read something. That's not going to make you more money. How dare you but. |
| 12:09.34 | mikebledsoe | Ah, yeah, and at the time I was studying you know it was all about business and strategy and all the shit. So I um the result was I ended up reading after that and books I enjoyed I just went with whatever I enjoyed and what I what I. |
| 12:16.40 | Max Shank | Her. |
| 12:28.42 | mikebledsoe | What I noticed is I did end up coming back and reading some business books I did come back and end up reading some books that ah were scientific and and around exercise and round things I already knew a lot about but it it my approach to the reading shifted. Ah. Tremendously and so I enjoyed it more and then I look back and I go you know what? I probably read more since that moment than before that moment and and before it was work in order to read and afterwards it became pure enjoyment to read. |
| 12:55.25 | Max Shank | And. |
| 13:06.11 | Max Shank | Um, it sounds like it was curiosity driven instead of fear driven. Yeah I I relate. |
| 13:07.68 | mikebledsoe | And ah, yeah, just yeah, yeah, exactly yeah in this past weekend I was um I was in some training I took a gun fighter training course and which is basically. Ah, training with nine millimeter pistols and carbines for you know worst case scenarios you know inside a house getting out of your house in your car and we actually did some some shooting as a team it was it was a lot of fun and 1 of the things that. Ah, 1 of the guys afterwards 1 of the older guys. He pulls me aside and he goes he goes you really? I'm really impressed by how you learn and I go oh well, how is that like how are you perceiving you know how I learn. And he was like yeah you just you ask lots of questions you don't care about looking dumb and and you're incredibly focused on what you're doing and and I I go yeah and it got me thinking about oh I when I look at the people I was training with. I I do think I was probably learning a little bit faster than than a lot of them. Although everyone advanced from wherever they were at they advanced tremendously the the coaches we had over the weekend were amazing. But I I definitely ah had more energy at the end of the day. Everything seemed a bit easier for me and and it's not because I already knew what I was doing it had everything to do with you know I was only concerned about learning what was right in front of me and I didn't care about how I looked if I made them. You know the only mistake you don't want to make in those situations is shooting somebody. Like as long as I'm not shooting somebody or making making you know making it. You know you don't want to flag somebody. You don't want to point your gun at anybody whether you you don't want to do that either. That's a safety violation. So inside these boundaries of. |
| 15:17.19 | Max Shank | There's a more sinister mistake too though. There's a more sinister mistake of being afraid to ask questions. That's it I Think that's a mistake for sure. |
| 15:21.62 | mikebledsoe | There There is that 1 that that is a mistake and so yeah I was I was in high communication with the instructors the whole time I didn't care how I was perceived by the group is whether I was smart or not and. I I could actually see that in some of the other people you know they would shoot their guns and then they would look over their shoulder for validation and I actually coached the guy the next morning afterwards because him looking over his shoulder for validation was causing him to flag people with his pistol and I and I go I go look. |
| 15:45.44 | Max Shank | Ah. |
| 15:54.23 | Max Shank | Oh my god. |
| 15:59.00 | mikebledsoe | Like because I mean it's 1 of those things where like he might have been get asked to leave the range and I was like I was like hey man, let's talk through this and I give him some coaching tips and after that he he improved tremendously. Um, but yeah, that was 1 of the things too I noticed is like this. It was very loud in that experience of of this guy's seeking validation as he turns around to look for it His fucking weapon is being drawn across 5 people and everyone's going Whoa I Go Wow that that seeking validation thing. |
| 16:33.33 | Max Shank | Yeah, that his insecurity. |
| 16:33.44 | mikebledsoe | Could kill somebody in this scenario. So yeah, his insecurity. So um, that's another thing. Yeah I think we've been dancing around that topic basically is yeah, there's Insecurity Driven education is. Is going to be really slow and difficult. It's It's just yeah. |
| 16:51.97 | Max Shank | It's fear based and it's fear based rather than curiosity based I think part of the reason you're so jazzed up and energized after the fact is you're legitimately interested. You're engaged. You're interested. You're not going to fatigue in that state. But if someone were trying to teach you something you don't want to learn in the first place it made you sit in a chair all day. Of course you're gonna feel fatigued I mean I'm I'm very similar in learning except I actually think I learned a little bit slower. Um, but I usually get. |
| 17:13.74 | mikebledsoe | Move. |
| 17:26.83 | Max Shank | Private lessons for stuff and I shy away from group classes because I don't want to hold up the flow of the class too long but I I hear this phrase a lot when I'm taking lessons. Wow I've never heard that question before because I'll just keep digging. |
| 17:28.69 | mikebledsoe | Ah, so. |
| 17:43.71 | Max Shank | To really figure out like why am I actually doing this and sometimes even a very experienced teacher it it kind of goes back to well that was what the other guy said so learning like if I don't know why I'm doing it just it's hard for me to buy in the same way. |
| 17:55.46 | mikebledsoe | Yeah, yeah. |
| 18:03.39 | Max Shank | So I think that's 1 of the huge advantages of learning in person is you can't ask those questions unlike a book. |
| 18:11.27 | mikebledsoe | But yeah, well I think this next point will get to the book as well. Which is ah I had fantastic instructors. 1 of the things they were saying the whole time was ask me why I will never get mad at you for asking me why we're doing something and. |
| 18:23.65 | Max Shank | Ah. |
