#652 - Chris Bumstead - This Is The Price Of Greatness

23:40This is like a good luck moment So for me like I'm on the right path like people see 11 11 I see this and this means I'm just moving in the right direction 9 11 is a good good luck moment for you. It's you choose for it to be It's if you're just your perception and now we see it on like fuck yeah, we're on track Let's go instead of you being like something gonna happen. I feel better about it. It's just reframing your mind, you know Okay, and I'm not trying to like put anything positive on while happy because it was horrible, but I know you mean Try not to fuck up my own mind Yeah, in other news this episode is brought to you by eight sleep It is unbearably hot in Austin, Texas at the moment and I'm exclusively being kept alive by my eight -sleep pod pro cover The pod pro cover actively cools and heats each side of the bed So if you or your partner sleep hot or cold it can keep the temperature absolutely perfect as you progress through your night sleep It'll actively adjust the temperature based on your sleep stage It tracks your sleep it tracks your heart rate variability your resting heart rate How much you're breathing throughout the night, it's incredible.

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25:11What life was like at that time and sort of what the texture of your own existence was like that led up to that point? Yeah, for sure I mean, this part of it I actually can't touch on. That's just too private, but it was Olympia I'd been prepping for weeks, like went on in my life, something happened with my family that was really stressful that I'm not gonna touch on, but it was greatly impacting us going forward and causing a lot of stress and anxiety in my self and my whole family. And we had just moved to Florida, all this shit going on, self -rears about my health, and I had gotten the side of my health going wrong, this inflammation of my shins, I get a Dima, and I started to get that a little bit.

25:47Fatshins. Fatshins? Fatshins, you make fatshins, can't tell it's correct. They're not quite cagled, but there's just my shins get fat, you know? So I'm getting this a Dima in it, all this personal stuff on the side, I didn't know, just I didn't speak about anything. It was just like, okay, wake up, do cardio, you know, go to the gym, go to work, do this, do that, just don't think about it, put it down, push it down, push it down, and I kept doing that. And then I just, I think with my fiance, she was noticing I was a little bit off and swi, like having good people around you, fucking everything when you have like a stressful life.

26:16And she just knew something was off and she's like, are you good? Like how are you doing? I'm like, I'm good. She asked me again, she's like, are you good? And I'm like, yeah, I'm okay. And then I was like in the bathroom, she came in and said, are you okay? Like yeah, she asked me one more time. She's like are you like look at me? Are you okay? And I just started bawling and I had no idea I didn't know I was that stressed out I just was like numb and I just Started bawling like hit the floor was just sobbing I was like I just feel like the world's crashing out. No, me right now I feel like all this shit going on externally and I'm just trying to focus on the limp You have one two.

26:45I have to be better. I'm getting so close. I feel behind like all this shit going on Now I have this business all this chaos going on in my life And I just like I don't know if I can handle this and she's just like Yeah, fuck yeah, like of course you feel like that like no shit This is like I don't know why like you can share this with me like the world is on your shoulders It's fucking stressed out right now. It's should be this is a lot of opportunity in front of you And if you want to quit you can but I know you and I know you won't and right now Did you just need to sit in this cry? Let it out.

27:12I'm here with you But I know you're gonna get out from this you're gonna go to the gym You're gonna kill your work. You're gonna wake up and you're gonna keep doing that But this is normal part of what you're going through She was literally like, you don't think Michael Jordan ever broke down and felt like he couldn't handle the stress that was on him Be like building the NBA into what it was not even just his team. I was like fuck like yeah He didn't talk about it though, and she was like well fuck yeah, then none of them knew No, men know how to talk about their emotions properly and it just like it just she just like built this confidence in me I was just like fuck yeah Of course like this is a huge pressure to the luck going on and I'm stressed.

27:43What's wrong with that? I'm not gonna let it control me But I'm allowed to feel this moment right now and that was just like wow, you know like I can lean on people People are there to help me. I can share how I feel and someone's gonna actually make me feel better Because my whole life it was just bottle everything up You can handle it all by yourself. You know you're a man. You can handle this shit And I was just like no, you know like I'm allowed to feel but who I am is not gonna be controlled by these feelings So it was just a huge moment. I mean in our relationship too, you know like I'm sure everyone is of what's our family alone like I have stress having to provide for a family like the old to men.

28:19The men who feel like they have to provide and like the world is on their shoulders, they don't understand that like their wife and their family wants to help them. Like they might not make it easier but like they'll get under that weight with you and they'll hold that with you and it's not a burden to them. So I always felt like asking for help wouldn't make me a burden. I'm just gonna make someone else's life harder. So like they're stressed out over there. I don't want to add to that. I'm just gonna be okay over here. But it actually make some feel close to you, it gives them purpose. People want to be wanted.

28:46Oh my God. You got someone for help that I feel good about myself today because I helped this person. And it really brought our relationship closer in that moment. It made her feel like I just helped him in this part where he said he can do it all by himself all the time. And now I'm like, fuck yeah, I really needed that. And it was a really important moment for my personal growth, champion growth, relationship growth. There's a meme at the moment of the sort of lone wolf sigma male guy that's making great things happen on his own. I'm pretty sure that you are the footage that's used over the top of a lot of these sigma man memes in any case.

29:23Could you do this on your own? Fuck no. No, none of it. I couldn't do my YouTube without Calvin. I couldn't have started my businesses without Maddie. I couldn't be doing raw supplements without Dom and Matt who are my partners in that. I wouldn't be the man who I am without my dad. I wouldn't be able to have gotten through my stress of the teenager without my sister I would have gotten through last four Olympias without Courtney like it's just Like I almost get emotional thinking about it But when I like reflect back on like what I'm most grateful for It's always the people in my life and I'm so fucking lucky.

29:55It's like crazy Like the people I have in my life are everything in the relationships. I like build mean the world to me I literally like cry sometimes by myself like doing like a gratitude reflection or something but it's relationships to my life or everything. And I just, I know I wouldn't be where I am without it and I would never be the one to think I could do it all by myself. Wasn't the story of your parents waiting in line to get your autograph one time? They've been to every Olympia and they go to the athlete meet and create and they wait for like an hour in line or something. What the fuck are you doing, mom?

30:27I'm like, we don't want to bother you. We just want to picture. I'm like, you're fucking crazy. Like, you can come backstage. You can do whatever you want here. Yeah. And that's like that's that humility that they raised to me though You know they never expect anything and there's always quietly there in the back one support me. I wonder whether Part of that humility is maybe where you not wanting to lean on other people comes from I Do think it's part of it for sure and I mean my dad is still like my number one role model But he didn't ask for help even if he wanted to do something with me He wouldn't like building offense.

31:00I'd have to be like hey dad Do you want me to help? And he like love that, but he wouldn't have asked you know he like all this like no matter What my family was going through dad was just like there? Such a great class. He's got a male parent philosophy isn't it do the work all of it he had it and I'm like how the fuck did you do that for so long? Have you ever asked him about it? I have and now that I've gotten to this age I've like gone to him. I'm like do you ever like just feel like fucking exploding and just like stressing he's like Not really know and I'm like what the fuck? They made him different man.

31:31They made him different in the 60s. He was built different. Yeah, and he comes from a family that was very resilient too from a small town You know working class throughout the generations and he's just like the beast But I had to really learn that that's not normal That's not me and I had to accept that But it was that's what would definitely part of the journey. So I think that's definitely Trying to have too much of a prescription about how you're supposed to go about things Oh, well, this is the way that men are supposed to be like on average there are ways that men and women are and there are sex differences between the two of us.

32:02And there are ways that men from Canada or men from Britain will differ and etc. People from different classes, people that were born at different times. But I think that you're a really good role model for somebody who has a particular programming and as opposed to trying to retrofit you into some mold that isn't you. When you did that, that was when you found friction. Yeah, exactly. And that was when there was incongruence and that's when you weren't able to enjoy things because you weren't able to fully embody all of this stuff Yeah, and also it seems like a big part of it is finding a partner who's prepared to see vulnerabilities as strength rather than a weakness For sure.

32:37Yeah, but she's also seen both sides She's seen like the utmost resilience of what I've been through and they're like She's like I don't know she's like something's gonna happen to us here because something happens every year But it's probably not gonna affect you. She's like it'll stress you out But you're still gonna win the Olympia because I know you know you can do it because I've shown her that proof You know, I've shown her that and now I've also shown the emotional side and she's like, okay Yeah, he's gonna fucking break down and cry in front of me, but he's gonna get up tomorrow and get back to work So it's like it's that you and Yang of being able to like compliment the masculine with the feminine and intertwine it in the right balance out Whatever works for you without kind of holding you back and that's honestly part of the I mean I could have a thousand bullet points on her champion mentality But I used to look up to people and I still do like Michael Jordan But that's not fucking me.

33:20That's not how I could be a champion forever. He wanted to kill everyone and fucking Took stuff personally everything with a battle to the death of being the best and like I don't feel like that But that's okay. I can still be a champ. There's no rules to be a champion You know you make a champion makes his own rules and rise up the wave like that I like that. Did you watch the new Arnold documentary talking about champions? I haven't yet. No, wow. I mean he's it's very interesting Especially because you live seen pumping iron. Yeah, I guess so I'm probably having haven't watched that for about 10 years now, but reflecting on that era of not only bodybuilding, but America in general.

33:56It's so romanticized. It's so cool. I told one of my friends this, we were driving from Austin to Houston to go to a bachelor party. As I was going past, it's just endless freeways and huge factories with flags that are 100 feet in the air and the flags 40 feet high and it's slowly waving. It's not a country that I even like, I'm from, but it's pretty patriotic, you think? That's cool. But it made me nostalgic for an era that feels like it's almost sort of fallen away and watching The Arnold Doc really reminded me of that sort of unbounded blue sky vision that everybody had. It was pretty fucking cool.

34:36But for the people who have seen The Arnold stuff and are maybe less familiar with what's happening in your world of bodybuilding at the moment, what are the differences between Arnold's era and yours now in classic physique. Like physically? Yeah. Essentially. I mean, obviously you look back at sports to everything progresses over time. We get more efficient with nutrition, with dieting, with PEDs, with rest, with recovery. Everything just gets more efficient and everything excels and you push limits further and further. So now I mean, open body buildings, just you look at it and you don't even question that they're even the same as the open classes.

35:12No limitation. No weight limits. Do their own stage at 300 pounds, like 3 % body fat, just fucking monsters. Like huge. Stuff you can't even fathom. Like when I see even person selling, like, wow, that's a real person, which is insane. But back in the Arnold days, it was purely like, it was bigger upper bodies, legs weren't massive, you weren't shredded, it was more about being full and round and just like aesthetic. And which is what classic physique was brought in for. But even so, the contrast classic physique versus like the Arnold era, it's way leaner now. It's still it's getting to just as lean as the open bodybuilders.

