January 9, 2023 • 45 mins
Have you tried to lose weight many times but never seemed to be able to keep it off?
So has Brad.
Have you started an exercise program and gone all in only to quit 3-4 weeks later?
So has Brad.
Have you disliked how you looked and felt and struggled with low self-worth?
So has Brad.
But Brad discovered that he had actually been focusing on the wrong things all along.
After changing his mindset, he went from being 50lbs overweight to completing over 30 endurance events including marathons and the Spartan trifecta, and creating the life of his dreams.
In this episode, he will teach you the framework he used to do that.
Brad Carlson is a certified health coach, spiritual practitioner, author and speaker. He guides others on a journey of self-discovery to become fit, happy and healthy based on what works for them and their own interpretations of being fit, happy and healthy.
Website:
www.trainingwithcoachbrad.com
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Brad Carlson (00:00):
I was trying to exercise and I had no energy.
(00:02):
I had no motivation.
And I asked myself a very simplequestion that I had never asked
before.
Why?
Why am I doing this?
Why am I exercising?
I discovered my why in thatmoment that if I take care of my
mind, body and spirit, my mind,body and spirit will take care
of me.
Michael Bauman (01:00):
So welcome back to Success Engineering.
I'm your host, Michael Bauman Ihave the pleasure of having Brad
Carlson on.
He's a certified health coach, aspiritual practitioner, author,
speaker.
He helps other people on the ofself-discovery, and we're gonna
get into what that looks likefor him as well, on how to
become fit, happy, healthy,based on what works for them and
how they actually interpret whatthat looks like.
(01:22):
So very, very fascinating.
He's the creator of Mind StrongMindset Training Academy audio
programs.
So it helps you develop themindset you actually need to
become the better version ofyourself.
He's coached hundreds of people.
He has a bunch of nutrition andfitness certifications.
He's done 30 endurance events,including the Spartan trifecta,
studied martial arts philosophyin five different countries,
black belts.
(01:43):
I mean, I'm just gonna keepgoing.
Aikido, hapkido, Japanese sword,black belts.
It's, it's amazing.
So this is gonna be a funconversation.
He loves adventure, lovestravel.
It's gonna be, it's gonna begreat.
So welcome to show
Brad Carlson (01:54):
Oh wow.
Thank you so much for having mehere, Michael.
Gosh, that was an incredibleintroduction.
Thank you.
Michael Bauman (01:59):
Oh, there you go.
You've had an incredible life,but it wasn't always Well,
doesn't always like that.
So let's start, we're gonnastart in the, in the rough, uh,
probably one of the hardestperiods of your, your life.
Just dive right into that.
So, can you talk about, youknow, around that 2011, you
know, period of time and youreally hit, hit a low spot, and
can you share that period ofyour life and how it just
(02:22):
started the journey ofdiscovering yourself and what,
what you became up to thispoint?
Brad Carlson (02:28):
Yeah, it actually started in 2009 when I was that
Couch Potato that was reallyoverweight.
I was 38 years old at the time,and I had come back to America
at 30 and then like everybody Igot cut up in, in the work, you
know, work life cycle.
I, all I did was work, comehome, I'd sit on the couch,
watch tv, and was justcompletely exhausted.
I was sitting on the bed one dayin my bedroom and I was
(02:51):
disgusted with the person I hadbecome.
I was just so disappointed inmyself.
I was very overweight, 50 poundsto be exact, and I had what I
call the couch potato belly, theSanta Claus belly, the spare
tire, I call it the 18 pack orsomething like that, and, and
yeah, my life was spiralingdownhill very quickly.
(03:12):
Starting in 2012, the divorcehit.
From 2009 to 2012.
I was still in the midst of whatthey call that yo-yo cycle,
trying to gain lose, gain, lose,and still trying to, to figure
all this stuff out.
2012, I went through the divorceand lost my house to foreclosure
when the economy in Americacollapsed the housing market in
2008.
My house went to the bank in2013.
(03:34):
I signed the divorce papers Iremember on a Friday, and had to
turn the keys over to my houseto the bank on a Saturday and
then couch surf for a month.
That was, oh my gosh,.
The whole time was still tryingto Figure out the whole health
thing.
I didn't even get my headwrapped around the whole health
thing for probably at least twomore years.
If I knew what, obviously what Iknow now, then it'd be very
(03:56):
different.
My life would've been verydifferent.
But I didn't.
It really began in 2009 withjust being overweight and I just
become purely disgusted anddisappointed in myself with, you
know, how did I let myself getthis way is the common question.
How did I let myself get solethargic?
How did I let myself get sooutta shape?
My self-esteem was in thetoilet.
(04:17):
If I think about it now myphysiology is changing a bit.
Like I can feel the pain comingback inside of me, that period
of my life.
It's like I wouldn't evenrecognize that person anymore if
they were sitting here.
But still definitely a painfulpart.
But again, what they say doesn'tkill you, makes you stronger.
That is true.
It took that pain to get me tochange my mindset, change my
(04:40):
health, change my nutrition topropel my life forward to where
I am now.
So I can look back at it now andsay that was the best thing that
ever happened to me.
Mm-hmm.
That's one thing I would telllisteners right away, is
whatever you're going through,you'll look back five years from
now and say that was one of thebest things that ever happened
to me.
Mm-hmm.
uh, doesn't seem like that in,in the meantime, but there's
(05:01):
always a reason for whatever ishappening is happening.
And if you can just kinda like asurfer on the wave.
If you could just ride the waveto the shore eventually it will
end and your life will bebetter.
But you gotta want to make itbetter.
You gotta want to change, yougotta wanna step forward.
And that was a big differencefor me is like, enough is
(05:21):
enough.
I'm ready for change.
I'm ready to get in shape, I'mready to lose weight.
But that was part of theproblem.
I thought it was about losingweight and getting in shape and
I learned along the way it hasnothing to do with losing weight
and getting in shape.
Michael Bauman (05:35):
Well, let's talk about that because I'm curious
to hear how.
how did you start workingthrough both on the, the
physical side of things.
So you go, Hey, I, you know,don't like myself, I don't like
how I look, I don't like wheremy life is at.
And you go, I wanna make achange with the, with the
exercise.
Um, so I'm curious as like whatthat started to look like, but
then also how did you workthrough, and this is a process,
(05:58):
right, like you said, but howdid you start to work through on
that emotional side of things,dealing with all of that?
Brad Carlson (06:05):
This is always a funny part of the story.
When I had that meltdown in2009, like sitting on a couch,
I'm like, okay, I'm gonna do it.
I'm gonna lose the weight.
It's happening.
And an entire year went by.
This is November of 2009 toNovember, 2010.
And I didn't do a single thing.
Like I didn't lift one weight.
I didn't spend a minute in anexercise class, I didn't do
(06:26):
anything.
And so a whole year went by.
And so now I'm a year later, nowit's November, 2010, I'm right
back in the same spot, sittingon, on my bed in the bedroom,
still 50 pounds overweight,still low self-esteem,
lethargic, everything.
And that's when I said, okay,now I call it my secret weapon.
I'm determined to do this.
So I had no training, noknowledge, no anything, but I
(06:49):
had an exercise bike in thegarage.
So I did the only thing I knewhow to do.
I went and rode it every singleday for three weeks, and then I
quit.
The physical part it came in inwaves, up and down.
Like I went for three weeks andthen completely quit.
And then I think it was about amonth later, a friend introduced
(07:09):
me to one of those home-basedexercise programs.
I'll just.
Say what it is.
Not that I'm promoting it oranything, but it was called
P90X.
This is why failure is such agood thing.
Failure is what drives success.
Each failure gave medetermination to then be more
successful the next time I didit.
It was about a month between thebike and then I started p90x,
(07:32):
but here was a little secretthat made all the difference.
When I did p90x, my goal was notto lose weight.
I didn't care if I lost a singlepound.
What I cared about was finishingthe program.
I told myself, I use some exexpletives.
Bleep, bleep, bleep Brad, Idon't care what you're gonna
start this and you're gonnafinish it no matter what.
(07:53):
So, by God, six, seven days aweek, I was in my garage.
It was like 30 degreesFahrenheit, sometimes two in my
garage.
Cause there wasn't any space inmy house to do it.
I couldn't even do half of theworkouts.
They would do like 20 and I'd dolike three.
But I didn't care, no matterwhat, I was gonna finish it.
And I just kept getting strongerand stronger and stronger.
(08:14):
And I remember one day I wasactually running around my
neighborhood.
One lap around my neighborhoodwas one mile.
And a really good friend, he wasdriving along on the car and we
hadn't seen each other a while,and he stopped and he's like, my
god, Brad, you've lost a lot ofweight.
Mm-hmm.
And that's when I went, oh, Ihave, I didn't even really think
(08:34):
to check about it.
But then here's the thing.
After I finished p90x, the 12weeks I quit again.
Mm-hmm.
Cause I didn't know what to do,and the weight started to come
back on.
I gained 12 pounds within twoweeks after finishing p90x.
Mm-hmm.
The magic moment for thephysical part, I'll get to the
emotional part in a second thateverybody has to know, and this
(08:56):
is one of the very first thingsI teach now, before you even get
into the exercise or diet, ifyou're starting with me, is I
discovered my why.
That summer I went on a weeklongwilderness survival trip.
Kind of like, Bear Grills, youknow, he takes people on the
trip, you eat bugs and you know,build your own shelter and all
(09:16):
that.
So there were 15 of us from allover the United States.
We got together, we met in theYakima Valley up in Yakima,
Washington.
And we lived like huntergatherers for a week.
And it was during that time thatsomething happened to me.
Um, It's hard to put into words,but I had a moment where
physically I could not move.
(09:37):
You're hiking all day, 20, 30miles a day on like one calorie,
if you're lucky.