| 18:29.82 | mikebledsoe | They were more interested in teaching us how to think about situations and in a tactical sense than to just teach us how to do these maneuvers so 1 of the things that I think is really the thing we need to look at first when you're selecting. What you're going to read is who wrote the book. So for me over the past weekend my instructor I go who is going to train me oh a 20 year command master chief navy seal who's done you know a dozen deployments and had a pretty long kill list like oh. If I ask that guy why we're doing this maneuver or whatever it is. We're doing. He's going to give me a really good answer and he was also open to being challenged. so I think but when when I so when I choose to read a book I like to think about who that person is what their life is like. And what it is that they're actually an expert in and what they're not an expert in because I've watched authors ah be an expert in 1 field and then stray outside of that and I go more into maybe something I know a lot about I go ah, you know what you were right? when you were over here. But when you got over here, you kind of. And it's good to be aware of who this person is. |
| 19:44.54 | Max Shank | It's tricky though too because then you also can fall into the appeal to authority or the ad homineym fallacies right? because a lot of the time. In fact, 1 of the books that I'm going to recommend today is an author. But he's also very intelligent in a lot of other areas and so it's kind of like in ancient egypt they would hold trials in the dark because they didn't want the um arbiters to be swayed by what the person looked like which I have this little phrase. Ah. How can you take something at face value if it's attached to a face. So I think really good ideas can stand alone regardless of who wrote the idea. |
| 20:22.62 | mikebledsoe | Ah. |
| 20:30.73 | mikebledsoe | Yeah, well when we're when I agree that and when we're swimming in in an infinite amount of books to read I'm gonna I'm gonna choose based on you know, well 1 1 of the things is who who are we learning from? yeah. |
| 20:39.81 | Max Shank | Um, yeah, totally you want to learn from the best right. |
| 20:49.50 | mikebledsoe | And 1 thing I Want to mention before we dig in because I want to dig in but I I wish I remember who there was a story being told recently and I heard this and there was somebody was sitting in this really intelligent guy's office and looking around his library Ph D type thing. And they go Wow. Your library is vast I've never seen a personal library So Big. You must have a lot of knowledge and then the guy responds This is not a sick. This does not signify my knowledge it signifies my desire and. |
| 21:23.53 | Max Shank | Peace Boom again. |
| 21:24.44 | mikebledsoe | A library is a signifier of desire not of knowledge and when I heard that story I said I said to myself. That's that's spot on. You know youre if you got a I've got quite a few books haven't read half of them. But. Maybe I will at some point. |
| 21:44.23 | Max Shank | It kind of makes me want to point out the tool Belt knowledge analogy again versus the toolbox knowledge tool beltt knowledge is something you can whip out anytime anywhere you know it forwards and backwards left and right. |
| 21:52.47 | mikebledsoe | And. |
| 22:04.13 | Max Shank | If something comes up in conversation. You're like Boom I know this bit of information and then there's toolbox knowledge where if someone jogs your memory about it. You have a familiarity with it and when it comes to reading books you have to accept the fact that even if you're. You know some sort of insane memory What do you What are you gonna retain 1015 percent especially if you only read it once. So as for myself I'm reading a lot of books multiple times I will often read a book and then. Go right back to page 1 and read through it again without going to a different book I'll read book 1 and then I'll finish the book and I'll be like huh that was really good I'm going to read it again right now while it's still fresh and see if I can get this information to concreize. But the truth is. If. You don't apply the knowledge. It goes away and you can't you can't remember a whole bookshelf. It's impossible. |
| 23:04.82 | mikebledsoe | Yeah, well quote I like to use frequently too is learning is behavior change. So if you don't put it to use. You didn't actually learn it. You just you may remember the words. |
| 23:15.81 | Max Shank | Hello. |
| 23:24.58 | mikebledsoe | Because that's all your that's all you unless you've applied it. That's all you have is you remember the words you remember the order of these words. Other than that, you really don't know shit so ah in order for to be in your tool belt like you're talking about it. It's something that has to be implemented. |
| 23:30.33 | Max Shank | First. |
| 23:41.14 | Max Shank | Well and you can never step in the same river twice because it's not the same river and you're not the same man. So I'm sure you felt the same way you read a book 5 years later you read the same book and it feels completely different. You're picking up totally different things. You're like whoa. Where was I when I read this last time I don't remember any of this this didn't resonate with me at all and now it's like like blowing my mind. |
| 24:09.57 | mikebledsoe | Oh yeah, yeah, there's a several books I've I've read a couple times that that I will probably keep reading every 2 to 3 years for for couple more decades who know all right? So let's dig into what? ah. Let's just go book by Book. Let's have you share a book and then we'll ah love to basically like do a mini interview with you about. |
| 24:34.33 | Max Shank | Should we do a why why? Why read? you should read to change your behavior or for entertainment and if and if you're reading a book that doesn't change your behavior then it was just entertainment and why are you bothering. |
| 24:43.11 | mikebledsoe | Love it. |
| 24:52.33 | Max Shank | That's that's why it's difficult for me to recommend books to people because I think the whole point is either to be entertained or to actually yield some behavior change. Ah otherwise like you know why are you reading 1 hundred business books shouldn't like. 2 be sufficient or or 1 good 1. |
| 25:10.16 | mikebledsoe | Yeah I like reading for entertainment I'm gonna I'm gonna list some books off I read for entertainment but got massive practical ah practical advice from the book. Basically and I noticed that I thought about things differently when it's an autobiography. So was autobiography for enjoyment. This is Mark twain's yeah autobiography um, you know and he wrote it I guess I'll fucking jump I was gonna I was gonna ask you first year book but I'm gonna start. So um, the the book. |
| 25:30.49 | Max Shank | So nonfiction. Oh Mark twain's okay, cool. |
| 25:39.16 | Max Shank | Ah, you start you start. |