35:46It's like shredded glutes, you know, your ass is just stride at the end of the day. Feathered quads just looks like you have no body fat on you. And probably probably about the same weight. I think Arnold was 240 on stage, approximately. And my weight cap is 240 on about 239 when I weigh in. So we're about the same weight, just like now it's just required to be a lot less body fat. So if you put Arnold and Surge Nubre on stage now, they would look aesthetically pleasing, but that condition would be significantly different to the guys that are up there now. Yeah, it would be, it wouldn't be the same.

36:24But what would be interesting is if you could put Arnold to be born in 1990 and then come up in this time. Those genetics. And those with all the stuff now, what would he look like? Surge Nubre would be even bigger freak. Arnold's a goat because he did it first but I think search and break would be like insane to see in our generation. Is there a part of you that wishes obviously you'd have to the family would have to come back in the misses and all of that stuff but is there a part of you that wishes that you could have had a fracture in the golden era as well? No I've never really thought of that honestly.

36:54I really think this arrow right now is just perfectly like where I meant to be and obviously I've been working up pretty people that can grade so far. So I don't tempt it with that. I'm just grateful for what I'm at. I read a story that you bought an inversion table. Is this true? I did, but it came in, it came with a hundred like page pamphlet and like 500 like instructions to put it together and I never put it together. Right. So this is a story that says you bought an inversion table so that you could make yourself a quarter of an inch taller so that that you could get an extra 10 pounds weight limit in your category.

37:30I tried, yeah, I did, but I didn't put it together. I went to a chiropractor consistently, and they have a machine that stretches your spine. They have a machine that just pulls you. Is that not just the medieval rack? Is that not a torture thing? It looks like it. You've got a peasant with one of those floppy caps on. Like, if we are men of the woods, we'll get you one inch taller. Literally, yeah, it looks more like Frankenstein. You like sit in this machine like upright, and then it tilts you down, and they have a thing around your waist that just pulls your spine. Right. And I did that for a while, But I'm like I'm just over six one so I'd have to green a full inch to be over six two So I'm like it would I would never do it, but I also don't want to shrink So I definitely tried a few things I hang from bars all the time to lungate my spine It's also just good for his spine, but yes classic physique is just a battle to be taller essentially to make your weight I've seen a bunch of rumors on the internet saying that if the timing was right you would roll straight from a classic physique show Potentially into an open show Definitely thought about it.

38:23Yeah. Have you really? I have you but there's no open shows after the Olympia. There's like one in Japan, but I would want to do like a decent show. I'd rather stack up beside like a top 10 Olympian and see like how do you think you get on? It depends on the show. If you were to put me in the Olympia, if you put me in the Olympia the way I look in classic right now, I don't think I would do top I would hit the top 10, but I think if I was able to like be a little bit less leaner and fuller and like I always have to die down about five pounds of muscle just to make my weight. So if I were able to be like full as fuck, like sometimes I'm in my check -in pictures, when I'm four weeks out and I have a high carb day, I'm like, I'm gonna be bodybuilding.

39:00That was crazy. I would love to just see what this looks like on stage. I think I could be like top, give me a year and I think I could be top 15 in like Olympia. But there's no part of you that's like, fuck, I should give that a crack. No more than just that, like this banter. Like, I just really truly like, I love classic physique And I love what it like pushes what it inspires people to be more so then like when I was young I literally was about to quit bodybuilding in 2016 because there was I turned pro and I was like I have to be 300 pounds or go down to men's physique and I wasn't wearing board shorts And I wasn't getting a 300 pounds so I was gonna retire But then literally that your classic physique came out and I was like this is for me.

39:38I'll give it a shot and then just ran with it Yeah, it seems so perfect in terms of the timing for you in terms of being able to find a sport that you actually enjoyed I wasn't going to make you go too freaky. So what would you need to do? Let's say that you did go across to open. What would you have to do to your physique in order to be able to improve? A lot of it would be, so right now, I give my body a lot of rest after the Olympia. I compete once a year and I take like three months off the Olympia and then coming back, it's just like relearning proper training patterns, perfecting my form, like making sure I'm healthy.

40:11And so if I were to really want to do the open, I'd have to like take like a week off the rest and then get back to work. Hold all that weight and just start growing for a full eight month and I don't push food hard right now I go like I'll cycle my calories if I start to get too fat I'm like I don't pull it back down. I would just have to like Lean into the fat put on a little ch... I wouldn't be like fat fat But I like being lean consistently lean enough so I feel good I'd have to put on a lot of weight and just eat consistently my training would be the exact same It would be mainly food a little bit more PDs of course, but just kind of dabbling around that I think I could do it with just food though That would be fucking great, man.

40:46It's such a shame that you can't do that. There's the 100 mile record for endurance racing running and the 24 hour record for a while when it was still a relatively new title were often broken together. Because I think it takes, I might be wrong, let's say it takes like 14 hours or 12 hours or something to get 100 and then people would just continue that pace or try and continue that pace and break the 24, Zack Bitter, this guy from Austin, did it, he broke both records in one, it'd be so fucking cool for somebody to like break through one and then go into the next place at a really great show.

41:25I don't even think, like I said, if they let me do both in the same day, it wouldn't be good because I'm too sucked out of the way. So I think I would look pretty small up there. What body fat do you step on stage out? You got any idea? You ever been in a Dexter? I haven't, no. I don't even try and guess because everyone on the internet's like, oh, you got any I called me Game of Thrones and said he was like 0 % or something. I'd be like, I don't think that's possible. If I had to guess, I think it would be like four. I think it was just fucking around, but people took it seriously. But I think I would be around four or five if I had to be conservative.

41:55And to get into the open category, you'd have to, you would be able to lose a tiny bit of condition. Yeah, a little bit. Because my structure would kind of make up for my conditioning, I think. We'll get back to talking to Chris in one minute, but first I need to tell you about element. I'm gonna look there, you're gonna throw it and I'm just gonna catch it because I'm a f***ing, I'm an epic, right? We'll get back to talking to Chris in one minute but first I need to tell you about element. Element is a science -backed electrolyte ratio of sodium potassium and magnesium with no gluten, no coloring, no artificial ingredients or any other BS.

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43:08Talk to me about your morning routine. What does that look like typically? Depends on the time of year really. Okay, so let's say off season and prep. Off season I wake up and I usually just do a bit of light cardio. What sort of time do you typically get up? It's been brutal lately. I've been in different time zones for the last six months. So it's just whatever time zone I'm on. Okay, but lately I've just been I'm not putting it on alarm, and I've been waking up with about 7 .38 o 'clock or so lately. And I normally wake up, and I just do like a little bit of cardio, just like 20 minutes, just to make sure my appetite's going.

43:40And then I have a cold plunge. I usually dip my legs in there at least, if not my full body, and just like, or up to my waist. Then shower, eat, go to work. What will you tend to have off -season? What will breakfast look like? Again, it varies consistently. I get sick of food really quick, especially breakfast foods. So I usually don't like eating eggs when I'm eating a lot of food, so I normally just make a smoothie, and they'll have like oatmeal like blended into the smoothie and some like a zikiel bread toast and almond butter. Okay, and then what about prep, which I'm guessing is significantly more dialed?

44:09Prep evolves. And like I just, I'm not trying to like, I evolve. I'm very fluid. Like my routines are like, what time you train, depends on the time of year. Like it's just wherever I feel natural, I just kind of flow into that state and do what I can and I kind of thrive in that structure rather than really regimented. But in prep, I'll wake up in the morning And I usually will like do like a breath work thing because I guess I didn't that and it's not even for like First I tried to do it for like mental to like kind of like tap deep into my mind And now it's just literally to oxygenate my body before like waking up during cardio Because I realized if I did a little bit of breath work and like just like you know Like a Wim Hof style Like three rounds of 30 breaths and I hold the next tail repeat three rounds in the morning and then I went to cardio I didn't need caffeine.

44:54I was wide awake and I could like blaster my cardio be a way easier and I just felt way better. Wow. And then after that, I'll usually sauna or cold tub, combine it. I'll always cold tub if I sauna, because I like finishing with cold. And then cardio will be higher at that point. And then I'll go shower and eat. And the goal that I do in the mornings, it's nothing crazy. Like it's just simple as that. But I usually try and put my phone on airplay mode when I go to bed and not look at it until this shit's done. Yeah, that's such a hack. Do you sleep? Well, if it's on airplay mode, it doesn't matter if I'm gonna guess you sleep with your phone outside of your bedroom as well.

45:24I still usually keep it. I use that alone. I'm still or I just have it in the corner of the real man It's on the airplane mode, but I just don't it's basically a brick until I've got not gets turned off Yeah, are you not concerned at all? There's a lot of talk on the internet about reducing inflammation through using cold Plunge when you're trying to maximize hypertrophy is this something that you're not particularly worried about? I think there's a lot of and again, I'm not the science guy, but I've looked into it too and I never started doing it for purely recovery and hypertrophy. I started doing it because of my autoimmune and just overall systemic inflammation and health and I just knew that it would be better for me to reduce my inflammation.

45:59And so what I looked into was it was saying that immediately after a workout when you're getting that like high inflammation response which is we're setting blood and nutrients to the muscle to recover, that's what you want to avoid it. So I'll typically if I do like a long like a 10 -minute session, that's on my rest day, but if I'm just doing it in the morning, I do it in the morning and and then I don't work out until later on the day, and I don't do it after I work out. So I have a full two meals, go to sleep, wake up in the morning, and I'll do it then. And I hasn't affected me at all. If anything, it's helped my joints from being overly inflamed, so I can continually train and push myself.

46:29So if I lose like 2 % hypertrophy, but my joints feel better to train harder, to me the outcome is just worth it. It's a trade -off. Yeah. Yeah, what about walks and stuff? Like cardio? Yeah, continuing to just get yourself moving sunlight, exposure, stuff like that. Yeah, I think like, do I do it or do that? I definitely do it more in prep again. I definitely slack off more than I should in my off season, but I do cardio in my off season so that I can eat. I usually just do a treadmill in there, but when I'm in prep, I'll just like roam around outside a little bit after meal just to make sure I'm digesting properly.

47:00And I also take my mind off life sometimes that just kind of relax. But I'm not too like crazy methodical with these things. I just make sure everything's on point. And then if my digestion ever goes to shit, that's when I start manipulating things, but I'm super consistent with my food. so normally my digestion is pretty good. Tell you what's crazy, if you ever want a glucose monitor, one of those things on the back of your arm, if you ever do that, and it doesn't even need to be a particularly high carb meal, but if you spike your glucose and then go on a walk, the difference is unbelieveable.

47:29Yeah, yeah, yeah, it just seems to mediate insulin sensitivity so well. And there's also muscles, I think, that cross, basically, across your stomach, that when you walk that sort of contralateral movement that actually helps digestion. So yeah, walks after food. Stu McGill, the back pain specialist, this one guy that gave me that forever and ever and ever ago. And yeah, trying to do that. That's one advantage of living near a park, you know, or being in a house. I think I'm in Florida though. Yeah. It'll be like 110 degrees in humid. So if I'm in the afternoon, we'll take a walk outside and come back, trench and sweat.