I mean, it takes like a hundredcalories to get a five calorie
mud cuz you're, you know, you'retrying to catch it or so you're,
you're, you're harvesting likeroots.
It takes more energy to harvestthe root than you get from
eating it.
I was like dead physically andsomething happened in me.
The Japanese call it"kokoro"where your spirit just takes
(10:00):
over.
There is no more physical andyour spirit takes over.
Well, that happened to me on thelast day.
And then I took that back withme from the hike and was trying
to, you know, try again.
I had lost motivation.
I had fallen off the horse.
I got back from that weeklongexcursion.
I was trying to exercise and Ihad no energy.
I had no motivation.
(10:20):
And I asked myself a very simplequestion that I had never asked
before.
So if you're listening, you'vegot to ask yourself this
question.
Why?
Why am I doing this?
Why am I exercising?
And in that moment, I call it myfirst miracle.
The roof on my garage opened up,the heavens parted, I got struck
by a bolt of lightning.
I discovered my why in thatmoment that if I take care of my
(10:43):
mind, body and spirit, my mind,body and spirit will take care
of me.
And that has been the drivingforce for the past 13 years of
everything that I have done,health and wellness wise.
That is the key to sustainingyour health and wellness
journey, is that you have got tohave a very deep inner personal
why that works for you.
It's exactly what Simon Sinexsays.
(11:04):
Start with why, but it cannot bean external.
Why?
Oh, I wanna lose 50 pounds.
That's not sustainable.
Oh, I wanna have more energy toplay with my grandkids.
That's a great reason, but itdoesn't work in the long run.
I wanna fit in a certain sizewedding dress.
Well, that's great.
I wanna be able to travel and,and more adventure.
Those are good, but they're allexternal why's.
I had one client I remember shekept training for the 5k.
(11:25):
She would do a 5K and thenanother one, and then another
one.
And as long as there was a 5K ora 10 K, she worked her way up.
She was good.
But then all of a sudden, COVIDhit.
There were no more five Ks.
She gained a lot of weightbecause everything she was doing
was external motivating.
And it wasn't until we talkedthat she realized that
everything she was doing wasexternally motivated.
(11:45):
And anything you wanna start abusiness, why, why are you doing
it?
You wanna start, you wanna be ahusband, a father?
Why?
Why?
You know, why, why this person?
You know, we'll get into thathere in, in, in a little bit.
But that's what sustained thephysical part of my journey and
any health and wellness journeyis that I discovered my why.
Michael Bauman (12:05):
Sorry, before, before we get into the
emotional, I, I would like totalk about how, how you kind of
coach, um, people to discoverthat, why, what does that look
like?
How do people go aboutdiscovering their why or their
purpose, vision.
Brad Carlson (12:17):
There's something called the seven levels of why
exercise.
And you start with that.
Okay, well, why do I wanna loseweight?
Oh, because I wanna fit into acertain size wedding dress.
Well, why do I wanna fit into acertain size wedding dress?
Well so I look good.
Well, why is looking goodimportant to you?
Well, because then I'll feelbetter.
Why is feeling better importantto you?
Because then I'll be able to dothe things I wanna do.
Well, why is doing the thingsthat you want to do important to
(12:40):
you?
Because then I'll be living alife of meaning and purpose.
You see how we're starting toget more deeper into that?
So it's basically, it's calledthe seven levels of why
exercise.
It's in my couch to healthycurriculum.
It's week, two, actually.
Week one is mindset.
Week one is about who are you?
Mm-hmm.
that, we'll get into that in asecond.
(13:00):
That's part of the emotion.
And then week two is the whyexercise?
One area I disagree with Simon.
He says You only have one whyfor anything.
And I don't agree with that.
I have very deep personal whys,sort of depending on what I have
going on in my life.
They're similar, but in someinstances they're really
different.
But you do that seven levels ofwhy exercise and then I work
with them on the phone and wekeep going and we keep going
(13:20):
until the light bulb goes off.
And in some cases we've gonedown to level 20.
It's called the seven levels ofwhy.
But in some cases, like for me,I've gone to level 17, I level
24.
Because until that aha moment,that epiphany, that white bulb,
it's not going to besustainable.
(13:40):
You know, it may be a great why,but it's not sustainable enough.
It has to be something that,that resonates with you and it's
so personal.
Michael Bauman (13:48):
Yeah.
I use a very similar thing, um,with my clients.
It's very simple.
But if you just asked thatquestion about any area of your
life, just going like, why am Iactually doing this you know?
Yeah.
Or like, what do I really want?
And then why do I really wantit?
Right?
Like,
Brad Carlson (14:01):
You start to questions what and why.
We don't have to ask how, howwill, how will I show up on our
life?
But the what and the why, thetwo most simple questions you
could ask that most people onthis planet don't have an answer
to.
Yeah.
When you can answer both ofthose questions, that's when
you're successful.
Yeah.
Michael Bauman (14:17):
There you go.
There you go.
We hit on the hit on thedefinition of success for you So
we have this why, right?
So you kind of discovered thiswhy, but obviously in life,
things come that affect thatwhy.
There's times where it'sdifficult and you have to push
through, and there's obstaclesand there's setbacks.
How do you go about maintainingthat why or keeping your focus
(14:40):
on that when things are reallychallenging?
Brad Carlson (14:43):
It always falls on your why, but that gets into the
next, the next question, who areyou?
Who are you as a father?
Who are you as a husband?
Who are you as a health coach?
And then show up as that person.
Mm-hmm.
And when you fully understandwho you are and embrace your
true, authentic self, then itbecomes easier and easier and
easier to just authenticallyshow up.
(15:06):
And then what you justdescribed, it rarely, rarely
happens for me now.
That I get down in the dumps andthat I'm off alignment and that
I'm off balance.
And when that does happen, Ijust sit in my chair, maybe get
my journal out, do somejournaling about the situation
that's going on in my life andjust let the verbal diarrhea on
the paper and like, what isgoing on in my life?
(15:27):
You know, and what I, what I'vediscovered, gosh, we could go
off so many areas here that'sthings like that.
Everything is an inner solution.
Every problem going you havegoing on in your life, the
answer is inside you.
And I've found that it alwaysboils down to a self-worth,
self-esteem type of an issue.
Feeling of a lack of worthinessor a lack of deserving something
(15:47):
or, and when you can workthrough that, and the more you
work through those with regardsto being a spouse or with being
a coworker, or with being ahusband or a dad or whatever
area in your life, then the lessand less that you get pulled
back down off that horse intothat depression hole, uh, so to
speak.
Michael Bauman (16:07):
How, how do you go about doing that?
Because that's, you know, rightup, right up my alley.
Um, how, how people could feelenough so that worthiness that,
you know lack of worthiness whenpeople have that, what are your
tips or your advice for how togo about filling, you know,
filling the This is
Brad Carlson (16:24):
Week 1 of my Couch to healthy program.
You have to answer the question,who do you want to be?
So that's the second miracle.
So, getting into how I dealtwith this emotionally.
I understood my why.
I was starting to get into theexercise groove.
I still didn't know anythingabout nutrition.
I was three years into thisjourney, I was still eating hot
pockets and chocolate milk andsugary donuts like every single
(16:46):
day.
I didn't realize you had to eathealthy too.
I thought all you had to do wasexercise.
Mm-hmm.
But during the divorce, my doghe would not come over to me and
like, come on, boy, come overhere.
And I still to this day have inmy mind the look he gave me.
You know, he was a 20 pound cockspaniel, like a foot and a half
off the ground.
(17:06):
He just gave me this look like,you're such a loser, dad.
Oh.
And he turned around and he wentback to his bed.
Dogs sense energy, especially inhumans.
He knew something was wrong withme, and I looked at him and
that's when I had my secondmiracle.
And that's when I go, oh my God.
I have been focusing up to thispoint in my life on everything I
didn't want.
(17:27):
I didn't want to be an uptight,grumpy, irritable husband and
father.
Well, guess what?
I was a very uptight, grumpy,irritable husband and father.
I didn't want to be a lethargic,low self-esteem, couch potato.
Well, guess what?
I was still a low self-esteem,lethargic couch potato.
Mm-hmm.
And in that moment I realized, Iasked myself a question, what
(17:48):
type of person do I want to be?
And that's how you staymotivated.
That's how you propel your lifeforward is what type of person
do you want to be?
So Michael, what type of husbanddo you want to be?
What type of dad do you want tobe?
What type of health coach?
What type of trainer do you wantto be?
(18:11):
Okay.
I wanna be someone that is fullof love and life and health and
passion and enthusiasm and, anddynamic intensity and fun, and
can bring that in into everysituation.
And it's just a matter ofshowing up authentically as who
you are every single time andfocusing on who do you want to
be.
Mm-hmm.
Who do you want to be a yearfrom now?
(18:32):
Mm-hmm.
five years from now.
10 years from now.
Okay.
Imagine what your life would belike.
Like best case scenario, shoot,reach for the stars, even past
the stars.
This is the type of life I wantto have.
This is the person I want to be.
I wanna be that awesome rockstarbusiness entrepreneur that is
kicking butt in the world and,helping people and is full of
(18:54):
love.
I call it love, life, health andhappiness.
And so who do you want to bemoving forward?
And when you step into that,that person of who you want to
be, that's when your life reallyshifts and that's when
motivation really doesn't becomean issue.
If you don't have your why, andwhat I'm talking about is your
what?
(19:14):
What type of person do you wantto be?
If you don't know your why andyou don't know your what, then
you have to have a lot ofdiscipline.
You gotta have a ton ofdiscipline to be able to move
forward, otherwise you will falloff the horse and most people
do.
Perfect example, an Olympicathlete, Michael Phelps, best
athlete in the world.
Some will argue at swimming 18Olympic gold medals, something
(19:35):
like that more than anybody inhistory.