| 25:48.22 | mikebledsoe | Ah, my favorite book that I read this year for pure entertainment was mark twain's autobiography. Ah, it's called roughing it and the story of his life is hilarious. There's just there's just tons up. You know we think back to Mark twain and 1 of the. Greatest literary artist american literary artists right? He was like the first american writer is is how he's commonly referred to and and I think a lot of times people think about huck finn and and all this in the Mississippi river and all this stuff when they think about Mark twain. But I'm reading his autobiography and he he's he goes to the west coast to mine for gold like he goes to Nevada he goes to california and he has the worst of luck just there's a story after story of him getting shit on and it's hilarious because the way that Mark twain writes is he can. Use very few words and you can picture the scene in your head and he says it in a way that you've never heard it before and it and it immediately causes visions to come so super super enjoyable and 1 of the benefits I got out of that book is just. |
| 26:54.42 | Max Shank | The. |
| 27:01.31 | mikebledsoe | Listening to his hardship and how much failure he had was a good reminder that. Ah, even if we experienced a lot of failure early on there's nothing to say you can't beat end up being like 1 of the greatest writers of all time or the greatest of anything of all time and you know the the thing that stuck out to me is. Even when he was mining and stuff like that he was picking up reporting jobs. He was always writing he was always. He would always go back to that and do some writing and he might he had this dream that he was always going to fucking strike it big and he was going to be. You know he talks about his ego in the book and how like when he had a lot of money. Cause there were times where he had a lot of money and he would blow it. He would just be like yeah I bought these fancy suits I would go to these these operas that I didn't really enjoy but I acted like I enjoyed them and and he's like I don't understand what the fuck is going on he eats all this fancy food and then like a month later he can't even afford a piece of bread. You know and that was it was that was Mark twain's life and this was during a time where like there wasn't homeless shelters. You know if if you fucked up in carson city Nevada ah you you know someone might take some pity on you but like you're out there in the. It was the wild wild west so I really enjoyed his book. In fact, there's about fifteen percent of the book I've I've yet to finish I've just been consuming it chapter here chapter there and whenever I need to relax the mind and get some chuckles in but it's it's. For me. The practical application has been just having a lot more ease in my life because sometimes something comes up and I go I just think about the story I read last night about Mark twain and how he almost died out in the cold because they got lost 10 feet from you know the hotel and it's just. Anyways, so that that 1 I highly recommend is just a lot of fun. |
| 28:58.43 | Max Shank | Ah, to check that out. You do it on audio or reading it. Yeah. |
| 29:01.72 | mikebledsoe | I got I my I'm I'm reading it? Yeah ah things I want to read slowly I Just ah I read that? Um, but yeah. |
| 29:10.80 | Max Shank | I like being told a story on Audiobook but if it's something that I'm going to reference a lot I like to read it with my eyeballs. Um, cool. Yeah, it kind of goes to show how much stories shape our reality i. |
| 29:16.19 | mikebledsoe | Yeah. |
| 29:29.76 | Max Shank | Sure I sound like a broken record but stories and stimuli are what shape us simple is that forces on our body. The things that we remember how we frame those experiences. That's what shapes our reality and a lot of writing if it. I Hate say only if it only eases your suffering That's huge actually because when you are in a state of fight or flight. You're not healing yourself So you're You're not going to be able to get into that you know wizard level Cerebral. Or Neocortex ah thinking and planning and conscious action rather than ah instinctive reflex out of Fear. So That's huge so those stories can permeate our being Or. Just be an easing of our suffering for a short time. |
| 30:30.30 | mikebledsoe | Yeah, yeah, how about you? What's what's ah but but you want to start with. |
| 30:36.90 | Max Shank | Um, well actually the first 1 is ah by a comedian named norm mcdonald and it's his book. Ah based on a true story a memoir and what's really interesting is. He was a huge fan of Mark twain. He talked about Mark twain a lot and he will he in the book or I should say in an interview he said it's not facts, but it's truth which I thought was really funny so he didn't. Just write a story of his life. He wrote about the truths of life that he had experienced that weren't necessarily factual. Um, because as he said you know most of my life has just been finding and consuming food. And it doesn't make for a riveting read and um, he's my favorite comedian I think he's so Funny. He's so Smart. He always pretended to be really dumb and would you know get interviewed and say yeah I've read like about 6 books in my life. Meanwhile he's like. You know, dostoyevsky and reading like all of these like gargantuan tombs about life and death and religion and philosophy and just total genius but you never knew it because he didn't want it to take away from the comedy anyway, his book. Based on a true story is hilarious I've listened to it a few times. It's 1 of those that's actually read by the author and it's it's so funny. It just makes me laugh and it makes me think about. 1 of the things I like about comedy is it lets you think about the most horrible things in a lighthearted way and it sounds like that's what twain does also like he makes ah being like totally poverty stricken or on the ropes essentially. |
| 32:36.71 | mikebledsoe | E. |
| 32:47.16 | Max Shank | Ah seem kind of okay and I think that's 1 yeah, it's it's 1 of the things that um gives us the power to carry on. You know that that hope and. |
| 32:50.80 | mikebledsoe | Comical. |
| 33:01.67 | Max Shank | Taking things with a light heart when you said the first american writer I kind of thought maybe that's what the essence of that is um and I'm I'm not well read enough with other. Ah. International authors to really understand the difference but it seems like there's more of like a sardonic and ah comical and quiplike kind of american irreverence that goes along with that to me. So. |
| 33:31.76 | mikebledsoe | Yeah, yeah, well I mean the the west Love it. Love it And yeah, he's ah well he spent a lot of time on the West Coast and the West coast is known for being irreverent. |
| 33:36.45 | Max Shank | Anyway, nor Mcdonald based on a true story hilarious I've listened to it several times. |
| 33:49.50 | Max Shank | All right? My key book to. |