48:05Yeah, true. It might be good for the calorie burn, but that's one thing I was talking to a couple of friends about that moved into this awesome new apartment complex. One of the things that you don't see is a price that you pay is if you do want to go out for a walk, it's like five minutes. It's five minutes to get downstairs. Well, if you take the stairs, that could be part of your walk. Yeah, the stairs are kind of lame, though, aren't they? They're kind of tough. Yeah, but going downstairs is at least good for your knees, so. True. What are you doing for knee health? Are you into the knees overtose stuff at all?

48:32Have you got to this? Yeah. I've dabbled in that. I downloaded the app for my dad because he has the issues and then I don't think he used it So I just started using it myself and I just took some things that like I found I could put into my routine super easily Like walking backwards with a weight and when I don't have like a sled I'll do it on the treadmill turned off yep I'll just turn off the treadmill and push the tread yeah warm up like that I go on the stairs walk up it turn around walk backwards I've seen videos even going backwards upstairs. Yeah a train my like to be a rather than just my calves to some band stuff pushing many backwards.

49:04I've definitely implemented that and it seems to be helping. Okay, so if you only had 10 exercises for the rest of time, all you have in your library to stay as muscular as possible, give me the list. So the goal is to be as muscular as possible? Correct. If I were to say I'm competing and I have 10 exercises. Sure. All right, shit. Sorry. I'm going to have to count it on my hands. Squats. Why? Just overall leg growth, they help glutes, quads, like a large portion of the leg that really have a barbell back squat. Okay. Okay. If it's my whole life, I might actually do some mismishing squats because it'll help my knees and a little bit, it'll be a little bit easier.

49:45Okay. That's the ability and people hate me for that, but I love squatting in the mismishing. All right. I get a lot of shit for that. Deadlifts, just to get something that'll target my hamstrings, and so I don't have to take out another 10, something two hamstring focus, and glute and back focus. Pull ups, so I can hit my back and biceps in one. Overhand underhand. Neutral. Oh, neutral, gradual, probably. It's a little bit more Latin biceps. Yep, yeah. Sure, my arms are going. Inclined dumbbell press. Uh huh. I find inclines a little bit better on your shoulders. So if you're doing this, the only thing I said that you can do, you won't fuck up your shoulders as much.

50:23And dumbbell, it'll just keep you a little bit more symmetrical. I love that. I've always loved to exercise. Which is weird because incline barbell press is one of the most uncomfortable for my shoulders really Yeah, you can do dumbbell yeah, most people feel better with dumbbell because you can go in and push it around a little bit Okay, how many's that that's four that's four yeah six left. This is gonna be hard without like I'd like have to make a list of 20 and cut out But the autism is put to one side for now. Yeah, do this in our heads together dumbbell shoulder press. Uh -huh seated seated.

50:55Yeah, I'm a shoulder press Yeah, I think that'll help your chiseps and shoulders a lot.

51:05Maybe a close grip flat bench. Different part of the chess and chiseps. Uh -huh. Okay. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Fallout. dumbbell curl. Just so specifically. I'm so glad that was enough. How do you want to live without doing a dumbbell curl for the rest of the week? I just need it for my mind. Exactly. Yeah with that are you Supernated you again. This is the only one that you're gonna get you see the standing Standing Supernated, okay good good the go the OG of dumbbell coves Yeah, and it's gonna be one of the time it can't be both arms together. It's gonna be one on one time Yeah, good six and the basics good stuff.

51:45I think you've got three left three left. I think we'll present the body I'm missing right now Cubs probably Oh fuck yeah, look at that. Are you dead? I'm not gonna get it with anything else. A little bit on a deadlift, but maybe I'll just do stairs on the side and not tell you about it. Okay fine. You've still got three exercises. You only need seven so far. Yeah. They say bent over row? No. Bent over row. Okay. That'll help stability core as well. And then like lower back and obviously upper back. Yeah, because the only back exercise that you've had so far is the pull -up deadlifts and pull -ups.

52:24Yeah, bent over rows. Yeah. Okay. Yeah. So I got two left. Yeah. Probably like a hanging leg raise, just to make sure your core is getting hit. You're not like, fucking up your back. And then... This is a tough one, I think. I'm kind of like focused on either lateral raises or like overhead tricep extension. because I haven't had a lot of specific triceps. I would probably do lateral raises just to get some meaty delts over. Fuck yeah. You just do more of course. Well, you've got the close grip and you've got the incline press. Yeah, those are good. So interesting. So Ryan Terry, who I know that you've trained with before, I asked him the same question.

53:02And his ab exercise as well was hanging like crazy. And where is this? Yeah, it seems to be the industry inside a fat ab exercise. I don't even know what I'm about the perfect person in that. But I always try and work on my lower abs because it's harder for me to contract with rather than upper. And that's usually when you're selling my kengz out and on bodybuilding stage you don't want. You're like gut hanging out essentially. What pulls in is the lower part when you do a hanging leg raise or like lying leg raise, it hits that part more. And also like hanging from a bar is really good for your shoulders and spine.

53:32So you're kind of hit two birds with one stone. One of my friends Alex who basically has an unlimited budget said that he'd been to every shoulder specialist on the planet. I've spoken to every single person, all of the most expensive specialists in the world, the best thing that I've found is hanging from a bar. Yeah,

53:50it's wild. I think he ends up strapping up and just hanging from there for about 90 seconds, a couple of times a day. I'd heard a rumor, I don't know whether you'd heard this, that because we'd spent so much time as primates swinging through the trees, that the way that our shoulder still articulates, like that position, is still one that's very comfortable to us. And I'm going to get torn apart by people who understand biomechanics in the comments. But this is supposed to be a little bit of truth to that. And it definitely feels nice. For sure. I mean, even if you're standing in a doorway and you just like do this and you're just chilling like you just feel better.

54:28What about your future CrossFit career? So we've spoken about what you've done so far. But before we started, you've said that you to take up CrossFit once you finish. Yeah, I mean, I used to be very athletic when I was young, it's really what got me into bodybuilding. I just loved sports. I played like six of them when I was younger. And I would like to get back to that like form of feeling like I could run. I'm strong, I can do a lot of bodyweight exercises. I could train anywhere in the world and just kind of like challenging my body in a new way. Because I'm obviously not gonna be hitting any PRs in the gym or being heavier than I've ever been that I am in my peak bodybuilding career.

54:59Though just finding a new goal to focus on, my dabble on that. but it's more of like an athletic training that like you can call CrossFit. Okay. It's so funny to think that the particular sport that you chose to go after actually has a load of restrictions on it. Like it's very very consistent, very repetitive by its nature, not a team sport. You know, there's a bunch of different things that it constrains you from doing. You know, what do you weigh now? How heavy are you? About 262 right now, 260. Right. You said I think you could dunk a year ago though. That could do. I got a video of it, so I'm not lying.

55:33No wait, do you put it online? It is online, yeah. Fuck yeah. But yeah, my point being that a game of pickup, you know, 30 minute game of pickup basketball would probably be not very good for your knees. No, I did it last year. I was telling you that, yeah. I went and played with a bunch of guys here. We played, probably played for almost an hour. It was pretty long and I could not walk for a week. Like it was just inflammation and pain. I was just sitting and making that. It's so bizarre right? Because you think, athlete, professional athlete. What do you do for a living? I like fitness things.

56:03Yeah, people often don't call bodybuilding athletes. Yeah, but it's not that Yeah, and you also said that after your last CrossFit workout you'd had a cough for like 10 days. Yeah, there's a Camera with a call specific person they need the cough Frank cough. Yeah, yeah, did you do Fran? Is that the workout? I don't think so. Okay, but you got Frank I probably heard from like gentle workout walking on the treadmill I'm not that bad. Yeah, it's thinking about what people want to do once they retire, so to speak. And the fact that you've had all of these different physical outlets that have been like, I can't do that, I don't know, better not do that.

56:43Snowboarding, I can only go twice a year in case of what if I rupture an ACL, that's not going to be very good for my own. Yeah. So you are very much constrained with this. In other news, this episode is brought to you by a product I have used every single day for over three years now. That is AG1. It's a foundational nutrition supplement that covers whole body health, helps with my digestion, helps with my energy. It is the staple to my supplement regime. And it's the same for Dr. Andrew Huberman, Joe Rogan, Lex Friedman, Tim Ferris. All of them have been using it for a very long time. And that's because they invest in the highest quality ingredients.

57:18and they've upgraded the recipe 52 times over the last decade as new researchers come in. Also, there is a 90 -day money back guarantee, so you can buy it and try it for 89 days, and if you do not like it, they will give you your money back. If you're looking for a simpler, effective investment for your health, try AG1. Get 5 free AG1 travel packs plus a year supply vitamin D and that 90 -day money back guarantee by going to drinkag1 .com slash wisdom. That's drinkag1 .com slash wisdom. When it comes to your training, what's with the no shoes thing? It's just part of, I mean, there's a movement online, honestly, but I just discovered it by accident.

57:59I wore Converse my whole life up until I was like 20 years old. And I started to get bunions on my foot, where like my toes were just like angled way far out to like outwards. And then my the side of my foot started to really hurt and then I was also getting really bad knee pain And I was like what the fuck was wrong my feet and I realized my feet don't fit in converse I have really wide feet almost I 13 like e like super wide And I'm wearing the most narrow shoe you could find them So I decided to just start taking it off and training barefoot I started rocking like socks and birken stocks which people used to roast me for but now it's in style So not cool now, but But working on the gym, it just felt better.

58:35It's like, I was doing like toe exercises where I would spread my toes, I was wearing toe spacers. And then just the gym was just a place where I didn't have to wear shoes. So I could like train and sucks. And I just felt better. And over time, I didn't do a whole lot of other things. I feel the other thing, but my knees just started to feel better. My squats started to feel a little bit more natural. Yeah, have I seen footage of you walking on your treadmill in the morning in Bethel shoes as well? Yeah, yeah, I've ordered, I've had like, like Vivo's, Lambs, Zero, and maybe one other. But I've tried all of the...

59:05Like, what's your favorite, what have you finished on? I'm between the Zero's and Lambs. Lambs are more comfortable if you're wearing, if you're barefoot in them, if you're not wearing socks. Which I feel like it's the point of it. So I'll be barefoot. Yeah, people are getting into this, man. Mark Bell's Power Project and Seymour and all of those guys, when I went down that everybody was in either barefoot or it's some crazy... Just socks, they're so ugly. Yeah, they... I'm a big shoe guy. I have a whole collection, but I'm just like, fuck these things, they're all like plastic and black. And just like, at least make it a nice one, you know?

59:37No one has yet. There's an open market for that right now. How do you prioritize recovery and rest in your program? What is it that you're focusing on for the biggest winners? I mean, there's a huge avenue, but sleep is probably like the number one thing. And whether it's brain health, aging, or just like high performance sleep is like one of the most important aspects anyone can have. You lose any bit of sleep in your use soon. Your body just suffers more than you can even understand. So I think being super -regumined is on sleep, and that's why when I'm in different times, I'm like, I'm not simply an alarm.