And after the Olympics, hedidn't.
Know what to do.
He was depressed.
He didn't know what to dobecause he didn't understand
some of this.
So yeah, we talked a little bitoff camera about success, you
know, the gold medals, thehouse, the car, and, and I asked
that question, well, is theirlife any better than mine?
At the time, 13 years ago Ithought it was, but,but now, no,
(20:00):
because The key to happiness,the key to success is knowing
who you are and being that typeof person you want to be.
So whoever's listening, take alook in the mirror.
Who am I right now?
Okay.
I was a tired, overweight,lethargic, couch potato.
I didn't figure this out untilmy dog would not come over to
me.
(20:20):
And then I asked myself thatquestion, who do I want to be?
What type of husband do I wannabe?
What type of person do I wannabe?
What type of father do I wannabe?
I had been focusing oneverything that I did not want
in life.
Mm-hmm.
I had been focusing on the typeof person I did not want to be.
And unknowingly that's what mostpeople are doing.
They're focused on the fear,what they don't want, who they
(20:42):
don't want to be.
And when you shift that andstart focusing on what you want
and who you want to be in life,everything changes.
And that's where discipline isno longer needed because then
it's fueled by passion anddesire.
There's a much, much, muchstronger factor force than than
(21:03):
discipline.
Discipline only lasts for solong.
So after I, I had that epiphanyon my dog, it still took me
about another year.
But finally I realized who do Iwant to be?
I want to be this healthyperson.
And everything started to fallin line under that.
I was in the public healthdepartment one day and about to
reach for the donut and I was inthe middle of triathlon training
(21:26):
and something, I swear to God itwas a higher power that like
literally grabbed my wrist andpulled it back and would not let
me grab the donut.
Every day I grab a donut,chocolate, candy.
Cause it's there every day.
It's like, how crazy, the healthdepartment, we should have like
fruits and nuts.
But we didn't.
And it's like, if I eat that,will it help me to be a faster
swimmer?
(21:47):
And I went, oh my God, no! Andthen I asked, well, what can I
eat to help me be a fasterswimmer?
And the first thing that came tome was spinach.
I literally went to the storeand grabbed a bag of spinach and
ate the whole thing.
And that what started my journeyinto healthy eating.
Michael Bauman (22:05):
While you are talking about the nutrition and
you know, the exercises as well,can you talk about what are some
of your tips in terms of how canpeople eat well sustainably and
how can people exercise wellsustainably?
Brad Carlson (22:18):
Again, it goes back to who do you wanna be?
If you want to be a healthyperson, it has to start with
that.
Focus on foods that will get youto that person you want to be.
So I realized if I eat thatdonut, will it help me to be
healthy?
The answer was no.
It's the questions that you askyourself.
Mm-hmm.
So ask yourself questions thatwill get you to where you want
(22:39):
to go, but you have to knowwhere you want to go.
Ask yourself questions that willlead you to that person that you
wanna be.
But you have to know that personthat you want to be.
Same with exercise, same withexercise.
Now, the problem I had backthen, it was all from a place of
fear and place of ego.
Mm-hmm.
Another principle is are youdoing this from a place of fear
or a place of love?
(23:00):
When I thought about switchingto RV tiny living, those
millionaires is their life anybetter than mine?
And I realized, no, it wasn't.
And that's when I started to askthe question, well, what is it
that you want outta life?
What is it that I want outtalife?
And I wanted adventure.
I wanted to live, dream, travel,adventure, explore.
(23:21):
And the first step of that wastiny living.
Because for me, that, that sumsup adventure in a nutshell.
You're like camping every night.
I mean, how cool is that Wetalked a little bit about what
success is earlier.
That slowly got me reallythinking that what is it that I
want outta life?
Okay.
First and foremost, I want to behealthy.
And once I started to get thatdialed in, then I realized, oh,
(23:44):
I need to apply this to otherparts of my life.
Oh, I want to be anentrepreneur.
I wanna have my own healthcoaching business.
Never in a million, trilliongazillion years, even 10 years
ago, five years ago, did I thinkI'd be a health coach.
Um, Do doing this or podcastingor anything.
Those are the first three thingsI teach.
Your vision, your why, and yourwho do you want to be?
Michael Bauman (24:08):
Yeah, it's super, super important because
especially like you're, you'retalking about so many people,
you know, in the health andfitness kind of arena, you know,
new Year's resolutions, right?
They set these resolutions, theygo, I wanna lose weight.
Similar to your journey.
They have those three weeks.
They, you know, they, they crushit for three weeks and then it's
difficult after that.
But what you're talking about isso important.
(24:29):
It sounds, it sounds simple, butit is so important for every
single area of your life toactually go, who do I wanna be?
And you're always aligning thosebehaviors with, is this aligning
with that or not?
And the other aspect, of it islooking at, there's an
incredible framework, fromRobert Keegan, out of Harvard
(24:50):
called Immunity to Change.
So why do we actually resistchange?
We have this desire and we go, Iwant to do this well because we
have these hidden assumptionsand this is what we're talking
about as well.
We have these hidden assumptionsthat about these different
behaviors that we have that keepus where we're at.
So a lot of times we look at thereasons, you know, to change,
(25:10):
but there's also, we havereasons to stay the same You
know, there's reasons why we'resitting on the couch and
exploring those and balancingthat out and going, oh, this is
why I'm actually wanting to staythe same and this is why I want
to change.
And then you would go, when Imake this choice, when I make
this behavior, do I wanna alignit with the new identity that I
have?
Um, or do I wanna align it withthe old identity that I have in
(25:32):
the past?
And it's cannot be overstatedabout how important this is in
terms of making any change inyour life.
Very important.
Brad Carlson (25:42):
And it's like Tony Robbins said, change will not
happen until your pain thresholdis at a certain level.
People will change either out ofdesperation or inspiration.
Either one works.
So in the beginning I waschanging out of desperation.
Mm-hmm.
uh, this, this wasn't working.
But now I change out ofinspiration cuz I know
everything is growing andleading me to my next highest
(26:03):
version of me.
Michael Bauman (26:05):
So I'm curious as what, yeah.
I mean, you have a very uniquekinda lifestyle.
So you have your little tiny RVyou're loving life in terms of
that.
Do you have any specificroutines that you do, whether
it's morning routines, eveningroutines, just routines that are
very helpful for you in terms ofaligning yourself with the
person you wanna be?
Brad Carlson (26:23):
So, yes.
And it's constantly changing Soto answer your question, the one
thing I always do is check inwith me.
Mm-hmm.
And what I mean by that is Icheck in with my inner voice, my
intuition, and I just allow itto guide me.
Okay?
Tomorrow morning I'm gonna getup and I'm gonna read for an
hour.
That's my morning routine.
Tomorrow morning I'm gonna getup and do my five mile run.
(26:46):
Very first thing.
That'll be my morning routine.
Tomorrow morning I'm gonna getup and just meditate for an
hour.
Tomorrow morning I'm gonna getup and journal for an hour.
It's not set in stone specificto any, it used to be very
rigid.
You know, 20 minutes of reading,20 minutes of journaling, 20
minutes of exercise, 20 minutesof meditation, shower, get ready
to go.
(27:07):
Uh, it's not like that at all.
It's very fluid now.
So a principle I live by now isI ask myself the question,
what's next?
And we talked about earlier, allthese millionaires who are not
successful, not fulfilled.
It's because they're living froma place of fear.
I'll just use Buddha as anexample.
Completely broke.
Outta shape.
Never read a single book, butprobably one of the most
(27:28):
fulfilled people that the planethas ever seen, because he lived
a life from the inside out.
So my evening routine used to beJournal and read the last hour
before lights out.
This is all changed.
It used to be the last hour, noelectronics, no anything.
Journal meditation, reading,which sounds pretty good.
But the difference is I'm doingit from a place of love now, not
(27:50):
a place of fear that, oh, if Idon't get my reading in today, I
won't be worthy.
I won't be good enough.
And so it's the same activity,but the reason, the why is very
different now.
Mm-hmm.
trust.
Learning to trust the path,trust the journey.
Michael Bauman (28:05):
Yeah.
I had Lord Richard Layard on,he's the co-editor of the World
Happiness Report, and heactually said a very similar
thing.
He said in the morning, justchecking in with yourself and
the highest version of yourself.
And using that to set theintention for the day.
I'm similar.
My morning routine is more rigidthan yours because I do have,
(28:26):
you know rigid things likegetting kids to school and
things like this.
But I would describe myself asan exercise nomad like you, you
do what works for that situationin time.
How I describe it is havingagile habits.
I have habits that are basicallylittle building blocks in terms
of my morning routine, myexercise, things like that.
(28:48):
And if they get affected, I canmove those building blocks to
different spots.
I can shuffle them around.
We listen to all of theseexperts and all of these people
Hal Elrod, the Miracle Morning.
You have, you know, very rigidkind of things.
Mm-hmm.
And I love talking to so manydifferent people on this podcast
cuz very successful people andsome of'em have very rigid
(29:08):
morning routines.
Yeah.
Or just routines in general.
And some of'em don't at all.
Some of'em get up at nineo'clock, you know, and are still
incredibly successful.
And so really understanding andexperimenting with what, what
actually works for you and whatactually works for you right now
in whatever season you're in isreally important.
And having the grace and theability to be able to adjust it
(29:31):
and not beat yourself up isreally important.
Really important.
Brad Carlson (29:35):
And I would say, just make sure you're doing it
for the right reason.
The first several years of myjourney, all those 30 plus races
I did, most of that was based infear and ego.
Mm.
Because I thought, and again, itgoes back to that question, what
is it you really want outtalife?
And I realized that for me in myjourney, I didn't want to be one
of these hardcore, diehard, youknow, ultra ultra type athletes.