| 33:51.60 | mikebledsoe | That's ah, that's 1 of the benefits of it. Ah, all, let me all right book 2 I'm gonna go with the Sovereign individual. So the first 1 is entertainment I've got my my book list and in. 2021 in the 3 categories is philosophy business or enjoyment and the sovereign individual falls under philosophy which for me is entertainment but again a lot of practical application there because with philosophy what I like about these philosophical books is. They're taking a generally take a macro view of of how the world works and a lot gives us space to know how to position ourselves. Well I'll say this for myself reading the Sovereign individual. It really informed me how to position myself as time goes on in this book. What they do is they wrote it in the they was published in the year 2000 it with the intention of predicting what was going to happen between the year 2000 and 2025 and as I was reading this book I got chills I got hairs were standing up on my neck. It was incredible. How spot on they were and they opened up the book because what's funny is if they knew that people were going to be reading this in 2021 they wouldn't have to give as much explanation as they did at and the beginning of the book first half of the book is really dedicated to the previous 2000 years and it looks at 500 year cycles and looks at big shifts in. Ah, power being centralized and decentralized and they they really look at the when the berlin wall fell. Ah, it was really the falling of the nation state. So this idea that these governments are in charge and so on and so forth they made the comparison to. |
| 35:40.49 | Max Shank | And. |
| 35:57.87 | mikebledsoe | Well you when you ask somebody ah world history and you go you know when did the roman empire fall that was a lot of people say you know four 1080 but it really it really when we look back on it. We could say it really lost. Steam around 500 a but but people were acting like it was still. You know in full force an 800 a d even though it was just kind of very surface level. It was still going but it didn't hold the same power and so they really painted a picture of. Nation state losing power due to technology decentralizing ah safety the protection of assets especially when assets become digital There's just this whole There's this whole um era coming and is we're we're in the the. Infancy stage of this decentralization and ah they they talk about in the book they call it cyber currencies so you know year two thousand bitcoin didn't arrive in what oh 8 till eight zero nine I think maybe oh 7 is when it. You know the founder started figuring it out. But ah, you know they they call it cyber currencies in the book. But the way they describe how these currencies will behave and how they'll be autonomous in some way ah was very predictive and in fact. what they described and what is reality the reality of cryptocurrencies at this point is is way more sophisticated than they were predicting because of course it didn't exist so how could they be? How could they comment too far on it but they did. They did note the results of there being ah cryptocurrencies. Ah, they predicted um, ah that there would be a bacterial or viral pandemic and that the media would behave the way it did they predicted race riots and wars. Um. And the context in which they talk about these things is what gives you chills. It's like yeah anyone can predict these things like there's gonna be pandemics. There's gonna be riots. That's that's part of human history. You don't have to be a genius to say. Yeah that's probably gonna happen. But the way in which it happened and the way they described why these things will. |
| 38:10.47 | Max Shank | And. |
| 38:26.92 | mikebledsoe | Happen the way they happen is pretty incredible and 1 of the things that they talk about in the book is ah governments because they're losing power and they lose control over the currency will you know government rules by 1 mean 1 method and that is violence right. Do as I say or else I'll put you in a cage or kill you and so ah, yeah, that's how it enforces there's There's no other like that when when it gets down to it. They have a monopoly on you know that that entity has a monopoly on violence and so be. |
| 38:49.60 | Max Shank | Um, well, that's how it enforces. |
| 39:05.17 | mikebledsoe | When you have an organization that that's always the last resort well as as it as it gets closer to losing more and more power. It's just going to become more violent so 1 of the things they talked about was you know there'll be a lot of smaller communities and h oas will include security and they they basically. Also noted that since the 80 s the amount of private security being employed is way up. Private security is a huge industry and you know if someone goes oh when are we going to start having to have private security. It's you know the reality is you already have it and um and. Or you may not have it personally. But it's probably you you it you get the it's prevalent and you're you're probably enjoying it I mean when I went to a store last night. There wasn't 2 cops sitting in front of the grocery store with guns. It's 2 security guards you know, ah the the the local government is supposed to hire police in order to. |
| 39:47.12 | Max Shank | It's prevalent. |
| 40:03.40 | mikebledsoe | Keep crime down but you know they can't do that well enough so they got to hire private security. So no, so um, anyways, they basically outline that they talked about the steps ahead and and that book was actually very. |
| 40:07.75 | Max Shank | A can't be everywhere all at once. |
| 40:22.70 | mikebledsoe | Relaxing for me to read in a lot of ways because it was I'm watching the world go through this chaotic thing and then it really did a good job of saying look look back 2000 years we're looking forward 25 years and maybe a little beyond that you know this is really just ah ah a frame. In history. It's not It's not the rest of your life. It's not this and that and and also it really instilled. You know we're not going back. We're we're definitely just progressing forward towards something and these are all the things that are going to happen as we we go there and. It may not necessarily be an easy path forward. But the thing you really have to because of the way what technology is an impacting culture the necessity for personal responsibility is at an all time high I mean that's what the the book is called the Sovereign individual is because if you if you don't want to be a slave. And the future you have to be sovereign and in order to be sovereign means that you have to educate yourself on technology. You have to educate yourself on protection and security physical protection and security. You have to educate yourself on these things or else. You're subject to like the government's not going to protect you anymore is basically what they're saying like you're gonna you're gonna have to create your own little tribe and you're gonna have to use technology and all this stuff to take charge of your own protection. So um, 1 of the things that motivated me to do the training I did last weekend this past weekend is I go. |