1:00:10Some people believe you should create your circadian rhythm as fast as possible. I'm like, no, I'm just going to get eight hours no matter what. Like I'm tired, I'm just going to sleep. So I let myself just get at least eight hours of sleep. And I usually aim for nine because I don't sleep through the whole night fully. But I think sleep has been absolutely huge. And honestly, at a point in my career when I was 21, I started to get a bit more injuries, and just like, starting to feel like a adrenal fatigue almost, I was like, I was training like six, seven days a week for like three hours. I was like, I feel like I need to tone this back a bit.

1:00:38And then I started training five days a week for three hours, and then I realized I had a little bit more progress. And then a year later, I was like, that was catching up to me. So I'm like, okay, what if I trained like three days on one day off, but I'm only in the gym for like an hour and a half or two, max two hours, including warm up and stuff. And I just noticed, as I was pulling away from that kind of like volume essentially, I actually started to progress more and feel better. I started to feel like I was like going the reverse way of aging. So allowing myself to have more time to recover actually made me stronger.

1:01:06Which I don't even, when I say that, I try and like pre -emptetize if you're 19 years old. Don't listen to me. You're fucking made of rubber magic. Go balls for the wall. Enjoy this time right now, go deadlift, fucking max out every day. And just like seep in these moments because they will be gone. Yes. But read your body. When you start to feel a little tired, make sure you're taking time off. And then obviously, basic shit, like protein intake is obviously huge. Timing of it, I really don't think matters. I think she at least four meals in a day. So you're spreading it out, but whatever you get it, it's fine.

1:01:36Ice bath, sauna has helped me a lot. I do believe that stretching, active recovery, like doing cardio and then stretching, meaty lay after. So you're a little bit warm and then I do a lot of soft tissue work. So when I'm in prep, I do probably a week or two. And that's something where you got to make sure you find someone who actually understands the body who's good at it. And it's not that you have to go to someone who's going to make it miserable, like you're crying the whole time, but they have to at least have know what they're doing and it should hurt a little bit. They shouldn't just be trying to hurt you, but you need to find someone good, because I've been through like 10 in my career and I finally just found one now, showed us Dr.

1:02:08Marlon, my boy down here in Florida, he's a chiropractor who does massage for me and he's just so smart, he just crushes it. And it's helped me a lot. One of my friends was pushed so hard during a workout that he ended up getting a like a blood blister below his eye from the pain, holding it in and trying not to scream. Yeah, so yeah, you can't, there is such a thing. Wait, from a massage session. Oh wow. He was like, and yeah, and then that's when he was like, I felt like that's like the ego of the massage therapist just trying to hurt you. I think it was his ego as well that he was like, you're not gonna make me make any noise.

1:02:40True. If you hold it in, it's like trying to squeeze out a really big poo. Yeah. Have I seen you in an altitude chamber? No. No, I'm done cry, or maybe if you've seen something, but I haven't, that's the next step though. Hyperbaric as well, I'm like, I need one of those in my house, I think. Slaped in one of those when I told you about those stem cells in Columbia. Yeah. Have you been in one before at all? No. So the weird thing is, let's say that you want to do an hour session, it takes you about 15 or 20 minutes to go down, right? So they've got to pump the pressure in. Yeah. And then like we're up to 14 PSI, 15, 16, 17, and you're watching this number go up.

1:03:15So it's like being in a rapidly climbing airplane. Do you use pop in there? Every five seconds. Oh, wow. So you're permanently yawning for like, maybe I should go over and over and over and over again. And then if you want to get out, it's like that's another 15 or 20 minutes because they go to bring you back down. Because if they just opened it, I don't know what would, you'd probably just get like rippling from Lame or I don't know what I don't think about what would happen. It's, I don't know, I can't really work out, I did two sessions of it for an hour. I feel like you gotta do it like a lot.

1:03:44Yeah, I have a lot. Bill Perkins, one of my friends from Austin, was talking about how he'd read this finished study and if people went and did three accumulated three hours of altitude chamber stuff per week that this thing happened to their telemia length and it reduced aging and all this stuff, but he realized that the closest facility that he could find was like three and a half hours away. So he was wasting four and a half hours of his life three times a week to try and save a little bit of time. I'm just going to die sooner for all of the times that I've wasted more precisely precisely such a false economy when it comes to that What about bad habits?

1:04:22So you've spoken about all of the things that you try and get done. Yeah What are the things that you think holds you back or if you were able to get rid of them? Your quality of life would improve or you would be a better athlete or a better person?

1:04:36Um, I Mean this year was the ability to say no something up with a lot of opportunity coming my way. Just I said yes to way too many things and I traveled like every week for like almost four months I think and I was barely home and I didn't even understand like how much it was impacting me until I get in the end and I was just like on edge stressed out I didn't feel good. I felt like I'm behind on my training where I should be and just like snapping just didn't feel good and I'm just like I felt like I had to do these things like my business owner now rather than and just like a sponsored by someone.

1:05:07So like I feel like required to go to these events. I had already pre -planned these like other seminars I've done or meet Greece and Europe and like different countries and meeting manufacturers in India and like all over the place. And last year I was always like no travel. I got to focus. And this year I was just like saying yes to everything that I felt like I had to. And I was like no, you do not fucking have to do that bullshit. Like I'm never doing that again. So one thing is definitely just speak, like being able to speak up more for myself and be like no I'm not doing that. No matter how much I get pushed to do it.

1:05:35Because I just a lot of the time you're being pushed by yourself right often. Yeah, exactly. No, it's like there's some External person saying Chris you need to go and do the whatever thing. It's your own drive your own desire Exactly Yeah, like we were talking about like the The chasing of more and more success, but you're sacrificing your current life to have more success But even though you're less happy with the way you're actually living your life like what's actually the point of that Like this is the most amazing time of my life and I'm just trying to like run through it and be busy all the time and not sit down and enjoy it.

1:06:06Or do I want to step back and maybe have less potential business success, but 98 % of it's still, but also be more enjoying of this time of my youth and in the middle of like my golden years. It's such an important story. Have you heard about the parable of the Mexican fishermen? Have you heard this? No. So it's a really cool story about someone, see if I can find it, about somebody who is, I can indeed. parable of the Mexican fishermen. An American investment banker was at the pier of a small coastal Mexican village when a small boat with just one fisherman docked. Inside the small boat was several large yellow fin tuna.

1:06:43The American complemented the Mexican on the quality of his fish and asked how long it took to catch them. The Mexican replied only a little while. The American then asked why he didn't stay out longer and catch more fish. The Mexican said he had enough to support his family's immediate needs. The American then asked but what do you do with the rest of your time? The Mexican fisherman said, I sleep late, fish a little, play with my children, take seastres with my wife Maria, and stroll into the village each evening, where I sip wine and play guitar with my amigos, I have a full and busy life. The American scoffed, I have an MBA from Harvard, and can help you, you said, you should spend more time fishing, and with the proceeds by a bigger boat.

1:07:18With the proceeds from the bigger boat, you could buy several boats, and eventually you would have a fleet of fishing boats. Instead of selling your catch to a middleman, you could sell directly to the processor, a eventually opening up your own canary. You could control the product, processing and distribution," he said. Of course, you would need to leave this small coastal fishing village and move to Mexico City, then Los Angeles and eventually to New York, where you would run your expanding enterprise. The Mexican Fishman asked, but how long will all of this take? To which the American replied, oh, 15 to 20 years or so.

1:07:45But then what, as the Mexican? The American laughed and said, well, that's the best part. When the time is right, you would announce an IPO, sell your company stock to the public, and become very rich. You would make millions. millions, then what? The American said, then you could retire, move to a small coastal fishing village where you could sleep late, fish a little, play with your kids, take the estes with your wife and stroll to the village in the evening where you could sip wine and play guitar with your amigos. Life is often simpler than we make it. Yeah. So good. So good, yeah, that's so accurate.

1:08:14Definitely something I've, that's exactly what I felt this year. Putting more on my plate, like, and I mean that like prime time right now, especially as like a part influencer, business owner, competitor, all this stuff going on. I'm like, this is the time to stack it all on top. This is my time to do all this. But this is also like the most exciting time of my life to enjoy where I'm actually at. Yeah. So like, like, to be the strongest aim in the gym, which is something I fucking love to do. So why would I take away from that and just, like, create more stress and pressure on myself when I can just be here, just to have more in the future, which I already have enough that I need.

1:08:46So that's a great story, for sure. I know that you're quite health conscious about bodybuilding. Yeah, but obviously it's a very rough spot physically psychologically homonally Do you have any concerns about longevity? You know you've done an awful lot of like extreme things to your body over the last decade How worried are you about that longer term? I mean, I think if you're a bodybuilder, you don't worry about that you're either stupid or lying to be completely honest So it's something I definitely obviously with all my own health conditions from the past is on the forefront of my brain but I just manage it as best as I can.

1:09:21You know, there's blood work you can get them consistently to keep your markers on. There's a lot of tests, you know, diagnostics now are absolutely insane. And if you want to stay healthy, long -term, it's getting something, if something's going on, it's you catching it early. So I do a lot of diagnostics and blood work and make sure I'm getting healthy. And ever since I was sick in 2018, my blood work's kind of continuously improved. So I know there's no like negative impact I'm putting on myself. Like I've reduced a lot of the stress, the negative things I put in my body and increase more my health, like the type of food I give in me, it's not just calories, it's actually the quality of the food and the type of food and everything that I need that I really focus on rather than just straight macros.

1:09:59Never been a macro guy and I'm even less now because I actually care about my health. And all these aspects, like everything I know I need when my body comes from a lot of the diagnostics I've done and vitamins and all this stuff. And I just know that I've made a agreement with myself that when these things start to falter and they start to go down, no matter where I'm at my career, if I'm peaked, if I'm not peaked, if I'm about to be better, I just need to call it. Really? I know that it's not worth it to me. There's a life after bodybuilding. For sure who I am is not a bodybuilder. There's more to me than that.

1:10:28I'll be happy without it. And there's no point in like that beautiful moment in my life is. It's already been a great time. But if I'm going to sacrifice my future life, hopefully it was a family and my children of my own. I'm going to be sick or unable to enjoy it with them. That's the biggest thing I would regret. So I just I'm sitting on top of knowing where I'm at and if it goes down I just kind of the colloquist Yeah, I've heard you say that in the past there was compounds and things that you would have taken that now you're like This is to yeah, it's too dangerous What are the things that for you are like off the table with regards to this is too much?

1:11:00This is too risky for me the biggest one is like trend Yeah, the good old trend that like this guy who literally like base their social media off that now It's just like a meme of the internet, the gym culture. And I don't even think people realize the impact that these jokes and memes have on people coming up who would just see you constantly joking and talking to it. So you need more of it to be better and feel stronger and all this shit. But that's probably the most toxic thing you can put in your body. And I've done it in the past, but I don't anymore. I just haven't touched shit in like five years.