(29:59):
What I really wanted to be wasjust fit, happy, and healthy.
And I realized, well, I could befit, happy, and healthy whether
I run a 20 minute mile or I runa 10 minute mile and my body
appreciated the 20 minute mile alot more than the 10 mile and I
could walk the next day.
And I started to go down this,what I call now, the slow, easy
path of exercise.
And especially for men over 40,this really makes a difference.
(30:22):
You've really gotta back off theintensity and do the slow easy
cuz it's much more sustainable.
I want to be fit, happy,healthy, walking, no wheelchair,
none of that stuff.
You know, walking tall, strongand proud, well into my, you
know, sixties, seventies,eighties and nineties.
I can't tell you how manydistance runners I've talked to
in their fifties that can barelywalk.
I know one, she did marathonsfrom 20 years old till almost
(30:45):
40.
She's probably late fifties,early sixties now.
She can't even barely walk amile on a treadmill now cause
her knees are gone because sheovertrained for almost 20 years
of her life.
I don't train for anythingspecific now, so my exercise
routines are very fluid andrigid.
What do I feel like doing thismorning?
Oh, I feel like walking thismorning.
Oh, I feel like doing weightstoday.
Oh, I feel like going to playracquetball today.
Oh.
I feel like playing pickleballtoday.
(31:06):
You know, something, somethingthat you're always moving.
Oh, I feel like doing a naturalmovement session today and, and
I have enough experience I canjust whip something up like on
the spot now and, oh, I only gotfive minutes.
I'm just gonna do five minutes.
Then I got 10 minutes latertoday, and then five minutes in
the evening.
That's at least 20 minutes.
I still get in during the dayversus one 20 minute session,
so, mm-hmm.
(31:26):
And I, I haven't mentioned thisso, to make your health journey
sustainable, to make yourhealthy eating sustainable, any
of that.
It must be a priority.
You manage your priorities, notyour time.
I cannot emphasize that enough.
I'm sorry, one more thing.
I wanna get this in.
This is a really powerfulexercise that I just recently
learned.
All coaches have coaches, so Ihave my own coach right now.
(31:49):
And she taught me this a couplemonths ago.
To help with the motivation tohelp with staying on the path is
a very simple exercise calleddaydreaming.
You know, sit back in your chairfor a minute or two and just
daydream about the life that youdesire about that person you
desire becoming.
Do that two, three times a dayfor just a minute, and your
energies will just fly off thechart.
(32:10):
And that helps begin toreprogram your mindset to bring
you back into, you know, havingthat high energy and that high
motivation where you don't losemotivation, you don't fall off
the horse.
Michael Bauman (32:22):
It.
It's like having consistent,like you're, you're talking
about it all, you know, it justcontinues to come back to that
one principle.
It's like having consistentthings in your day, whatever it
is that, that allow you to alignback with who you are, who you
are, or who, who you want to be.
You know, because all of ourbehaviors are a reflection of
our identities, the values thatwe have, then the priorities
(32:43):
that we have, and then thegoals, you know, that we, that
we set.
And so often we focus on thebehavior or the goals and like
we're talking about, it's likeno, focusing on the identity,
who you wanna be.
You know, then you know thevalues that you have that you
wanna show up with in everysingle situation.
Then looking at, you know, yourpriorities and making sure that
(33:04):
those are, those are aligned andthen your goals reflect that and
your behaviors reflect that.
Brad Carlson (33:08):
And kind of the modern culture, modern society,
the hustle culture.
We have a backwards, it's alwayswhat do you do?
We always emphasize the doingfirst.
Well, you want to get overdepression, well, what will you
do?
We'll go to the doctor or takethis pill or whatever.
But in the native indigenouscultures around the world, they
always focus on the person andthe being.
Who do you want to be?
That started to click in mybrain a couple years ago.
(33:30):
And then as I got deeper into myspiritual studies and went to
some other seminars and readother books or something called
the Be, Do, Have formula.
Be the person you wanna be thedoing will automatically show
up.
Michael Bauman (33:41):
There's a, really, you know, powerful kind
of framework.
It's along those lines that I,that I referenced by a
leadership coach called AlanSeal.
And he talks about, there's fourlevels of engagement with a
situation.
So when any situation arises,that first level is, you know,
just jumping into the drama,right?
So we all do it at, at times,like, just jump into the drama
this did that, you know, I feltthis, you know, whatever that
(34:04):
is, right?
But then above that, if, if yougo above it, you're able to look
at it from a situationalawareness level and you go, oh,
you know, instead of being, youknow, it's this person's fault,
this person's fault, I canactually look at it from a, a
higher level and go, oh, this isthe situation.
This is what's going on.
This is how we can fix it.
This is how we can approach it.
But what you're talking about iswhat he references is kind of
(34:27):
the level above that is that hasto do with choice.
So it's actually choosing.
Who do I want to be in thissituation?
So it doesn't matter whathappened, what situation it is,
whatever at all.
We can always choose who we wantto be in this situation that and
that references, you know, likeVictor Frankl's Man Search for
(34:48):
Meaning.
Like he is in like we've heard alot of the things.
Yeah.
Yeah.
But it probably, I mean, it'sjust like, it's kind of the
quintessential book on meaningwhere he is in.
As dire situations as you canpretty much possibly think, you
know, every right to say, whydoes this happen to me?
But he goes, man's ultimatefreedom is the ability to be
able to choose, you know, howthey respond to this situation,
(35:09):
choose their emotions.
And that's extraordinary.
Like that's some, like, that'snot just like a namby-pamby
thing.
He was in the worst situationand you, you're able to, you're
able to say that.
So that level of third level ofkind of being able to choose and
then that fourth level is theopportunity and when do you
focus on who you want to be?
A lot of times that opportunityjust naturally arises to provide
(35:33):
the solution for that situation.
But you have to train yourselfto recognize.
Am I operating?
You know, like you talked about,am I operating out of fear or am
I operating out of love?
Or who do I wanna be in thissituation?
Yeah.
Um, and it's, it's totallydifferent way to approach,
approach living.
And it takes practice, it takestraining, it takes, oh, it
Brad Carlson (35:52):
did.
Absolutely takes practice.
Yeah.
No, I've been doing this foralmost, I'm on my 14th year now,
and it's taken a lot of, I guessthey call it intentional
practice or awareness practiceand understanding that stuff.
Yeah.
You, you're hitting the nail onthe head.
Choose who you wanna be and thenstart to have everything
revolve, evolve, I should say,evolve around that.
Michael Bauman (36:11):
As far as your meditation routines or just kind
of developing awareness, do youhave any tips for how people can
go about doing that?
Brad Carlson (36:19):
You know, the two tips I would have, one is that
daydreaming, take a minute asmany times as you can a day and
just daydream, imagine the bestlife and the best version of
you.
There's a meditation that Istarted doing about six months
ago.
I don't even know how todescribe it.
But if I use the metaphor of acell phone, when your cell phone
is low on battery, you have acord and you plug it into a
(36:42):
charger.
Mm-hmm.
Okay.
And it charges.
And so what I do, and I actuallydo this when I'm laying in bed,
like the last 10 minutes beforeI actually get up in the
morning.
So that's, going back to yourquestion, my morning routine.
This is something I do almostevery morning now.
I lay there and allow your mind,your body, and your spirit just
(37:03):
to fill with joy and love andhappiness.
That's the only way I know howto describe it.
And for someone who's beginningat this, I would just say focus
on all the exciting, wonderfulthings that you have going on in
your life and focus on all theexciting and wonderful things
that you know, not, that youhope for, not that you wish for,
but you know, will be a part ofyour life in six weeks, a year
(37:24):
or whatever.
You just allow those feelings oflove and health and passion and
joy just to flow through you andjust allow it to charge
yourself.
And that is the most powerfulmeditation that I do now.
I do that and then a lot ofjournaling.
Mm-hmm.
okay, this is my life right now.
This is all messed up withregards to, I don't know,
coworker relationship orsomething like that.
(37:46):
So I'll just start journaling,just let the pen flow and I'll
get about three, four, I meanthree, four pages in, and I'm
like, oh my God.
I was being inauthentic towardsthat person because I had an
insecurity, I had a fear aboutsomething.
And then through the journaling,that fear of insecurity will
come out.
Then once I can identify that, Ican immediately replace it with
(38:07):
what I do want to, I want loveand peace and help and
happiness.
Mm-hmm.
And so next time I'minteracting, I know how to
better handle that situation.
But I would say the two things.
Yeah.
Do practice the daydreaming andpractice the morning meditation
where you just allow your heartto open up and fill with love
and joy and peace, and healthand happiness.
Those are the values that I wantmy life to be about.
(38:29):
That's who I'm stepping intomore and more every day.
and my vision is, is to becomethis bigger source and this
bigger version of love, health,and happiness for the world, one
person at a time.
Mm-hmm.
I'm so blessed to have the lifeI do.
My lifestyle has not made anysense at all to a lot of people
(38:51):
because they're so wrapped up insociety's definition of
lifestyle, the big house, thecar, and, okay, well, you're
stuck with, you know, X amountof mortgage every month and I'm
traveling to three differentcountries, which, you know,
again, what do you want yourlife to be about?
Such a simple question that somany people really have a hard
time questioning for me at thisstage in my journey.
(39:12):
And it, it evolves, it changes.
But for right now, I want mylife to be a big adventure.
Mm-hmm.
And that's tiny living, that'straveling, that's hiking in the
wilderness, you know, all kindsof stuff.
So yeah.
What do you want to be about?
Uh, if I could leave yourlisteners with anything, it's
that question.
Michael Bauman (39:30):
that's a super, super, great spot.
To kind of wrap up, I did wantto talk just a little bit about
what you talked about you know,just receiving, the love and the
joy and stuff into that.