| 41:56.60 | Max Shank | Ah. |
| 41:58.86 | mikebledsoe | I'm looking at the book and I go yeah it could ah you know ah America in this time is actually a very safe place. Still um, it's relatively if you look at human history lot less murder a lot less a lot of things. Um I think in the last couple years |
| 42:07.71 | Max Shank | Relatively? yeah. |
| 42:16.45 | Max Shank | Yeah, super rare still well and what's funny about that? Well what's interesting about that I guess it's not funny about that is the dramatic difference. |
| 42:18.60 | mikebledsoe | Um, homicides are way up, especially where awesome tax is up 1 hundred and seventy five percent homicides this year |
| 42:33.67 | Max Shank | Between how many people kill themselves versus each other I mean whenever whenever anyone wants to talk to me about how like a place is dangerous I'm like dude like what people kill themselves with fritos people kill themselves with a toaster in the tub like it. |
| 42:35.51 | mikebledsoe | Right. |
| 42:51.80 | Max Shank | And you know like I said sometimes fast sometimes slow but people kill themselves like way way more. So if anything we should be like more afraid of ourselves than we should be of other people If if we're going to like follow the statistics right. |
| 43:02.41 | mikebledsoe | Yeah, well well well a good example of this. Yeah, you're right is yeah I like to go down to columbia and columbia is not necessarily the safest country in the world. Um I've encountered a couple things down there I mean I've been down there maybe a total of. |
| 43:11.47 | Max Shank | Ah. |
| 43:20.56 | Max Shank | A. |
| 43:20.56 | mikebledsoe | 3 or four months at this point I've made 3 different trips and yeah I've run into a riot I've had some people follow me I have you know there's there's been a few times where I thought I was gonna end up in a fight um and it was really just cause I was in the wrong place at the wrong time and you know after you're there for a bit you learn how to you know. |
| 43:33.12 | Max Shank | Ah. |
| 43:40.15 | Max Shank | Right. |
| 43:40.70 | mikebledsoe | Navigate yourself to avoid those things but um, you know there people at home are going. Oh you gotta be careful and's like it's like this is the same person who is overweight eating ice cream before bed watching Jeopardy or something like that. It's just they're not like yeah but you're not living like you're. |
| 43:54.65 | Max Shank | Ah. |
| 44:00.30 | mikebledsoe | Like to your point probably killing yourself slowly whereas I'm just taking a little bit of a risk over here. |
| 44:02.89 | Max Shank | Yeah, right? And who's who's to say that it's It's better to live like a really really long time sadly than a short time Happily you know that's it's hard to quantify. |
| 44:14.53 | mikebledsoe | Yeah, yeah I think Ellenlan Watts Alan Watts has a tough thing about that and if aen said it then it's it's true. |
| 44:21.55 | Max Shank | I mean he was a hardcore alcoholic but I like a lot of his ideas I mean that's why you you got to take everything with a grain of salt and that's why um a certain book. Might be the opposite of what you need to hear like a certain book could be fantastic for you. It could bring you to better action and I could read the same book and it could be devastatingly bad if I believe it because you and I are different people So to your point earlier. So. |
| 44:54.82 | mikebledsoe | Yeah, yeah, context matters. |
| 44:59.47 | Max Shank | Sovereign individual read it so you can defend yourself and when I think about um situations like that I think there are really only a couple important things you need to be able to defend yourself physically. Um, you need a community. Of people you know, love and trust and you need to be able to create value and that and that's a big 1 because no matter what the economy does if you are valuable then you'll basically always be okay. |
| 45:28.50 | mikebledsoe | Many. |
| 45:34.47 | mikebledsoe | Absolutely absolutely. Ah, um, by the way just on the on the notion of value just so this book out there the last safe investment I didn't read this this past year but to max's point the last safe investments all about how to it. |
| 45:38.70 | Max Shank | Ah. |
| 45:53.83 | mikebledsoe | It talks about 21 I think 21 or 22 different types of labor that you could develop yourself in that would be valuable and they they basically steer you away from the ones that are not that valuable and steer you towards the ones that are super valuable for example, copywriting is in there as 1 of the most valuable. So. Max you write and to that book's point ah the most valuable thing that you can have and when it comes to financial. It doesn't matter what the currency is or what's going on in the world if you can produce value for other people. Yeah, you should never go hungry. |
| 46:27.75 | Max Shank | Yeah I mean bitcoin and gold could both go to zero bullets probably won't though I don't think Bullets ever go to zero. Um all right shall I do 1 you did 2 books in a row by the way. |
| 46:30.95 | mikebledsoe | Yeah. |
| 46:36.73 | mikebledsoe | Um, Bulletin seeds. Yeah yeah, what's your next book. Yeah, let's go now I just do 1 in that wasn't when I read this year it doesn't count. |
| 46:46.23 | Max Shank | It's not fair. Ah I just threw an extra 1 in guess your opinion is more important than mine trouble in Paradise over here folks. We made it nineteen episodes. |
| 46:54.69 | mikebledsoe | I I look I'm older than you I'm allowed to do these things I. |
| 47:02.37 | Max Shank | Oh nice appeal to age authority very good I think you might be losing it though time is ticking. My friend time is on my side. Um, okay well I'm gonna do 2 books then also and I'm gonna really. |
| 47:10.56 | mikebledsoe | Of course I'm losing it. |
| 47:20.66 | Max Shank | And I'm going to relate them together because they're similar but ah, monumentally different in the same way. So I read a book this year that is actually out this year called how to live and it is 27 conflicting answers. And 1 weird conclusion I really like the format of this book because each chapter says you know this is how to live and then the whole chapter is about that and it's by a guy named derek sivers who started a cdbaby. He also wrote a book called anything you want. I really like the way he writes and his his chapters for how how to live are do nothing think long term master something pursue pain do whatever you want now. So they're all conflicting ideas. But that's how life is. |