1:11:29Why? Just the toxicity it causes in your body. Like it just comes in, it harms your kidneys, your liver, just everything that takes your body to process it doesn't go through it. It's just not natural. It's not meant to be in your body. And it makes you strong. It's fucking people, if you say they feel like they're on top of the world, and they take it. But to me, that's not really worse than health risk anymore. And another reason why I love plastic physique is because I had a weight cap. And I was close to my weight cap like three years ago, not at it. But I could have taken more shit and really tapped out and been at the point where I couldn't put on any more weight, or I could actually take less shit and force myself to work harder, be more consistent with my diet, my training, my recovery, and then still get that result.

1:12:09But it would just be a little bit more effort. You know, there's a peak body, a peak open bodybuilder with no wake up. Probably needs to do everything to be the best. But if I can just still put in discipline in the work and then take out something that less shit the tire of my body, then I'm on the same point that I would be. It's just a little bit more effort. It says it all that you was somebody who is competing at the highest standard of bodybuilding on the planet is still finding compounds where you're like, that's off the table. That's too much. For sure. You can always find things to take out, things to add in, ways to get better, things that are unnecessary and just kind of fine tuning.

1:12:44And a lot of any type of success is getting the most out of the least in whatever effort. The amount of work you put in in a day, the amount of shit you put in your body, the amount of training even you do, it's just being as efficient as possible So that you're putting in you're getting maximum result from minimum effort essentially. Yeah, we've spoken before and I think that it's a Smart approach that you have of not talking about the things that you use and and dosages because it's just gonna result in people doing if I take X then equals Chris Bums. That'll look like a story. Precisely. Yeah.

1:13:15But I think that you've mentioned before people would be very surprised at how low those numbers are. For it that I think most people in the sport can look at me and be like okay He doesn't made much changes in six years like and he they see me training and they see how consistent Am so they would understand But I think a lot of maybe aspiring kids who like who just want to like maybe look like me or look like a pro bodybuilder They'd be like no, I got to take this but he's lying like I got an ending more like to be like that Why don't I look like that and they don't see a my amazing genetics showed up to my parents for that and then be the 10 years of work I put in that has been consistent, you know What is the ratio of attention that you get from guys versus girls?

1:13:56Like 90 -10. The favorite of men, of course. Literally. And I think my Instagram statistics are like 91 % men. Yeah. Anyone who thinks that this life is going to get you girls, you get more men to come back. What does it say that like the king of the aesthetics bro era is just swimming in men. like there's just men everywhere and all of these guys that think I'm gonna go to the gym and I'm gonna if I get buffed Then I'm gonna get loads of attention with the girls and so which also there's there's a line of respect in that because Let's say you start doing something for the attention of women and then in the end you don't get it But you realize how much you love it so you see keep doing it and your bros are like that's dope And like you're not doing it so your bros love you But you're doing it now because you actually love to do it rather than just getting a girl, you know Yeah, there's like a little bit more meaning in doing it for yourself and just because you love training come for the girls Stay for the games exactly.

1:14:50Yeah, yeah, but it's just it's just so funny like every person that I've spoken to that's in there's got a big platform that is built around the physique like It's a lot of men every time a lot of men out there that like are you getting requests for sock? Simply send me your used socks. Please. I used to but I don't I don't read my DMs anymore. Okay. I don't really go through a lot of it No guy I'm the only one logged into myself. He said me stuff. I post it Okay, but I just don't even dive into it. There's too much shit in there. There's gonna be it's a cesspool down that Chris There's all these like groups now, and it's just like memes and tags and like there's not even like anyone actually saying it What do you mean like people will start a group?

1:15:30Yeah with like all their boys Oh Like lifting club and it will be you and your friends from high school and then there's a stroke Chris mom said in there because it's funny maybe you'll see it one day and I have like hundreds of those and that's all I really and they're not even messaging me they're messing each other and I'm just in the chat So I like I'm like every couple months all I go and I'm like bored waiting someone I like looking I'm like nope

1:15:53Yeah, fuck Yeah, what Talking about social media in the social media games something that you guys like pay attention to To continue to build how have you dealt with the increasing amount of notoriety and pressure and eyes on you and stuff as somebody that's pretty heavily introverted and wants their privacy. You've had to make public relationship with misses, business, you know, the most stressful times of your sporting career and stuff as well. How does that feel? Like how have you struggled with that and how's it helped I think honestly, unlike most in that position, it's impacted me less than a lot of other shit.

1:16:39My life has impacted me. I think I was just raised purely for like valuing people who know who you are and who you are as a man and how you like act in this world, rather than what you accomplish and what you own and all these things. And all these people don't know who I am. So even from a young age, I literally remember thinking like all these compliments I'm getting, these people don't even know who I am. These people don't even like, They could say whatever they want about me, but it's just this idea of me they're talking about, not actually me. So the compliments, well I'm grateful for it and the support and it means a lot to me.

1:17:09They don't know who I am. It doesn't make me better or worse whatever they say. So when negativity comes in, and people say anything bad, it's, they're both one and the same. They're both just kinda like out there and it doesn't really mean anything. You know, if like my mom came up to me and I'm like, you're being a really fucking shitty person, I'd be like, what the fuck? Like I would like, my heart would think, you know, I'd change my whole life. But like if someone on the street comes up and be like, you're this sat and I'm like, you don't even know me. Yeah, like what? But how do you, you know, your mind isn't actually going to gravitate toward these meaner comments.

1:17:43We have this negativity bias that we see. Yeah. How have you trained yourself to you not look? Is there a strategy behind this for how you try and avoid that seeping in? I imagine if you're three weeks out from prep with everything in the toilet and you feel like crap and you've got 1500 calories. to look forward to today, half of which is from broccoli. Like the last thing that you want to see is someone saying something mean on the internet. Sure, yeah. So why do you go to deal with that? I mean, it's been, there's a lot of things and it's been a tradition, but now at this point when I'm in prep, I mute everything.

1:18:14All notifications are off. I don't look at my comments. I don't really look at anything. And I would just rather that not seep into me. On a baseline, I can always bring myself back to like what I said, understanding these people don't know me. but I'm obviously still affected by certain things that hit me. But again, if something affects me, it's because of something I have on healed inside of myself. It comes back to like where I'm still hurting, not so much what other people are, what they're thinking of me. So like an example of something that hit me the few years ago, but it was, it wasn't online.

1:18:44It was someone in person and they were just fucking around with me, we were bantering, we're guys, we're like, you know, we give each other shit. And he said something like, oh wow, when you were a kid, like girls must have been like, here's this good looking tall jacked handsome guy, come up to him and then you open your mouth and they hear your voice in that list and they're like, what the fuck? And they're immediately, they're like, this fuck this guy and they leave you alone. And I remember like feeling like a kid again, just getting this washed over embarrassment. And just like feeling like fucking like 12 years, 15 years old again.

1:19:12And I was like, wow, like I'm like, I just can be tease a little bit for my list. And I'm like, that's still kind of in there a little bit. But that's not because this guy's an asshole. That's because when I was a kid, someone made me feel like shit about it and I never really like gave that kid like the love and permission myself being that kid the love and permission to like be okay with that and understanding that doesn't represent himself. So I think just taking those moments and using them as an opportunity to go inside yourself and kind of like a give your like the younger self a little bit of love and compassion who like didn't get it maybe when he was younger because he felt like alone to go back and try and heal those periods of your life rather than being angry at the other person Because I mean, that's really all that is to it because if you're given the power to the person, then you're just focusing on them and you're going to continuously live in that pain, doesn't help you and they don't go fuck.

1:20:01They're just around shit at you. They don't care what they want you to react. It's hard to not have a chip on your shoulder because of that though, right? Like how have you managed to get rid of that wanting to prove these people wrong? And you know, you've seen the ways that people who were mistreated or felt lonely when they were younger, that can become malignant, right? as they grow up. Is there something, does a chip appear on your shoulder every so often that you want to kind of... I was never, like, just two people who get affected by it in different ways. And I was never the one who got angry in the chip on my shoulder.

1:20:33I kind of felt shitty about myself. I felt embarrassed and like, yeah, you're right, I am fucking stupid. I do sound stupid when I talk. I should just shut up and sit over here and look quiet. I was more like, and it never led to aggression in me or a chip on my shoulder. it was more of a like, you're right, you are kind of worse. Let's just go say it over there. So that was more of like, that's why when I say what I needed to work on was more empathy and compassion for myself and just like accepting my humanity, my imperfection, rather than like, I mean, it's all the same thing, but mine was more focused on like not shaming myself, rather than like bringing down a level of aggression and anger.

1:21:09Tell you what I absolutely love about that is You saying I was made to feel shitty lonely, sort of worthless at some point throughout childhood, and your answer to it isn't to lean into aggression and to push back against it, but to find empathy. But to find empathy that you turn inward. I think that's just so noble. So I've told this story before, but I was doing a big podcast last year and my strategy typically when I'm doing the big episodes is that I'll stay fasted, end up being quicker, mentally, and I didn't realize how long this episode was going to go on for. Partway through, I went high, so I'm sat there and my mind goes completely blank, like just fucking nothing.

1:21:54I'm like, what's going on? I'm sat opposite, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, just hearing something happen, like, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, and I'm thinking to myself, why don't you have anything to say? Like, what's just, it It was like, it literally like someone shook the etch a sketch and decided my brain. It's like, fuck. There's nothing left. Like, there's nothing for me to say. And then immediately this voice came up that said, you're not supposed to be here. You were never supposed to be here. Everyone's laughing at you. Everyone thinks that you're stupid.

1:22:22You knew that this was a fluke. Everybody isn't interested in what you've got to say. This is your chance and you're blowing it. You're an idiot. And I was like, whoa. Where the fuck has that voice come from? Yeah. And I realized it was a voice that I remember from my childhood, but it was one that I thought I'd know a deep program or whatever, but after in times of really serious stress, I think old wounds and old habits and old traumas like reappear and that was really, really high pressure. Anyway, I ended up having some coffee and this caffeine just ripped me out of it and everything was fine.

1:22:59The funniest thing was that if you actually listen back to the episode, you can't even tell. There's just an autopilot voice that's moving while internally and no one would know nobody in the entire I thought we were able to respond and don't even know how to perfectly cogent conversation. Wow Well, yeah, you do anything long enough. Yeah, she become competent at it But yeah, my entire mind was saying your piece of shit your worthless everyone's laughing at you. You're stupid You know that this was a fluke. You're not supposed to be here. You're never supposed to be here. Meanwhile, I'm having a conversation I get to say anything But yeah, the issue with that is it's not like the whole point is like when you felt that it isn't like If it then that's becomes another problem.

1:23:38So you're beating yourself up and then it's a problem that you're beating yourself up It's just like a contingent is what loop of like this like battle you're having yourself Yeah, but if you don't even think that you forgetting and beating yourself up with a problem It's just part of like what happens in the human experience then there's nothing to fix and it slowly just like shifts back to normal. Yeah, I think feeling shame about the things that you feel is really, really, really destructive. And I know that I felt this for a long time that I should be more disciplined, I should be more competent, I should be more diligent, every single mistake that I make, I stumble over this particular, I'm supposed to not hit snooze on the morning and I hit snooze So I check my phone really quickly before I go for a walk on a morning and that means I'm fundamentally a piece of shit or this means I'm at this, there's an awareness, there's like a alert radar and I'm permanently looking for reasons to justify that I might be a piece of shit.