A really powerful thing to beable to learn is to how to be
able to shift our state in thesituations like we're talking
about.
And, I've had some elite,special forces people on the
(39:51):
podcast and they talk about howbasically it's, it's the
principle for trainingeverything.
You learn to train something inan environment that has low
distractions.
And this is what essentiallymeditation a lot of times is,
you know, it's like, can Ichange my state to what I wanna
be?
Whether it's peace, whether it'slove, whether it's joy.
Um, can I change that in asituation?
(40:12):
Maybe there's no kids around,you know, it's quiet, you know,
I have headphones on, I'mlistening to lovely music.
But then you start to add insome of the different things
that of life, right?
You start to add in thesedifferent situations.
So for instance, these elitespecial forces, if you're
learning how to shoot, you learnshooting downrange with earmuffs
on with very littledistractions.
Then you start to add indifferent situations.
(40:34):
Maybe you add in movement.
Can I still hit the target?
Maybe you add in, explosionsnoise, other people shooting at
me, right?
All of a sudden you ratchet thatup.
Can I still perform this skillin complex, chaotic situations?
So the question is, can youstill access those places of
peace and joy and love in thecomplex, you know, situations?
That's what you talk about,having these things throughout
(40:56):
your day where you're resetaround accessing those things
in, in the context of your, ofyour daily life.
So I wanted to, you know,highlight.
Brad Carlson (41:06):
Can I, can I say something on that real quick?
Yeah.
I used to have, well, I stillhave a philosophy.
Can you do it when you're tired?
You had a good night's sleep andyou got a full breakfast and you
can show up and, and you're hotshower and all that, and you
can, you know, perform at a highlevel.
But what if you didn't have anyof that?
What if you got a terriblenight's sleep?
What if you haven't had a mealin two days, you haven't
showered for a week.
(41:26):
Can you still perform at a highlevel?
And the answer to that is yes.
And the way you do that is,again, who are you?
If you know in the bottom ofyour heart that you are an elite
warrior, you will, before thesituation, you will show up as
an elite warrior.
If you know that you are afather, a husband of love and
compassion and kindness beforeyou're in the the chaos of the
(41:49):
situation, you will show up asthat, and then in the middle of
it, you just take a deep breath,quiet, center yourself and
remind yourself who you are.
I am a, I am a husband andfather of joy and compassion and
love and repetition.
Like Tony s says, the more youdo that practice, that skill,
the stronger you'll get and theeasier it becomes.
So to switch your state in themiddle of the situation, it's
(42:12):
still possible to do that.
But to do that you've got todeep breath and focus and center
yourself.
Show up as the person you wantto be, know who you are and show
up as that person.
And the more you practice, andthe more you do that, the easier
it gets.
Another reverend minister friendof mine, she called it your
peace bubble, so that whenyou're in that situation, your
peace bubble doesn't get burstBecause if your peace bubble
(42:33):
burst, you're allowing it to beburst.
You're allowing those people torob you of your personal power.
Michael Bauman (42:39):
Mm-hmm.
And I would say, and this goes,in general, obviously we started
talking about like nutritionand, and things like that too.
Um, even in these situations,like this is, a challenge for
me.
I have times where I do thatreally well, and then I have
times where my kids, where Ihaven't gotten to sleep, it was
crazy and I just go off on it.
But using that in a, in a verynon-judgmental way and just
(42:59):
going it's like the fitnessthing.
It's like, maybe this is aweight that at this current
point I can't lift, or I haven'ttrained well enough to lift this
weight.
But it's feedback.
And I go, I need to learn how tobe more peaceful when I'm tired
and when, when things are crazy.
And same with the exercise andnutrition.
Like when you fall off, quoteunquote the wagon, you know,
whatever that means, it's notgoing, I'm a terrible person,
(43:22):
it's going.
oh, I need to learn how, whenthings are maybe stressful or
chaotic or I'm busy at work orI'm really tired.
How can I still maintain thesebehaviors that support who I am?
So I, I think that's a greatspot to kind of wrap it up on
going.
Like, you don't have to use thatas, as judgmental against
yourself, but you can use it asfeedback and go, this is
(43:44):
something I need to work on.
And it's not like you failed in,in terms of what you're doing.
Brad Carlson (43:48):
Self, self-care, self-compassion.
Yeah, you're right.
Yeah.
Even for me, I won't be perfect,I guess, or whatever.
I won't show up as the person Iwanna, I wanna show up as, and I
used to really beat myself up,but self-care, self-compassion,
self-love, self-forgiveness,goes a long way.
So I've learned to be morekinder, gentler on myself,
starting with myself.
(44:09):
Yeah.
I've made myself a priority.
Mm-hmm.
um, I kind of mentioned thisalready, but make your health
and wellbeing for yourself firstand foremost.
So, for me, my three prioritiesare God, health and family.
So that's my number two priorityin life.
My health and wellbeing.
And that's another way I'm ableto sustain this journey.
Some people, their health andwellbeing is their number 10
(44:30):
priority.
Everything else revolves aroundyour health and wellbeing.
So better relationship with yourwife, your kids, all that.
It starts with you and your ownpersonal health and wellbeing.
Yeah.
Michael Bauman (44:40):
Yeah, absolutely.
It's very, very important, veryimportant conversation.
So where can people go toconnect up with you if they want
to coach with you or just followwhat you're doing?
Brad Carlson (44:49):
Yeah, absolutely.
Thanks.
Thanks, Michael.
www.trainingwithcoachbrad.com ismy website.
All my social media handles areon there.
The link to my own podcast is onthere and yeah,
trainingwithcoachbrad.com
Michael Bauman (44:58):
awesome.
I really, I really appreciatethe conversation and like I
said, you're somebody who'sliving it.
You know, living that tiny RVlifestyle and, you know, being
happy and joyful every day andit's, it's really important and
sharing with other people aswell.
So yeah.
Thank you.
Thank you for the time.
Brad Carlson (45:13):
Thank you.
Thank you for having me,Michael.
I appreciate it.
Michael Bauman (45:16):
Absolutely.
I was trying to exercise and I had no energy.
(00:02):
I had no motivation.
And I asked myself a very simplequestion that I had never asked
before.
Why?
Why am I doing this?
Why am I exercising?
I discovered my why in thatmoment that if I take care of my
mind, body and spirit, my mind,body and spirit will take care
of me.
Michael Bauman (01:00):
So welcome back to Success Engineering.
I'm your host, Michael Bauman Ihave the pleasure of having Brad
Carlson on.
He's a certified health coach, aspiritual practitioner, author,
speaker.
He helps other people on the ofself-discovery, and we're gonna
get into what that looks likefor him as well, on how to
become fit, happy, healthy,based on what works for them and
how they actually interpret whatthat looks like.
(01:22):
So very, very fascinating.
He's the creator of Mind StrongMindset Training Academy audio
programs.
So it helps you develop themindset you actually need to
become the better version ofyourself.
He's coached hundreds of people.
He has a bunch of nutrition andfitness certifications.
He's done 30 endurance events,including the Spartan trifecta,
studied martial arts philosophyin five different countries,
black belts.
(01:43):
I mean, I'm just gonna keepgoing.
Aikido, hapkido, Japanese sword,black belts.
It's, it's amazing.
So this is gonna be a funconversation.
He loves adventure, lovestravel.
It's gonna be, it's gonna begreat.
So welcome to show
Brad Carlson (01:54):
Oh wow.
Thank you so much for having mehere, Michael.
Gosh, that was an incredibleintroduction.
Thank you.
Michael Bauman (01:59):
Oh, there you go.
You've had an incredible life,but it wasn't always Well,
doesn't always like that.
So let's start, we're gonnastart in the, in the rough, uh,
probably one of the hardestperiods of your, your life.
Just dive right into that.
So, can you talk about, youknow, around that 2011, you
know, period of time and youreally hit, hit a low spot, and
can you share that period ofyour life and how it just
(02:22):
started the journey ofdiscovering yourself and what,
what you became up to thispoint?
Brad Carlson (02:28):
Yeah, it actually started in 2009 when I was that
Couch Potato that was reallyoverweight.
I was 38 years old at the time,and I had come back to America
at 30 and then like everybody Igot cut up in, in the work, you
know, work life cycle.
I, all I did was work, comehome, I'd sit on the couch,
watch tv, and was justcompletely exhausted.
I was sitting on the bed one dayin my bedroom and I was
(02:51):
disgusted with the person I hadbecome.
I was just so disappointed inmyself.
I was very overweight, 50 poundsto be exact, and I had what I
call the couch potato belly, theSanta Claus belly, the spare
tire, I call it the 18 pack orsomething like that, and, and
yeah, my life was spiralingdownhill very quickly.
(03:12):
Starting in 2012, the divorcehit.
From 2009 to 2012.
I was still in the midst of whatthey call that yo-yo cycle,
trying to gain lose, gain, lose,and still trying to, to figure
all this stuff out.
2012, I went through the divorceand lost my house to foreclosure
when the economy in Americacollapsed the housing market in
2008.
My house went to the bank in2013.
(03:34):
I signed the divorce papers Iremember on a Friday, and had to
turn the keys over to my houseto the bank on a Saturday and
then couch surf for a month.
That was, oh my gosh,.
The whole time was still tryingto Figure out the whole health
thing.
I didn't even get my headwrapped around the whole health
thing for probably at least twomore years.
If I knew what, obviously what Iknow now, then it'd be very
(03:56):
different.
My life would've been verydifferent.
But I didn't.
It really began in 2009 withjust being overweight and I just
become purely disgusted anddisappointed in myself with, you
know, how did I let myself getthis way is the common question.
How did I let myself get solethargic?
How did I let myself get sooutta shape?
My self-esteem was in thetoilet.
(04:17):
If I think about it now myphysiology is changing a bit.