| 48:15.50 | mikebledsoe | Yeah. |
| 48:18.73 | Max Shank | It's a bunch of paradoxes but he spent 4 years working on the book and it's it's a short read, but it's beautifully done. It's very concise. It's exactly what I am looking for in a book I get to essentially consume his suffering to make it concise. So I can get these ideas in their most purest form fully refined. Um, no wasted words. So I loved it. I think it speaks to me personally because the question of how to live is very conflicting. And it depends on the individual. some people are so over the top arrogant that they're going to burn themselves and some people are so um insecure and lacking confidence that they're never going to take that step forward. There's going to prepare prepare forever. So. Everybody needs to hear something a little bit different I thought these chapters were fantastic I'm interested in juxtaposing that book with another book that I re reread which is tools of titans which is a gargantuan book. Full of some of the top performers in the world in different areas, physical feats business feeds technology. Um, and there's a lot of differences. In their advice and I think that's what makes it good and that's what made me think of that book in relation to this book how to live because it's stories that you can relate to and be like oh that's how that guy did it and it's just little bites and books. As I mentioned should inspire some sort of action. So whenever I'm writing something it should inspire action I don't really like writing if it's not going to inspire action. Frankly I find writing kind of painful sometimes anyway so if it's not going to. Inspire action in somebody I'm not going to bother I'm going to go take a walk essentially so I think the the stories um the chapters in how to live by Derek sivers are fantastic I think it will make you think differently and. |
| 50:35.40 | mikebledsoe | Yeah. |
| 50:49.98 | Max Shank | It's each chapter is its own little book and it's really beautifully done So how to live by Derek sivers and that's ah with an s s I V E R S That's a great book. Very easy read to. |
| 51:04.74 | mikebledsoe | Beautiful. |
| 51:09.92 | Max Shank | Now we're even 3 each now we're even I'm keeping score by the way I'm also keeping score of how many minutes each of each of us talks. So we get equal time because we believe in equality here folks. |
| 51:11.47 | mikebledsoe | Now We're even all right I'll go Okay, good. Well I'm um, um, I'm curious. Are you taking notes about are you taking the time down when I say something brilliant so we can cut it out for a video. Ah yeah, that was a softball all right? ah. |
| 51:28.15 | Max Shank | Um. |
| 51:33.76 | Max Shank | I'm still waiting for you to say something brilliant I do have my pen here though. |
| 51:42.33 | mikebledsoe | We've got my my um, my favorite business book of the year was incredibly practical and that is 1 hundred million dollars offers by alex hermosi now I want to I want to say this alex hormosey also wrote a book called jim launch secrets. He comes from the fitness industry and you know I learned about how he did his his tactics and I'm not really a big fan of the tactics he used and growing gym memberships and things like that I think that? yeah. That's all I'm gonna say about that I just want to I want to throw that out and to max's point early in the show if I were only going off of what I had already prejudged the author on I wouldn't have picked his book up because I already had a judgment about how he does things and then and and. Ah, 2 people 2 really intelligent friends of mine in one week they suggested to read his book so I pick it up and this is the beauty of having a kindle is I can usually get books at you know, half the price or maybe even a quarter of the price and I don't have to wait for it and I can. Lot of times I can read the preview ahead of time and that's what sold me on this I I got to read the first chapter and I go. Okay, this is going to go somewhere that book 1 hundred million dollar offers I have never seen anyone after reading it I realized that I never consumed a resource on offers by themselves. I'd study a lot of marketing I'd study a lot of business and offers usually fits inside of this marketing chat. So. It's like a chapter in a marketing book or it's a it's a module or a week during a marketing course and alex where Mosey is the guy's ah a fucking genius and he's built. I think over five companies at this point over 100 million dollars and and different industries at that and so um, it's 1 thing for someone. Um, you know, build a business that makes 1 hundred million dollars. But it's another thing to do it to do 5 and I think he's with 32 or 33 years old so really young guy. Um. Super sharp and 1 thing I really liked about his book as well is he had a an online course. Companion. So if you if you get the book. It's got little link at the he does a little lead magnet type thing. Um technically not lead magnet because he doesn't even collect your email address. So um, anyways I read that book and it really helped me and it was just perfectly packaged in the right order it. It's you just follow from chapter to chapter and by the end you're going to have a solid offer and you're going to understand what it is you offer your customers and your customers are going to understand. |
| 54:28.64 | mikebledsoe | But you're offering them and they're going to feel as though you're solving their problem which is exactly why they're going to hire you or they buy a product anyway. So hundred million dollar offers by alex or Mosey favorite business book of the year |
| 54:41.27 | Max Shank | That is 1 hell of testimonial and it's also a testament to how information is still valuable even though it's ubiquitous or even though it is everywhere information is free. It's everywhere. But you can still make information extremely valuable if you put it together in a format that is really easy to digest. Nice. |
| 55:06.19 | mikebledsoe | Yeah, the beauties and the packaging. All right, You're up. What do we got? He's looking around. Yeah. |
| 55:15.95 | Max Shank | I'm up. Ah another book I read this year was I have ah I have like a little list here but I also have a couple of books I'm trying to decide because I don't want to? um I want to do too many because I know we're getting close to the wire. But um. |
| 55:30.54 | mikebledsoe | Why you probably just running out of books you read this year |
| 55:35.80 | Max Shank | You know what. |