1:24:36I'm just constantly seeking like a threat detector, but it's not, it's a shit detector and I'm permanently looking for reasons to justify it to myself. And that was for a long time and this is, you know, I'm such a massive fan of personal development and of personal growth and of people improving themselves. but as soon as you posit an ideal, you then begin to compare yourself to that ideal. And that creates a pain between where you are and where you want to be. And I'm all for trying to maximize your agency, make as much of the time that you have on this planet as you can. And balancing that desire to be better, with acceptance, love, empathy for yourself and the ability to just be grateful and present in the moment.

1:25:17I think fundamentally for a lot of driven people that is that's the battle Yeah, I think those are the two things that they're fighting with that tension and it's I mean it's work It's like constant work and like I still have things that come up with me that are like similar to that like even in this Conversation honestly when you ask you about my morning routine. I'm like Fucking mr. Olympian you only have a morning routine like, you should be more structured in the morning. And then I was like, what the fuck? Like, you are Mr. Libya and you don't have a morning routine period. I don't need to fucking shame myself after that.

1:25:51I'm Mr. Libya and I have a morning period. And I can just leave it at that. And I honestly just recently discovered this like battle in myself, which I kind of mentioned of this expectation that was on me, which like I kind of labeled as Sebum. Some people call me Sebum. They don't know who I am. And then there's Christopher. Yes. There's like that 12 year old Christopher who's just like, you know, he's emotional, he's anxious, He's stressed out, but he's quiet and he's he's just who he is and then C -Bum is fucking confident calm cool collected Can step on sage grab a mic give a motivational speech crush Olympia squat 600 pounds You know he's like the dream and then that person doesn't exist But when people continuously call me C -Bum treat me like that look up to me like that That's what builds this like this connection myself and I need to continuously Discover who Chris is who Christopher is go back who he was who he is now and like all these aspects of myself that are just me and let that continuously shine through.

1:26:43But I think as like you adapted when you were young, I've adapted when we were young, we create this thing that fits better into society rather than just being ourselves because we want to fit in, we want to succeed, we want to be the ideal that we hear. And there was this, I think it's Brunei Brown, she talks about it. She's a vulnerability specialist, I'm sure you know who she is. She said this thing where, is if you show up in a crowd and your goal is to fit in, then you're putting yourself worth on the line. But if you show up in your goals just to be yourself, then you can't fail. And yourself worth it's at the end of the day.

1:27:15If you just act like yourself, everybody can do that. And then you leave feeling good about yourself because you have control over that. But if you're showing up and you're just doing and being anything just to be fit into the crowd and you don't fit in and you're not even being yourself, then who the fuck are you? You know, you're worthless. So it's a lot easier to just show up and make the goal to be seen rather than to be accepted because that's who you are and it's in your control. There's a problem as well that I found, especially in my 20s, so as this sort of big name on campus club promoter for 15 years right now, massive events company meet millions of people and the guy that's really well known on the front door of night clubs, et cetera, et cetera, et cetera.

1:27:51And I never felt love for the achievements that I had during that. And I think a big part was because I was playing a persona. And I came to believe this is an all -brain Marcus thing. I know you're a fan of his as well. He says, the persona is incapable of receiving love. It can only receive praise. The reason is that if you're not genuinely, existentially connected from your heart to the things that you're doing, any praise that you get isn't going to actually impact you emotionally, because you're not emotionally connected. You're cognitively connected. You go over here, you can get the praise, but you're not really good.

1:28:28Correct. Yes. So, see, bum. Congratulations, see, bum. You did really well. Well, Christopher, meanwhile, is still a worthless piece of shit for 12 years. A little boy locked in the closet just passed there watching Seabum. Precisely correct. And it goes back to the parable of the Mexican fisherman thing, like what are you optimizing for with regards to success? Do you want to make it to the end of your life with all of the public accolades that anybody could want, feeling completely unfulfilled internally? And alone. And alone. Lost. Or do you want to dial back what you do in the real world so that it actually might matches up with who you are and move both of those people forward.

1:29:06And you know, it's, that's why I think that you're a really great champion for the introvert it and quiet, you know, in a world of, of guys that get rich off egos and, and being loud and sort of out there, you know, and you take like, fucking fantastic speaker, great communicator. But very different sort of person to you for sure. And yet, both role models for men. both people that are very highly followed online, both people who embody masculinity in incredibly different ways. But I think it's very important that we have a counterbalance for the sort of introverted quiet kids. It's hard because like you said, social media is like targeted towards the extroverted, loud, controversial, the people who are like, the entertainer who are just going out there like captures people's attention.

1:29:57People like me, like, I always joke about it, I was like, when I'm done, I'm gonna move to the mountains. No cell phone service. I was gonna have my address, you'll never find me. You know, people like me want to go hide. People like Andrew are like, where's the spotlight I got you to say, you know? And it's hard to balance that. And I've also learned that I'm actually less introverted than I even thought it was. I was just more like afraid to show myself essentially. So it was easier just to kind of hide in the background. When I start to feel comfortable and be myself when I'm out there, I'm like, I actually kind of enjoy this.

1:30:27more than I realize, as long as I'm showing myself truly and I'm not feeling like I need to put on this facade. That's the persona thing again, right? Exactly. If you start to play that, I actually think that even though publicly you may be more competent because you have created this mirage out in front of the person who's lost and alone and secure, it actually makes going out and doing it more and more difficult. And this is how you see, you know, guys like Avicci, the DJ, as a good example, somebody who publicly was having to do something that privately he didn't feel alignment with, and they end up in really bad situations.

1:31:06Given obviously you are a role model for men, mentioned Andrew Tate, they're also another role model for men. How much do you interact? How much do you think about sort of the state of modern masculinity at the moment and the challenges that young men are facing? I've recently started to think about it a lot more. I think it's been surfacing more and it's it's a weird like balance because people like Andrew Taylor saying like we need more masculinity, we need more aggression, we need like x, y and z and I think there's that's agree with that on one level for like a little bit. But there's also a section of men who just feel alone like myself who felt like they have to hold things in and that they shouldn't share their emotions that they don't lean on people and that they should just Care stuff in and they need to be x, y, and z to be like good enough So there's just like balance of that and you almost need to learn to again like I mentioned like that The masculine and the feminine be able to integrate that I feel like a real man is confident and comfortable enough to embrace The feminine energy he has in him if he's emotional let it out But also have that masculine side of it be like I'm gonna be emotional right now But I'm still gonna go and fuck straight up right now, you know I'm still gonna take charge of what I want with my life I'm gonna work fucking hard to be disciplined But I'm gonna accept that sometimes I'm gonna break down and it's gonna be I'm not saying that women break down But there's more emotion over there and allowed to feel it and to ask for help and to lean on people and be able to balance Soath to and that like yin and yang I think that I think that's what's missing personally and I do like on one level I do feel a sense of responsibility because the fitness is a big world of men who are I think usually get into fitness On some level and maybe feeling lost and then can feel a little bit safe and I heard a lot of people I can go in the gym and just forget about everything.

1:32:42I'm like, that's great. The gym's an amazing tool for that. But you still need to go back and feel that shit eventually. Because it's not going away. A good workout doesn't make the stress at home better now. It's still just buried under that fucking dopamine Russian. Sick pump you got in your chest, you know? It's still there. So I think just learning to navigate and down set is super important. And that's where I'm like, okay, I'm someone right now where people look up to. On one level, there's a responsibility for me. Let's take my 12 year old self. who felt like he had to hold it all together.

1:33:12He couldn't lean on anyone, he couldn't ask for help. And I just remembered this time I was in the hospital a few years ago and I didn't tell my parents, I didn't want to tell them that I didn't want them to be stressed and anxious. And then they found out and I was like, it's okay, like don't come, I'm totally fine. Like they were out of town or we live in different cities and I like don't even bother coming out of here to know time it's okay. And I thought about that and I broke down crying again. I was like, why didn't I ask for help? I felt so scared and alone. And just to have my mom sitting beside me, a man, 20 years old at the time, it would have felt better, but why am I so scared to ask for help?

1:33:42You know, like, if - Why do you think you ask a task about? Part of my childhood of just feeling like, A .S. on my dad, who didn't really need help, my mom was busy. They were both super busy with work and they gave me everything that they could, but they came from families who didn't know how to show them kind of love and support, and they came from - So there's all these generations of this pain who don't know how to express themselves, And then I think honestly my parents jumped about tenderness and worse of progress of who they are and how they showed me love and Vulner really as much as they could but they're still stuff missing and now I would like to jump a few generations Well and hopefully help my kids But there's always a gap of where the kid where we're gonna miss something and I think a lot of that does come from my childhood And then so when I get in situations like that I was afraid to ask for help and now I look back and I'm just like If I had just started crying and been like I need you mom like I would have felt so much better But I had to be like, no, I'm okay, don't even come.

1:34:35I'm good, I'm sitting in this house, will buy myself a shirt or a ball and just try not to think about dying, you know? Like that's fucking insane. I don't know why I did that. Well, what would you say? Okay, so you know, there's a lot of guys listening who say that resonated with me. I feel like I struggled to open up. Like I find it hard to embrace the fears and the insecurities and stuff that I have. What have you found as a good first step or is the first steps that's good for those guys to take to move forward. It's definitely tough and it's depending on the situation in your life and this is kind of where I was getting at is like hopefully myself.

1:35:15If I think of who I would have wanted to be the role model to that 12 -year -old boy, that's who I should be in this world to anyone who is looking up to me now. So I hope that some people like me who express this stuff can at least give permission for people to start that journey. So if I have that, if I have that impact on anyone and I've had people come up to me and like a Q &A's and shit like I wanted to ask you this but like I'm fucking going like tell me some crazy story around about the cry listening to them and they're coming to share it with me and I'm like fuck man like that's that's deep you need some like these people to lean on and they're like I don't know what to do so my advice while those people would be to understand that hopefully you have someone in your life who loves you and if they love you they want to help you they might not know how to ask you because they weren't given that help so sometimes you have to put yourself out there and be like and just open yourself up to them and allow them to see deep inside you because not everyone can read your mind and like dive deep into your school just because of you're like you have a different look on your face today or something.

1:36:10So if you have people you love lean into them and if you really don't feel safe with anyone in your life that's scary and I'm like I feel horrible for anyone who feels that alone but find a therapist or something. I initially I did have people I could lean on and love them my life but I went to a therapist before even them. And back in 2020 when I told you that thing I don't really want to, that can't talk about that, it was really hard on me. I buried all that and then I went to a therapist and started talking to them. And I thought I'd never be able to open up to someone, someone strange or I don't know.