Like I can feel the pain comingback inside of me, that period
of my life.
It's like I wouldn't evenrecognize that person anymore if
they were sitting here.
But still definitely a painfulpart.
But again, what they say doesn'tkill you, makes you stronger.
That is true.
It took that pain to get me tochange my mindset, change my
(04:40):
health, change my nutrition topropel my life forward to where
I am now.
So I can look back at it now andsay that was the best thing that
ever happened to me.
Mm-hmm.
That's one thing I would telllisteners right away, is
whatever you're going through,you'll look back five years from
now and say that was one of thebest things that ever happened
to me.
Mm-hmm.
uh, doesn't seem like that in,in the meantime, but there's
(05:01):
always a reason for whatever ishappening is happening.
And if you can just kinda like asurfer on the wave.
If you could just ride the waveto the shore eventually it will
end and your life will bebetter.
But you gotta want to make itbetter.
You gotta want to change, yougotta wanna step forward.
And that was a big differencefor me is like, enough is
(05:21):
enough.
I'm ready for change.
I'm ready to get in shape, I'mready to lose weight.
But that was part of theproblem.
I thought it was about losingweight and getting in shape and
I learned along the way it hasnothing to do with losing weight
and getting in shape.
Michael Bauman (05:35):
Well, let's talk about that because I'm curious
to hear how.
how did you start workingthrough both on the, the
physical side of things.
So you go, Hey, I, you know,don't like myself, I don't like
how I look, I don't like wheremy life is at.
And you go, I wanna make achange with the, with the
exercise.
Um, so I'm curious as like whatthat started to look like, but
then also how did you workthrough, and this is a process,
(05:58):
right, like you said, but howdid you start to work through on
that emotional side of things,dealing with all of that?
Brad Carlson (06:05):
This is always a funny part of the story.
When I had that meltdown in2009, like sitting on a couch,
I'm like, okay, I'm gonna do it.
I'm gonna lose the weight.
It's happening.
And an entire year went by.
This is November of 2009 toNovember, 2010.
And I didn't do a single thing.
Like I didn't lift one weight.
I didn't spend a minute in anexercise class, I didn't do
(06:26):
anything.
And so a whole year went by.
And so now I'm a year later, nowit's November, 2010, I'm right
back in the same spot, sittingon, on my bed in the bedroom,
still 50 pounds overweight,still low self-esteem,
lethargic, everything.
And that's when I said, okay,now I call it my secret weapon.
I'm determined to do this.
So I had no training, noknowledge, no anything, but I
(06:49):
had an exercise bike in thegarage.
So I did the only thing I knewhow to do.
I went and rode it every singleday for three weeks, and then I
quit.
The physical part it came in inwaves, up and down.
Like I went for three weeks andthen completely quit.
And then I think it was about amonth later, a friend introduced
(07:09):
me to one of those home-basedexercise programs.
I'll just.
Say what it is.
Not that I'm promoting it oranything, but it was called
P90X.
This is why failure is such agood thing.
Failure is what drives success.
Each failure gave medetermination to then be more
successful the next time I didit.
It was about a month between thebike and then I started p90x,
(07:32):
but here was a little secretthat made all the difference.
When I did p90x, my goal was notto lose weight.
I didn't care if I lost a singlepound.
What I cared about was finishingthe program.
I told myself, I use some exexpletives.
Bleep, bleep, bleep Brad, Idon't care what you're gonna
start this and you're gonnafinish it no matter what.
(07:53):
So, by God, six, seven days aweek, I was in my garage.
It was like 30 degreesFahrenheit, sometimes two in my
garage.
Cause there wasn't any space inmy house to do it.
I couldn't even do half of theworkouts.
They would do like 20 and I'd dolike three.
But I didn't care, no matterwhat, I was gonna finish it.
And I just kept getting strongerand stronger and stronger.
(08:14):
And I remember one day I wasactually running around my
neighborhood.
One lap around my neighborhoodwas one mile.
And a really good friend, he wasdriving along on the car and we
hadn't seen each other a while,and he stopped and he's like, my
god, Brad, you've lost a lot ofweight.
Mm-hmm.
And that's when I went, oh, Ihave, I didn't even really think
(08:34):
to check about it.
But then here's the thing.
After I finished p90x, the 12weeks I quit again.
Mm-hmm.
Cause I didn't know what to do,and the weight started to come
back on.
I gained 12 pounds within twoweeks after finishing p90x.
Mm-hmm.
The magic moment for thephysical part, I'll get to the
emotional part in a second thateverybody has to know, and this
(08:56):
is one of the very first thingsI teach now, before you even get
into the exercise or diet, ifyou're starting with me, is I
discovered my why.
That summer I went on a weeklongwilderness survival trip.
Kind of like, Bear Grills, youknow, he takes people on the
trip, you eat bugs and you know,build your own shelter and all
(09:16):
that.
So there were 15 of us from allover the United States.
We got together, we met in theYakima Valley up in Yakima,
Washington.
And we lived like huntergatherers for a week.
And it was during that time thatsomething happened to me.
Um, It's hard to put into words,but I had a moment where
physically I could not move.
(09:37):
You're hiking all day, 20, 30miles a day on like one calorie,
if you're lucky.
I mean, it takes like a hundredcalories to get a five calorie
mud cuz you're, you know, you'retrying to catch it or so you're,
you're, you're harvesting likeroots.
It takes more energy to harvestthe root than you get from
eating it.
I was like dead physically andsomething happened in me.
The Japanese call it"kokoro"where your spirit just takes
(10:00):
over.
There is no more physical andyour spirit takes over.
Well, that happened to me on thelast day.
And then I took that back withme from the hike and was trying
to, you know, try again.
I had lost motivation.
I had fallen off the horse.
I got back from that weeklongexcursion.
I was trying to exercise and Ihad no energy.
I had no motivation.
(10:20):
And I asked myself a very simplequestion that I had never asked
before.
So if you're listening, you'vegot to ask yourself this
question.
Why?
Why am I doing this?
Why am I exercising?
And in that moment, I call it myfirst miracle.
The roof on my garage opened up,the heavens parted, I got struck
by a bolt of lightning.
I discovered my why in thatmoment that if I take care of my
(10:43):
mind, body and spirit, my mind,body and spirit will take care
of me.
And that has been the drivingforce for the past 13 years of
everything that I have done,health and wellness wise.
That is the key to sustainingyour health and wellness
journey, is that you have got tohave a very deep inner personal
why that works for you.
It's exactly what Simon Sinexsays.
(11:04):
Start with why, but it cannot bean external.
Why?
Oh, I wanna lose 50 pounds.
That's not sustainable.
Oh, I wanna have more energy toplay with my grandkids.
That's a great reason, but itdoesn't work in the long run.
I wanna fit in a certain sizewedding dress.
Well, that's great.
I wanna be able to travel and,and more adventure.
Those are good, but they're allexternal why's.
I had one client I remember shekept training for the 5k.
(11:25):
She would do a 5K and thenanother one, and then another
one.
And as long as there was a 5K ora 10 K, she worked her way up.
She was good.
But then all of a sudden, COVIDhit.
There were no more five Ks.
She gained a lot of weightbecause everything she was doing
was external motivating.
And it wasn't until we talkedthat she realized that
everything she was doing wasexternally motivated.
(11:45):
And anything you wanna start abusiness, why, why are you doing
it?
You wanna start, you wanna be ahusband, a father?
Why?
Why?
You know, why, why this person?
You know, we'll get into thathere in, in, in a little bit.
But that's what sustained thephysical part of my journey and
any health and wellness journeyis that I discovered my why.
Michael Bauman (12:05):
Sorry, before, before we get into the
emotional, I, I would like totalk about how, how you kind of
coach, um, people to discoverthat, why, what does that look
like?
How do people go aboutdiscovering their why or their
purpose, vision.
Brad Carlson (12:17):
There's something called the seven levels of why
exercise.
And you start with that.
Okay, well, why do I wanna loseweight?
Oh, because I wanna fit into acertain size wedding dress.
Well, why do I wanna fit into acertain size wedding dress?
Well so I look good.
Well, why is looking goodimportant to you?
Well, because then I'll feelbetter.
Why is feeling better importantto you?
Because then I'll be able to dothe things I wanna do.
Well, why is doing the thingsthat you want to do important to
(12:40):
you?
Because then I'll be living alife of meaning and purpose.
You see how we're starting toget more deeper into that?
So it's basically, it's calledthe seven levels of why
exercise.
It's in my couch to healthycurriculum.
It's week, two, actually.
Week one is mindset.
Week one is about who are you?
Mm-hmm.
that, we'll get into that in asecond.
(13:00):
That's part of the emotion.
And then week two is the whyexercise?
One area I disagree with Simon.
He says You only have one whyfor anything.
And I don't agree with that.
I have very deep personal whys,sort of depending on what I have
going on in my life.
They're similar, but in someinstances they're really
different.
But you do that seven levels ofwhy exercise and then I work
with them on the phone and wekeep going and we keep going
(13:20):
until the light bulb goes off.
And in some cases we've gonedown to level 20.
It's called the seven levels ofwhy.
But in some cases, like for me,I've gone to level 17, I level
24.
Because until that aha moment,that epiphany, that white bulb,
it's not going to besustainable.
(13:40):
You know, it may be a great why,but it's not sustainable enough.
It has to be something that,that resonates with you and it's
so personal.
Michael Bauman (13:48):
Yeah.
I use a very similar thing, um,with my clients.
It's very simple.
But if you just asked thatquestion about any area of your
life, just going like, why am Iactually doing this you know?
Yeah.
Or like, what do I really want?
And then why do I really wantit?
Right?
Like,
Brad Carlson (14:01):
You start to questions what and why.
We don't have to ask how, howwill, how will I show up on our
life?