| 55:38.99 | Max Shank | I can only I can't read actually I only listen to audiobooks ah now I'll recommend um I have 2 more that I really want to recommend so the travels by Michael crichton. |
| 55:50.28 | mikebledsoe | Ah. |
| 55:55.67 | Max Shank | And I reread it every year since I had a recommended to me by a good friend of mine and it's amazing travels by Michael creton. He's a um, super prolific author he covers it all. Travels he talks about um, you know going to medical school and seeing like the psychiatric wards and traveling to all these different places and nearly dying several times and um, he's. Just a fascinating individual. He goes into the ah physics and metaphysical plane and he just dives right in it kind of reminded me of richard feynman's book a little bit surely. You must be joking Mr. Feynman but travels by Michael crichton. Is absolutely fantastic. He talks about the travels externally and travels internally and relationships and science and I know I've recommended some of his stuff in the podcast before especially his. A little lecture called the state of fear which talk about prophetic for for what's happening right now. But michael crichton travels excellent book worth reading worth rereading. He's awesome. |
| 57:20.91 | mikebledsoe | Yeah, you recommended a video for me to watch of his a lecture. He gave an hour long presentation that was just not only was it enjoyable but it was it was kind of kind of like the sovereign individual is relieving in some way in some ways and. |
| 57:37.47 | Max Shank | Earth. |
| 57:39.89 | mikebledsoe | Really pointing out really where a lot of bullshit exists in the world and the media and and how he really explains how things get out of control. Um, and so as far as how narratives get out of control and yeah. |
| 57:43.87 | Max Shank | Oh yeah. |
| 57:56.53 | Max Shank | Yeah, he goes over it in such a calm way too. There's like humor in it and he's like yeah of course then this happens and you know he's just talking about like horrible things. Ah that are happening but he's doing it in a very lighthearted manner which I like. |
| 57:59.43 | mikebledsoe | Super cool. Yeah, he's chuckling the whole time. |
| 58:12.91 | mikebledsoe | Yeah, yeah, yeah, it's It's really nice to have someone who's ah like an M D Ph D That's confirming some of ah your biases. But. |
| 58:15.51 | Max Shank | It makes you feel a little bit less alone doesn't it. |
| 58:27.45 | Max Shank | Ah. |
| 58:31.62 | mikebledsoe | Um, let's see we'll do a couple more books and then I'll ah we'll put the rest on the blog that doesn't exist yet. So but I may if it if it does exist and you're listening to this I'll put it here at the end. |
| 58:44.94 | Max Shank | It after. |
| 58:50.58 | mikebledsoe | I haven't bought the domain yet I don't think. |
| 58:51.48 | Max Shank | You don't want to read too many books either. You want to read a few good ones and then reread them and take good notes about them and write in the margins I mean here's a quick intermission you got to rewrite these ideas in your own words if you want to remember them. |
| 58:58.79 | mikebledsoe | That's true. |
| 59:07.93 | mikebledsoe | Yeah. |
| 59:10.61 | Max Shank | Go ahead and and make notes inside of the book too. That's what those little margins are for it might not be what they're for, but that use the margins to highlight things and yeah exactly I used to try to keep them really pristine now I just write all over them because it makes you. |
| 59:19.20 | mikebledsoe | It's your book. You can do whatever you want. |
| 59:27.52 | Max Shank | Ah, helps you remember the information a lot better. |
| 59:28.30 | mikebledsoe | Yeah, um, yeah let's do 1 more each and then we'll call it a day ah and outwitting the devil was would be ah another 1 at top of my list and outwitting the devil. Is by Napoleon hill he wrote how to think and grow rich. Ah rich. You know that's what he's most known for because that book was published maybe in what the thirty s or forty s and it's been commonly referenced if I go to a business networking. |
| 59:57.97 | Max Shank | Something like that long time ago. |
| 01:00:06.27 | Max Shank | It's still a good buck. It's still a good book. |
| 01:00:06.83 | mikebledsoe | Event. It's people are referencing it all the time and it's practically a hundred years old. And yeah, so that's thing and grow rich is what he's known for. There's a book called outwitting the devil that he wrote back in the thirty s |
| 01:00:11.94 | Max Shank | Hundred years later almost amazing. |
| 01:00:26.60 | mikebledsoe | Early forty s and never was published until 2009 and when you read the book. You'll understand why it wasn't published and in fact, it required him passing and I think 1 of his children passing before it could. |
| 01:00:26.70 | Max Shank | Um, ah, whoa. |
| 01:00:45.85 | mikebledsoe | See the light of day and so the book is called outwitting the devil and it is quite the commentary on human nature and on culture as a whole and how ah groups of people. Um. Behave and how the majority of people are just drifting through life and if you're just drifting the devil has got yeah and talks about how to think for yourself and has warnings about different things to come and. Which there's some. There's a lot of really insightful and interesting things in that book I enjoyed reading it every book I've mentioned so far I smiled I giggled I I I got excited as I read these books so I hope you do too all right? come by. But your last 1 max. |
| 01:01:45.14 | Max Shank | Outwitting the devil out outwitting the devil itself sounds kind of like outwitting yourself was the first thing I thought when you even said the title. Um, so I read ah I read a comic book. It was ah I think it was the the the prehistory of the far side by Gary larson. The guy who did the far side comics. Um, it was just funny is hilarious I thought those comics were really good. |
| 01:02:12.15 | mikebledsoe | E. |
| 01:02:21.31 | Max Shank | I Think that the fact that he frequently switches the roles between humans and animals is really funny like when you have animals doing human-like things. It seems very absurd and quite macabre. Also and I thought that was really funny. Um another but an actual book I liked was guns germs and steel which I doubled down I doubled down ah guns germs and steel because it gives you. |
| 01:02:47.53 | mikebledsoe | Oh now you're now you're now you've got 1 up on me. |
| 01:02:58.77 | Max Shank | A little I mean I don't know if it's more honest like where I'm at as far as history is concerned is it's just his story like whoever wins the War writes the history books So I don't really believe too much of. |
| 01:03:08.78 | mikebledsoe | Are. |