1:36:38For a session, fucking crying on the couch. And I was like, holy shit, there's a lot of stuff inside of me right now. And so much of my journey for the last five years, I've been understanding how much stuff I've suppressed and didn't know what was there and allowed to come up. And the amount of like, the whole light my heart feels and how light my body feels when I kind of get some of that out, it just helped me so much. You can tell. You can really tell that you feel more sort of aligned with it. Just like, yeah, I just feel good with myself overall. And I know like I said earlier, I've got emotional just thinking about like the people I've had in my life.

1:37:08And now it was Courtney. The amount our relationship has built over this span of time of me being able to bring myself out more and share with her. We were engaged and now I'm like, I don't fucking even know what a ring is, but I'm going to fucking die with this girl about my side because nothing's going to tear us apart. Like, I just we built that connection through that trust. Remembering what you said about, don't necessarily expect people to be able to pick up on the fact that your face looks a bit different today. Yeah. She had to ask you four times in the bathroom. Yeah, and I was lucky as hell that she's such an empath, the type of human.

1:37:40She's super emotional. And she was able to see me. But if not, who knows if I would have shared that with her? Yeah, either empath or unrelenting. Perhaps. I can keep on asking. Keep on poking. I really do think that this tension, we talked about this tension between a desire for success and a feeling of being enough, between wanting to be strong and competent and also being able to integrate the emotions that you have. It is all so individual and the point is that trying to take any philosophy, any one philosophy from someone and saying, I am going to take the Andrew Tate or I'm going to take the Chris Bumsteader, I'm going to take the Chris Williamson approach to this sort of a thing.

1:38:28Fundamentally doesn't work because the drivers that you have are completely different. And I think that the only thing which really does scale is, okay, try and find out what's true in you. Try and find out how you actually feel about these things. I have a friend who's staying in Austin at the moment, Gakko George, and when anybody asks him about his childhood, and everyone's supposed to have got like shit from their childhood. He has nothing. He has absolutely nothing like is my childhood was fantastic Do you ever get bullied? No, I had a lot of good friends and I have no baggage I have no trauma.

1:38:57I have no nothing so for him the solution is completely different Yeah, solution is completely different to the one that it is for maybe me or you and Yeah, I think they're still a potential that he's looking back with rose colored glasses Oh, yeah, and that he just kind of pushed a few small things aside and now some stuff might make him to feel triggered or insecure your embarrass and he just like, oh, it's normal, just kind of push it over and move on, but he doesn't even see it. I'm not saying that's true. Might be, but it's possible. If he breaks down crying this week in the, just go home and poke him back.

1:39:24Are you good? Are you good? Yeah, five times. Yeah. I do think a little breaking that stigma that like, both can coexist in an alpha male too, for men. You know, like you can be this fucking killer who cries. You know, like you can. And I mean, I'm not a deep religious person, but you look at someone like Jesus Christ. The night before he got crucified, the Bible says he was weeping. You know, he was scared. When he was carrying the cross, he was stumbling, he was falling. He had to have people help him. Like, this is the epitome of the archetypal, like, human. You know, and he struggled. He cried.

1:39:57He was scared. And he was sacrifice for everyone. Like, that's a story that is old as time that was equally showing that. But you don't think Jesus was a fucking bad as motherfucker? Like, I think he probably was, you know? So I think there's an ability to intertwine that And sometimes people come out of the woodworks like Andrew Tate who are just so far one way like this is being a man And then there's people who are too far the other way who like you need to be sensitive and cry and who cares about winning and all this shit It's like no like I want to be the best version myself and that's my biggest goal But underneath that I want to fucking win I want to fucking embarrass everybody on stage But when I don't I'm not any less of a man I'm still just as like I still value myself.

1:40:34I'm just as worthy of a human being But that's just I still want to fucking fuck shit up over there, you know? Yeah, to be able to intertwine that and just believe that they can co -exist I think is something just super important to set off on that journey You are the first thing I asked you was about pressure as a privilege And you mentioned that it was like just a thing that you came up with and then you almost retrofitted the idea Around it the same thing goes for a champion mentality Yeah, you like come up with a thing. I have a friend Marion. She says a meme first meme first explain later and And I think that it's really, really important that you have concepts that can be quite easily summarized, the parable of the Mexican fishermen.

1:41:13Everybody knows what that is. Everyone knows that story, they know what they take away. One of the problems that you have with a meme first explain later philosophy is that you optimize for ideas that are very simple and like unidimensional. So holding two opposing thoughts in your mind at the same time is the most difficult thing that you can do in 2023. I want to be strong and powerful, but open and vulnerable. No, these two things, you have to be just one or the other. That's the only way that it works. So I do think that the limited bandwidth that the internet has and some of the ways that people are rewarded for content online causes them to simplify down theories and philosophies to the point where you lose the nuance and the nuance is really what's important.

1:42:06And it actually causes cultural memes to propagate that are nowhere near as sophisticated as they should be. Like, if any one concept can be explained in a single sentence, it's probably not sufficiently complex, you know? For sure. I think the biggest tool that they come up with, that those like parables or quotes or whatever have come with me, was just like giving me a reason to self -reflect. So when I hear like a quote or like a story or something I've said in the past that really like I'm like fuck that kind of like hits me I'll like write it down and I'll continuously go back and kind of rethink what it means to me You know, and I think we all need to learn how to really think for ourselves So when you listen to someone like we keep on much and you take because you brought him up when he goes on this I listen to part of his huge podcast and there's all this shit I'm like fuck like this dude smart.

1:42:56I'm fired up like this is all makes sense and he said something and I'm like I don't agree with that. Like I don't for myself. That's if it works for him okay, but like I don't. So I don't have to agree with everything you're saying, but I have to be smart enough to be able to think for myself, to take pieces of both sides and understand that much of politics wants to lean right or left, that like it's somewhere in the middle at the end of the day. And you have to like you said, you have to find your own way, some level. You have to constant reflection of finding who you are and finding it where you fit and all this and how it integrates into you, not just because person X does it like this, but because you do it the best way you do it.

1:43:29You have to learn through mistakes and through practice and reflection and life and triumph and pairing and all the share. Well, when you have someone that gets a platform, any platform, they are usually especially in one particular area or good at one particular thing. The problem is that they then, because social media is ubiquitous, 24 .7, they're then asked their opinion on other things. Like I will quite happily take your advice on a good push -pull -leg split, but to be frank I don't care what you think about the Ukraine conflict. Do you know what I mean? I'm not going to give a pilot this.

1:44:06Yes, but there are a lot of people who we've got the opportunity to have this platform So when do you think about the COVID Wuhan lab leak hypothesis? And what do you think about the situation that we've got going on with Russia and blah blah blah? I think staying in your lane in that regard is a good idea. And even that, you know, coming from someone that does have a platform, even that's tempting. Maybe I could become the, what if I was the Ukraine guy as well. I have a friend Douglas Murray and he said somebody asked him why he hadn't commented very much on the COVID situation is like back end of 2021 or start 2022.

1:44:48We've been through this two year. I mean, in the same thing and he writes four or five columns a week and it's a big, big deal. New Bailey comments on it. Yeah. And he said, I'm going to do something which is very rare in the modern world, just to not say anything about something which I know nothing about. I imagine that. Fucking brilliant. Yeah. So it was one of the things that we've spoken about today, a common theme has been an investigation into your own mind, introspective, retrospective, doing that room -inative work. Have you ever had any interest in psychedelics? Yes. Have you taken any?

1:45:20I haven't. I'm so tempted though. Yeah. I'm like constantly like, I want to go to Peru, do I wasca? Like I want the journey to hit me with it. I mean, there's still a part of me. That's like a little bit afraid. You know, you hear all the, like this. I do believe what people say when, like, One of the common fears is like, you're not going to want anything that's currently in your life. And then the contrary to that is like, well, it's because of the things that weren't meant to be in your life. And I do believe that. But I also love my life right now, and I don't really think I need that much of a change.

1:45:49And I'm slowly, mentally growing and becoming more true to myself and happy. And I don't really want to fuck with that. But the shroom side of things, I'm sure I'll dabble eventually. Yeah. I just haven't gotten there yet. Yeah, yeah, yeah. I would do. So mushrooms, yeah, but nothing. I haven't tried LSD, I haven't tried Iowaska. I mean, Austin, which is the psychedelic capital of America. And yeah, a lot of people go down to Saltara. I think it's called a lot of the guys fly down there. I want to say that that's maybe in Peru. It sounds fantastic. I mean, actually the process doesn't sound that nice up until the point in which you're in it.

1:46:27But yeah, there's definitely fear, I think, and apprehension around, okay, what's this gonna bring up? You know, especially if you've done some work and you realize that there's depths to trauma and you think, wow, fuck, there is some stuff that came up that one time when I was on a podcast and you go, okay, what if I think I've relieved all of the pressure that was tamping down that and it's not as fucking heavy, touched it. You know, in the iceberg, yeah, it's scary. I mean, that's part of the, I mean, the fear of even self -reflection. It's a baby version of just like uncovering what's inside you that you've been suppressing forever, like what's deep inside Chris, other other Chris, you know, send in the, can I pour out and you know, no idea what you're going to do.

1:47:15I saw you post about the difference between seeing a dream as a fantasy and seeing it as an objective that you guys have been playing around with words and definitions and how important they were. What is that difference? What's the difference between seeing a dream as a fantasy and a dream as an objective? I was kind of just reflecting on... I think a lot about language too and I try and correct the way I say things and like people call me out for it now my YouTube and it helps me a lot. And I just think there's a lot of power and words that reflects a lot but it's not so much of the word but it's each individual perception of that word.

1:47:51And it was just more of a thought because we made this I said this thing like dream with intent and it was just like What is a dream you like? Anyone could ask you a question and you're like always your definition of this word in that question and it could be completely different So if I say dream somebody could be like well, I'm fantasizing about this But in their mind they're like someone who works nine or five in their fantasizing of their dream job that they know They're gonna never get new because it's just a dream and then there's a type of person who hears dream and it's like well It's the same, it's the synonymous with goal.

1:48:19It's just an objective I'm gonna get. It's just my top line objective. And I think even just like starting something, I mean like this is my dream. If that means that's you great, but maybe just wish that were to this is my goal. This is my objective. This is what I'm chasing after. So you're actually committing a plan of action to yourself rather than just some like fantasy that you have in your sleep. One of the best things I heard about this was a lot of people are worried about giving up what they have now for what is gonna happen in the future. especially it comes to do with work, right? That you have a job which is okay, it's not great, but it's not that bad.

1:48:52And you end up realizing, are you succeeding at a job that you hate? Yes. Imagine how well you would succeed at a job that you loved. Yeah. And it's crazy. It's crazy to think that, is it, I think 85 % of Americans say that they are either actively unengaged or not engaged with their work. It's only 15 % of people that say, I am actively engaged with my work. So you have 85 % of people that are basically ambivalent or like outright negative about the thing that they spend 40 hours a week doing. Yeah. And not everybody can just upsticks and decide to pivot and go and do different stuff, but that's the point that everybody faces that same level of difficulty and that when it becomes tough or you're uncertain or whatever, everybody else faces that as well.