But the what and the why, thetwo most simple questions you
could ask that most people onthis planet don't have an answer
to.
Yeah.
When you can answer both ofthose questions, that's when
you're successful.
Yeah.
Michael Bauman (14:17):
There you go.
There you go.
We hit on the hit on thedefinition of success for you So
we have this why, right?
So you kind of discovered thiswhy, but obviously in life,
things come that affect thatwhy.
There's times where it'sdifficult and you have to push
through, and there's obstaclesand there's setbacks.
How do you go about maintainingthat why or keeping your focus
(14:40):
on that when things are reallychallenging?
Brad Carlson (14:43):
It always falls on your why, but that gets into the
next, the next question, who areyou?
Who are you as a father?
Who are you as a husband?
Who are you as a health coach?
And then show up as that person.
Mm-hmm.
And when you fully understandwho you are and embrace your
true, authentic self, then itbecomes easier and easier and
easier to just authenticallyshow up.
(15:06):
And then what you justdescribed, it rarely, rarely
happens for me now.
That I get down in the dumps andthat I'm off alignment and that
I'm off balance.
And when that does happen, Ijust sit in my chair, maybe get
my journal out, do somejournaling about the situation
that's going on in my life andjust let the verbal diarrhea on
the paper and like, what isgoing on in my life?
(15:27):
You know, and what I, what I'vediscovered, gosh, we could go
off so many areas here that'sthings like that.
Everything is an inner solution.
Every problem going you havegoing on in your life, the
answer is inside you.
And I've found that it alwaysboils down to a self-worth,
self-esteem type of an issue.
Feeling of a lack of worthinessor a lack of deserving something
(15:47):
or, and when you can workthrough that, and the more you
work through those with regardsto being a spouse or with being
a coworker, or with being ahusband or a dad or whatever
area in your life, then the lessand less that you get pulled
back down off that horse intothat depression hole, uh, so to
speak.
Michael Bauman (16:07):
How, how do you go about doing that?
Because that's, you know, rightup, right up my alley.
Um, how, how people could feelenough so that worthiness that,
you know lack of worthiness whenpeople have that, what are your
tips or your advice for how togo about filling, you know,
filling the This is
Brad Carlson (16:24):
Week 1 of my Couch to healthy program.
You have to answer the question,who do you want to be?
So that's the second miracle.
So, getting into how I dealtwith this emotionally.
I understood my why.
I was starting to get into theexercise groove.
I still didn't know anythingabout nutrition.
I was three years into thisjourney, I was still eating hot
pockets and chocolate milk andsugary donuts like every single
(16:46):
day.
I didn't realize you had to eathealthy too.
I thought all you had to do wasexercise.
Mm-hmm.
But during the divorce, my doghe would not come over to me and
like, come on, boy, come overhere.
And I still to this day have inmy mind the look he gave me.
You know, he was a 20 pound cockspaniel, like a foot and a half
off the ground.
(17:06):
He just gave me this look like,you're such a loser, dad.
Oh.
And he turned around and he wentback to his bed.
Dogs sense energy, especially inhumans.
He knew something was wrong withme, and I looked at him and
that's when I had my secondmiracle.
And that's when I go, oh my God.
I have been focusing up to thispoint in my life on everything I
didn't want.
(17:27):
I didn't want to be an uptight,grumpy, irritable husband and
father.
Well, guess what?
I was a very uptight, grumpy,irritable husband and father.
I didn't want to be a lethargic,low self-esteem, couch potato.
Well, guess what?
I was still a low self-esteem,lethargic couch potato.
Mm-hmm.
And in that moment I realized, Iasked myself a question, what
(17:48):
type of person do I want to be?
And that's how you staymotivated.
That's how you propel your lifeforward is what type of person
do you want to be?
So Michael, what type of husbanddo you want to be?
What type of dad do you want tobe?
What type of health coach?
What type of trainer do you wantto be?
(18:11):
Okay.
I wanna be someone that is fullof love and life and health and
passion and enthusiasm and, anddynamic intensity and fun, and
can bring that in into everysituation.
And it's just a matter ofshowing up authentically as who
you are every single time andfocusing on who do you want to
be.
Mm-hmm.
Who do you want to be a yearfrom now?
(18:32):
Mm-hmm.
five years from now.
10 years from now.
Okay.
Imagine what your life would belike.
Like best case scenario, shoot,reach for the stars, even past
the stars.
This is the type of life I wantto have.
This is the person I want to be.
I wanna be that awesome rockstarbusiness entrepreneur that is
kicking butt in the world and,helping people and is full of
(18:54):
love.
I call it love, life, health andhappiness.
And so who do you want to bemoving forward?
And when you step into that,that person of who you want to
be, that's when your life reallyshifts and that's when
motivation really doesn't becomean issue.
If you don't have your why, andwhat I'm talking about is your
what?
(19:14):
What type of person do you wantto be?
If you don't know your why andyou don't know your what, then
you have to have a lot ofdiscipline.
You gotta have a ton ofdiscipline to be able to move
forward, otherwise you will falloff the horse and most people
do.
Perfect example, an Olympicathlete, Michael Phelps, best
athlete in the world.
Some will argue at swimming 18Olympic gold medals, something
(19:35):
like that more than anybody inhistory.
And after the Olympics, hedidn't.
Know what to do.
He was depressed.
He didn't know what to dobecause he didn't understand
some of this.
So yeah, we talked a little bitoff camera about success, you
know, the gold medals, thehouse, the car, and, and I asked
that question, well, is theirlife any better than mine?
At the time, 13 years ago Ithought it was, but,but now, no,
(20:00):
because The key to happiness,the key to success is knowing
who you are and being that typeof person you want to be.
So whoever's listening, take alook in the mirror.
Who am I right now?
Okay.
I was a tired, overweight,lethargic, couch potato.
I didn't figure this out untilmy dog would not come over to
me.
(20:20):
And then I asked myself thatquestion, who do I want to be?
What type of husband do I wannabe?
What type of person do I wannabe?
What type of father do I wannabe?
I had been focusing oneverything that I did not want
in life.
Mm-hmm.
I had been focusing on the typeof person I did not want to be.
And unknowingly that's what mostpeople are doing.
They're focused on the fear,what they don't want, who they
(20:42):
don't want to be.
And when you shift that andstart focusing on what you want
and who you want to be in life,everything changes.
And that's where discipline isno longer needed because then
it's fueled by passion anddesire.
There's a much, much, muchstronger factor force than than
(21:03):
discipline.
Discipline only lasts for solong.
So after I, I had that epiphanyon my dog, it still took me
about another year.
But finally I realized who do Iwant to be?
I want to be this healthyperson.
And everything started to fallin line under that.
I was in the public healthdepartment one day and about to
reach for the donut and I was inthe middle of triathlon training
(21:26):
and something, I swear to God itwas a higher power that like
literally grabbed my wrist andpulled it back and would not let
me grab the donut.
Every day I grab a donut,chocolate, candy.
Cause it's there every day.
It's like, how crazy, the healthdepartment, we should have like
fruits and nuts.
But we didn't.
And it's like, if I eat that,will it help me to be a faster
swimmer?
(21:47):
And I went, oh my God, no! Andthen I asked, well, what can I
eat to help me be a fasterswimmer?
And the first thing that came tome was spinach.
I literally went to the storeand grabbed a bag of spinach and
ate the whole thing.
And that what started my journeyinto healthy eating.
Michael Bauman (22:05):
While you are talking about the nutrition and
you know, the exercises as well,can you talk about what are some
of your tips in terms of how canpeople eat well sustainably and
how can people exercise wellsustainably?
Brad Carlson (22:18):
Again, it goes back to who do you wanna be?
If you want to be a healthyperson, it has to start with
that.
Focus on foods that will get youto that person you want to be.
So I realized if I eat thatdonut, will it help me to be
healthy?
The answer was no.
It's the questions that you askyourself.
Mm-hmm.
So ask yourself questions thatwill get you to where you want
(22:39):
to go, but you have to knowwhere you want to go.
Ask yourself questions that willlead you to that person that you
wanna be.
But you have to know that personthat you want to be.
Same with exercise, same withexercise.
Now, the problem I had backthen, it was all from a place of
fear and place of ego.
Mm-hmm.
Another principle is are youdoing this from a place of fear
or a place of love?
(23:00):
When I thought about switchingto RV tiny living, those
millionaires is their life anybetter than mine?
And I realized, no, it wasn't.
And that's when I started to askthe question, well, what is it
that you want outta life?
What is it that I want outtalife?
And I wanted adventure.
I wanted to live, dream, travel,adventure, explore.
(23:21):
And the first step of that wastiny living.
Because for me, that, that sumsup adventure in a nutshell.
You're like camping every night.
I mean, how cool is that Wetalked a little bit about what
success is earlier.
That slowly got me reallythinking that what is it that I
want outta life?
Okay.
First and foremost, I want to behealthy.
And once I started to get thatdialed in, then I realized, oh,
(23:44):
I need to apply this to otherparts of my life.
Oh, I want to be anentrepreneur.
I wanna have my own healthcoaching business.
Never in a million, trilliongazillion years, even 10 years
ago, five years ago, did I thinkI'd be a health coach.
Um, Do doing this or podcastingor anything.
Those are the first three thingsI teach.
Your vision, your why, and yourwho do you want to be?
Michael Bauman (24:08):
Yeah, it's super, super important because
especially like you're, you'retalking about so many people,
you know, in the health andfitness kind of arena, you know,
new Year's resolutions, right?
They set these resolutions, theygo, I wanna lose weight.
Similar to your journey.
They have those three weeks.
They, you know, they, they crushit for three weeks and then it's
difficult after that.
But what you're talking about isso important.
(24:29):
It sounds, it sounds simple, butit is so important for every
single area of your life toactually go, who do I wanna be?