| 01:03:16.22 | Max Shank | What is told about what happened but I liked guns germs and steel because it gives a reasonable explanation for why things are the way they are now. And why some places advanced and why some places didn't I didn't agree with everything in the book. Um, but it was a really good. Ah it was a good follow up to another book I liked which was called Power Sex Suicide Mitochondria and the meaning of life so it kind of just goes. |
| 01:03:48.26 | mikebledsoe | Me. |
| 01:03:52.10 | Max Shank | Along that logical pathway and I think that sort of stuff is is just fun. It Also I don't know about you but it makes me a little more compassionate toward others especially with what we're talking about with. Outwitting the devil and there's so much pressure to fit into the group and I used to be I'm still pretty hard on myself which is fine I Guess Ah, but I used to also just think everybody was a malicious idiot and now I realize that it. It's just very uncomfortable to have this unique existence and try to fit into a group and that there's usually a reason why people are the way they are. You know if you get really good positive feedback for doing well at School. You're probably going to get good at school if you get really good positive feedback. Playing Basketball you're probably going to keep getting really good at basketball and so on and so forth so seeing things from more of a historical thing which is guns germs and steel and then seeing things from a cellular and biological standpoint power sex Suicide I think is ah. I Guess it's comforting for me to know this backstory but at the very least it's entertaining. |
| 01:05:10.22 | mikebledsoe | Love it. Yeah, 1 things that you said ah brought up for me is everybody is suffering and it's it's just something to remember your your suffering is actually not unique and people tend to to think it is. |
| 01:05:25.79 | Max Shank | Would you write a book if you weren't suffering. Why would you write a book if you weren't suffering. Yeah, that's what I'm saying like that that. |
| 01:05:29.63 | mikebledsoe | Once you realize that it's. |
| 01:05:34.35 | mikebledsoe | If you're not suffering. Why would you do anything. |
| 01:05:44.95 | Max Shank | You hear me I'm like a broken record I'm talking about hunger pain and desire all being synonymous with each other. So um, every book I've written was to ease the suffering of others because the suffering of others. Ah, is quite irksome to me I don't I don't like it when other people suffer it it hurts I'm a very empathetic person I'm like oh man, there's no reason you should be suffering like this like you don't even know why you're doing this exercise you're doing this exercise because he saw it in a magazine you haven't even considered what a human body. |
| 01:06:04.54 | mikebledsoe | Here. |
| 01:06:12.75 | mikebledsoe | Right. |
| 01:06:23.24 | Max Shank | Can and maybe even should be able to do as you as you age, you're just like copying the dance moves that you saw it's ridiculous. So That's ah, that's kind of where I come at I mean everything I've written was to. Ultimately ease suffering and I think that's why people write stuff at All. It's a very compassionate thing that we do and I think that compassion is what um ties us together intergenerationally and that's what allows us to write these things and have. Have a hope that they will ah be useful to our our family right. |
| 01:07:05.69 | mikebledsoe | Yeah, yeah let's let's wrap it up. Um I'll go first and you know what make sure you're reading things that you enjoy because you probably already know enough of what you need, um, and. Ah, don't worry about how many books you're reading enjoy the process digest it learning as behavior change implement before going and consuming a bunch of new information. Um, understand why you're reading the book. Why are you picking it up understanding that intention is. Is ah very necessary to get the most out of it even if it's enjoyment. So yeah, that's all I go to say about that what reading contest which want. |
| 01:07:51.15 | Max Shank | Well there goes our reading contest we were gonna do I joking we were gonna see who could read the most books next year it's not that funny. Okay, minus 1 that just. |
| 01:07:59.89 | mikebledsoe | oh oh oh oh yeah I mean ah I would just pick up a bunch of Seth godin books whop your ass eighty pages tiny 10 words per page. |
| 01:08:10.32 | Max Shank | Super short super short books I just read every Dr. Seuss books on you um fiction fiction books can help you make better decisions. That's that's a big 1 it doesn't have to be nonfiction. It doesn't have to be boring. It doesn't have to be a business book to understand. Value and scarcity and desire and human nature fiction. Books can tell a lot about that sort of thing as well. Um, read a book more than once if you like it read a chapter of a Book. Doesn't have you don't have to read the whole thing. You can just open up to a random page and you might get a spark of insight. You don't have to read the whole damn thing if you're reading a book and it sucks stop reading it? ah. |
| 01:08:59.46 | mikebledsoe | That's a big 1 I probably started more books than I finished this year |
| 01:09:03.41 | Max Shank | Yeah, it's good. Why not I mean why? why should you have to? um, rewrite the ideas in your own words. Don't don't just copy verbatim unless you're copywriting then it can be really useful and then you can ingest later from there. But. Rewrite the ideas in your own words and it's like the difference between um, just Mimicry and learning the principles. So yeah, don't get don't get caught up in how many books reread books over and over that really that you really like. Um, consider the source of course but really good ideas should be able to stand alone and. |
| 01:09:57.85 | Max Shank | That's it. Yeah, you don't you don't need to read a lot of books probably most of us have enough information. It's better for us to spend time synthesizing um and organizing the information that we have already consumed as it pertains to your own life and. Um, maybe it's time to write your own book. Even if you don't think you should. |
| 01:10:19.18 | mikebledsoe | Yeah, all right up if you can find me on Instagram mike underscore blood. So and you can go over to I have a summit coming up in March here in austin texas you can find out more information about that at where they go. Destrongcoach dot com slash summit max. |
| 01:10:41.39 | Max Shank | I am max you can find me in maxshank dot com or at Maank sometimes I hope you guys have a lovely rest of your week see you later. Love you bro. |
| 01:10:52.70 | mikebledsoe | Later. Love you bro. |