1:49:40Yeah, so it's almost like When you're deep in a diet and your body is Pushing you to try and eat more food, but you're stopping it from eating more food Yeah, that's not an enjoyable feeling, but it is the sign that progress is being made and it's the same thing is when A lot of guys message me and ask about I don't necessarily have the support system around me that I wish that I did to be able to do the things that I want to. I live in the north west of England and you know, I love reading philosophy or psychology and learning about human nature, but all of my friends are like rugby players and all they want to do is go out and drink every weekend.

1:50:17And I'm I used to be like that and maybe now I'm not and I'm starting to feel discontinuity and discord and friction between me and a life that I used to live in the life that I live now and where I want to go. How can I deal with the fact that this is painful for me? And the answer is the fact that it is painful is the reason that it's working. If it wasn't you stepping out everybody else that has to try and step out into this new life faces this same thing to every single person does, that's why most people don't do it. Like, this is what hard feels like and this is why most people don't win.

1:50:55So continuing to push through and almost seeing that level of discomfort as a signal, it's like a way marker that's been planted in the ground. Yes. More this way. Because if it was all just super easy, well, how are you going to get anything different to what everybody else has got? If you do the same thing that everybody else does. Yeah. And one of the best selectors for people not doing a thing is discomfort. So the route that has a lot of discomfort down it, usually on the other side of that, ends up with something which is valuable. Usually. Usually. If you know where your progress is going.

1:51:25Correct. Like to build on that way, you were talking about like the progress part, a lot of results, kills a lot of people. Like what are you progressing towards? People who sit in their jobs and they feel like there's no value, it's not contributing to themselves or the world or really it's just there for a paycheck. That and it feels like tough, like uncomfortable, though there's just, you know, you're just miserable with it. But at least your friend, if he's chasing after something that's like a dream of his or a passion that he's chasing towards and there's progress since uncomfortable, at least at the end of that line, it's what he wants.

1:51:54You know, and that's leads to obviously like a lot of people ask me, how do you say so? Like you mentioned discipline when you're at the point you want to eat and you want to diet Like well, I love what I do at the baseline I'm passionate about what I'm doing and I love that what the goal will be I love the part of it. I love the impact it has on others that help people in my life and myself So at the end that's just there's a reason there's a purpose behind it rather than just mindlessly Circling the hamster wheel. Yeah, one of my friends Chris Sparks has this idea called there is no growth without goals and what he means is that the the James Clear atomic habits idea of, you know, just focus on daily routines and you don't need to be outcome focused, you just need to be iteration focused, just do one day, do one day, do one day.

1:52:39But that only works if it is in service of a greater thing. Yes. You are going to not rise to the level of your goals, you are going to fall to the level of your systems, but your systems need to be moving you in the right direction. Because if you end up realizing, oh, I've been doing all of this stuff day after day, after day and the destination it's taken me to is something that I wasn't even really that bothered about. This happens all the time. People that think all I need to do is continue to grow the business. One day after the next, I'm going to turn up on time, I'm going to work hard, I'm going to do the rest of the thing.

1:53:08And in 20 years, they look back and go, I didn't want a big business. Don't be scared. Yeah. I can do anything with all this money now. Spent all of this time climbing up a ladder to realize that it's up against the wrong wall. Yeah. So, yeah, there can be no growth without goals. and I think that it's important, but also being too outcome -focused, again, holding two conflicting thoughts in your mind at the same time. Yes, it's difficult, it's difficult, but it's important. And even that, even in this that we're talking about, the fact that it's hard to hold two different thoughts in your mind at one time is the exact thing that separates you out from the rest of the crowd, because that's what most people do.

1:53:43Most people struggle to do hold those things. If you can do it, that's also another selector. But yes, I wasca, I would love to see you do it. I wonder what sort of size dose they would need to give you about they're gonna have to give you a big boy does I don't know. I feel like I'm like it's still be a lightweight. Yeah, I Want you gonna stop when you're gonna be done when you're gonna be done the million dollar question right now The last few years I've been getting asked out a lot. I think I could I Went through a tough period at one point where I wasn't thriving in bodybuilding and I wasn't enjoying it too much And I think I almost like hinted in my energy that this wasn't like gonna be forever and people like he's good at retired.

1:54:21So now I get that question all the time. But since integrating myself more into this, like I was speaking about the C -Bummer's Christopher being myself more, allowing myself to feel the stress sometimes makes me more excited about the good parts and feel all the joy rather than just numbing stuff out. It's actually made it a lot more fun. Overall, I'm a lot more excited every year now and I look forward to it. So every year now, I'm like excited to keep going, to be better. And I've always told myself, again, I tell myself these things, if I come to the point where I'm not excited, I'm not like looking forward to like pushing myself and going past with limits again and I'm like, oh, like fuck, like I have those days, but I mean consistent, like that's how I truly feel about it, then I need to pull it because I don't think without that like love and drive and passion, that I'm going to be able to push my bodies to the limits of where I'm actually capable of being my best self.

1:55:08And I don't want to compete to win another title. I don't want to look worse than win a title. I want to know that I'm progressing and I'm like beating what I looked like last year, which how fucking miserable it was to get down to that body fat and to keep that muscle on me and to train like that and do all that I want to know I can beat that this year that's part of what excites me even more than the trophy does So as soon as I lose that fire I got to tell myself I'm tapping out and I'm ready for the next part of life But I'm truly taking it year by year and it sounds like a bit of a political answer But I honestly I look to the next year and I'm like if I finish this year and I'm like buck yellow suit again Then I'll do it again, but if I'm like nope, this isn't it for me like over a set up here to time I truly my heart.

1:55:46I'm done Then I'm gonna check out but I really I can't predict the future again my health comes into it My health is a deteriorate that I'll be gone, but I've been Functioning in a way where I like I know I have a lot set up post -career You know, I've never identified myself as a bodybuilder. I don't really even like to like dress looking like I'm this fucking jack bodybuilder I'm just like a skinny guy who walks through the street, you know? But like I don't identify myself as such. So when I'm done bodybuilding, it's not like oh, no, who am I now? There's lots of there's lots of self no, it's just a chapter of my life the book is closed It's open a new one what's next so just Creating a structure right now and a self where there's no fear around leaving it It'll be sad as fucking I will forever miss being the strong and shredded as big the standing on stage the feeling on their lights It's hearing my name called, but it's the time and place for it.

1:56:41I'm enjoying it right now and when it's gone, it'll just be time for the next thing. Then fatherhood. Yes. That's like my thing. And I still, like if I'm lucky enough to have kids, it's like I just, I put that little safety cynicism that on myself because there's always a fear behind that. But I just truly think that I'm gonna be the best at ever. My fiance will be the best mom ever. And I'm like, I'm fucking looking forward to that. I'm very excited to have kids and like I'll hear a lot of people say that they're scared to bring their kids into this world Get the shape of where it's at and how like crazy things are now But I'm like no like that's exciting I'm gonna bring a badass kid and he's gonna fucking own this shit because I'll teach him how to navigate it And I'll give him permission to do all the stuff that I've learned and I'll teach him everything I've learned and I'm really excited to like Build that kind of family unit and hopefully pass on some knowledge I've learned over years and what my parents gave me and what I've expanded on that put that into another human.

1:57:37Yeah, me too. I can't wait to be a dad and the difference between our parents' generation and ours, an odd generation and the next one, I really, really hope will be a big inflection point. Our parents did fantastic. They did as well as they could, but the difference in the amount of information that's available, the self -growth, the personal work that you've been able to do, that I've been able to do, You know, you have the opportunity right now, if you're listening to this, to access the greatest thinkers on the planet 24, 7 in real time for free directly into your ears. It is such an unbelievable privilege to be able to have that.

1:58:12It is fucking insane. You cannot like the way that you feel. You cannot like the texture of your own mind, the way that you experience the world. And you have the opportunity to be able to go out and learn the exact thing that you need to be able to improve that. go away, work on it, come back, listen to the same person again. It's fucking insane. It's absolutely ridiculous that we have the opportunity to do this and it is such a huge opportunity. I asked David Goggins because he, David Goggins his father had been mistreated by his grandfather, Goggins his grandfather, and then his father mistreated David.

1:58:48And I asked David whether he most sort as part of his mission to be a like a dam, to be a breakwater or a circuit breaker from all of this trauma, you know, that's getting passed down from generation to generation. And I think that a degree of awareness, you know, all of the challenges that young men are facing at the moment where they wish that they'd be able to speak up more, integrate the feminine, learn to embody the masculine, whatever it might be. I really, really hope and think that in 20 years time when the next generation, like the millennial personal development bro generation kids are growing up, that they're actually gonna be like, you know what it was, I fucking, I learned so much from my dad, like I just, he downloaded like every Jordan Peterson and Joe Rogan insight directly into my brain by the age of 10 years old.

1:59:36You can imagine that generation, yeah. I think it's really exciting. I feel like it would be like a, but not everyone's thinking of it in it. Some people are just growing TikTok with this use of internet. So it'll be like those people and then no one's in here. It'll be like a beautiful description and people without an audible subscription. Exactly. I do agree. I think it's called assortative mating in like the the evolution psychology literature and people that are alike mate, people that are alike mate. And that ends up with, you know, the personal growth people mate with the personal growth people and the people that the TikTok people make with the TikTok people.

2:00:10And you do end up your right. you do end up with this almost diverging quality of insight. Like polarizing growth, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, which is not good. But on the flip side, like, what are you going to do? Like you're reaching 20 million people across all of your socials. If you can't nudge culture, then nobody can. For sure. So, but yeah, man, I think the opportunity and it really sounds like the work that you've done is almost preparing yourself to become a good dad. in a way, I love the idea of most of the battles that you go through in your twenties being the thing that prepares you to be the father that you want to be in your thirties.

2:00:48I really think that that's a very noble way of thinking about and also it you know it's not like you didn't get anything out of it either but for sure. You also get this beautiful opportunity to pass on more insights to a a child that will hard one by you. I think that's really really cool. For sure. Yeah. Why it's so important in your 20s to throw yourself into the fire to take the risks. And if there's going to be a moment in your life where you're like, fucking, I'm just going to go for it. And if I fail, I fail, do it in your 20s. Take the risks, do the things that are uncomfortable, and kind of like navigate yourself through it.

2:01:27Because really putting yourself in the uncomfortable situations, like you said, that discomfort equals growth. So you kind of got to do it. Fuck yeah. Chris Bumsteads, ladies and gentlemen, Chris, that's bringing this one home. I really appreciate you, man. Thank you for having me. Why should people go if they want to check out all of the shit that you're doing at the moment? I could just look up Chris Bumstead. I can find it. Right name? Right name, yeah. Relatively right name. Right. Dagwood Bumstead famous from the old newspapers in the 70s or some shit. Okay. Dude, thank you so much for having me.

2:01:55I appreciate it. Yeah, no, I'm super grateful to be here. I've watched your podcast for a while, so it's an honor to be sitting in front of you in this intimidating interview as people like I