And you're always aligning thosebehaviors with, is this aligning
with that or not?
And the other aspect, of it islooking at, there's an
incredible framework, fromRobert Keegan, out of Harvard
(24:50):
called Immunity to Change.
So why do we actually resistchange?
We have this desire and we go, Iwant to do this well because we
have these hidden assumptionsand this is what we're talking
about as well.
We have these hidden assumptionsthat about these different
behaviors that we have that keepus where we're at.
So a lot of times we look at thereasons, you know, to change,
(25:10):
but there's also, we havereasons to stay the same You
know, there's reasons why we'resitting on the couch and
exploring those and balancingthat out and going, oh, this is
why I'm actually wanting to staythe same and this is why I want
to change.
And then you would go, when Imake this choice, when I make
this behavior, do I wanna alignit with the new identity that I
have?
Um, or do I wanna align it withthe old identity that I have in
(25:32):
the past?
And it's cannot be overstatedabout how important this is in
terms of making any change inyour life.
Very important.
Brad Carlson (25:42):
And it's like Tony Robbins said, change will not
happen until your pain thresholdis at a certain level.
People will change either out ofdesperation or inspiration.
Either one works.
So in the beginning I waschanging out of desperation.
Mm-hmm.
uh, this, this wasn't working.
But now I change out ofinspiration cuz I know
everything is growing andleading me to my next highest
(26:03):
version of me.
Michael Bauman (26:05):
So I'm curious as what, yeah.
I mean, you have a very uniquekinda lifestyle.
So you have your little tiny RVyou're loving life in terms of
that.
Do you have any specificroutines that you do, whether
it's morning routines, eveningroutines, just routines that are
very helpful for you in terms ofaligning yourself with the
person you wanna be?
Brad Carlson (26:23):
So, yes.
And it's constantly changing Soto answer your question, the one
thing I always do is check inwith me.
Mm-hmm.
And what I mean by that is Icheck in with my inner voice, my
intuition, and I just allow itto guide me.
Okay?
Tomorrow morning I'm gonna getup and I'm gonna read for an
hour.
That's my morning routine.
Tomorrow morning I'm gonna getup and do my five mile run.
(26:46):
Very first thing.
That'll be my morning routine.
Tomorrow morning I'm gonna getup and just meditate for an
hour.
Tomorrow morning I'm gonna getup and journal for an hour.
It's not set in stone specificto any, it used to be very
rigid.
You know, 20 minutes of reading,20 minutes of journaling, 20
minutes of exercise, 20 minutesof meditation, shower, get ready
to go.
(27:07):
Uh, it's not like that at all.
It's very fluid now.
So a principle I live by now isI ask myself the question,
what's next?
And we talked about earlier, allthese millionaires who are not
successful, not fulfilled.
It's because they're living froma place of fear.
I'll just use Buddha as anexample.
Completely broke.
Outta shape.
Never read a single book, butprobably one of the most
(27:28):
fulfilled people that the planethas ever seen, because he lived
a life from the inside out.
So my evening routine used to beJournal and read the last hour
before lights out.
This is all changed.
It used to be the last hour, noelectronics, no anything.
Journal meditation, reading,which sounds pretty good.
But the difference is I'm doingit from a place of love now, not
(27:50):
a place of fear that, oh, if Idon't get my reading in today, I
won't be worthy.
I won't be good enough.
And so it's the same activity,but the reason, the why is very
different now.
Mm-hmm.
trust.
Learning to trust the path,trust the journey.
Michael Bauman (28:05):
Yeah.
I had Lord Richard Layard on,he's the co-editor of the World
Happiness Report, and heactually said a very similar
thing.
He said in the morning, justchecking in with yourself and
the highest version of yourself.
And using that to set theintention for the day.
I'm similar.
My morning routine is more rigidthan yours because I do have,
(28:26):
you know rigid things likegetting kids to school and
things like this.
But I would describe myself asan exercise nomad like you, you
do what works for that situationin time.
How I describe it is havingagile habits.
I have habits that are basicallylittle building blocks in terms
of my morning routine, myexercise, things like that.
(28:48):
And if they get affected, I canmove those building blocks to
different spots.
I can shuffle them around.
We listen to all of theseexperts and all of these people
Hal Elrod, the Miracle Morning.
You have, you know, very rigidkind of things.
Mm-hmm.
And I love talking to so manydifferent people on this podcast
cuz very successful people andsome of'em have very rigid
(29:08):
morning routines.
Yeah.
Or just routines in general.
And some of'em don't at all.
Some of'em get up at nineo'clock, you know, and are still
incredibly successful.
And so really understanding andexperimenting with what, what
actually works for you and whatactually works for you right now
in whatever season you're in isreally important.
And having the grace and theability to be able to adjust it
(29:31):
and not beat yourself up isreally important.
Really important.
Brad Carlson (29:35):
And I would say, just make sure you're doing it
for the right reason.
The first several years of myjourney, all those 30 plus races
I did, most of that was based infear and ego.
Mm.
Because I thought, and again, itgoes back to that question, what
is it you really want outtalife?
And I realized that for me in myjourney, I didn't want to be one
of these hardcore, diehard, youknow, ultra ultra type athletes.
(29:59):
What I really wanted to be wasjust fit, happy, and healthy.
And I realized, well, I could befit, happy, and healthy whether
I run a 20 minute mile or I runa 10 minute mile and my body
appreciated the 20 minute mile alot more than the 10 mile and I
could walk the next day.
And I started to go down this,what I call now, the slow, easy
path of exercise.
And especially for men over 40,this really makes a difference.
(30:22):
You've really gotta back off theintensity and do the slow easy
cuz it's much more sustainable.
I want to be fit, happy,healthy, walking, no wheelchair,
none of that stuff.
You know, walking tall, strongand proud, well into my, you
know, sixties, seventies,eighties and nineties.
I can't tell you how manydistance runners I've talked to
in their fifties that can barelywalk.
I know one, she did marathonsfrom 20 years old till almost
(30:45):
40.
She's probably late fifties,early sixties now.
She can't even barely walk amile on a treadmill now cause
her knees are gone because sheovertrained for almost 20 years
of her life.
I don't train for anythingspecific now, so my exercise
routines are very fluid andrigid.
What do I feel like doing thismorning?
Oh, I feel like walking thismorning.
Oh, I feel like doing weightstoday.
Oh, I feel like going to playracquetball today.
Oh.
I feel like playing pickleballtoday.
(31:06):
You know, something, somethingthat you're always moving.
Oh, I feel like doing a naturalmovement session today and, and
I have enough experience I canjust whip something up like on
the spot now and, oh, I only gotfive minutes.
I'm just gonna do five minutes.
Then I got 10 minutes latertoday, and then five minutes in
the evening.
That's at least 20 minutes.
I still get in during the dayversus one 20 minute session,
so, mm-hmm.
(31:26):
And I, I haven't mentioned thisso, to make your health journey
sustainable, to make yourhealthy eating sustainable, any
of that.
It must be a priority.
You manage your priorities, notyour time.
I cannot emphasize that enough.
I'm sorry, one more thing.
I wanna get this in.
This is a really powerfulexercise that I just recently
learned.
All coaches have coaches, so Ihave my own coach right now.
(31:49):
And she taught me this a couplemonths ago.
To help with the motivation tohelp with staying on the path is
a very simple exercise calleddaydreaming.
You know, sit back in your chairfor a minute or two and just
daydream about the life that youdesire about that person you
desire becoming.
Do that two, three times a dayfor just a minute, and your
energies will just fly off thechart.
(32:10):
And that helps begin toreprogram your mindset to bring
you back into, you know, havingthat high energy and that high
motivation where you don't losemotivation, you don't fall off
the horse.
Michael Bauman (32:22):
It.
It's like having consistent,like you're, you're talking
about it all, you know, it justcontinues to come back to that
one principle.
It's like having consistentthings in your day, whatever it
is that, that allow you to alignback with who you are, who you
are, or who, who you want to be.
You know, because all of ourbehaviors are a reflection of
our identities, the values thatwe have, then the priorities
(32:43):
that we have, and then thegoals, you know, that we, that
we set.
And so often we focus on thebehavior or the goals and like
we're talking about, it's likeno, focusing on the identity,
who you wanna be.
You know, then you know thevalues that you have that you
wanna show up with in everysingle situation.
Then looking at, you know, yourpriorities and making sure that
(33:04):
those are, those are aligned andthen your goals reflect that and
your behaviors reflect that.
Brad Carlson (33:08):
And kind of the modern culture, modern society,
the hustle culture.
We have a backwards, it's alwayswhat do you do?
We always emphasize the doingfirst.
Well, you want to get overdepression, well, what will you
do?
We'll go to the doctor or takethis pill or whatever.
But in the native indigenouscultures around the world, they
always focus on the person andthe being.
Who do you want to be?
That started to click in mybrain a couple years ago.
(33:30):
And then as I got deeper into myspiritual studies and went to
some other seminars and readother books or something called
the Be, Do, Have formula.
Be the person you wanna be thedoing will automatically show
up.
Michael Bauman (33:41):
There's a, really, you know, powerful kind
of framework.
It's along those lines that I,that I referenced by a
leadership coach called AlanSeal.
And he talks about, there's fourlevels of engagement with a
situation.
So when any situation arises,that first level is, you know,
just jumping into the drama,right?
So we all do it at, at times,like, just jump into the drama
this did that, you know, I feltthis, you know, whatever that
(34:04):
is, right?
But then above that, if, if yougo above it, you're able to look
at it from a situationalawareness level and you go, oh,
you know, instead of being, youknow, it's this person's fault,
this person's fault, I canactually look at it from a, a
higher level and go, oh, this isthe situation.
This is what's going on.
This is how we can fix it.
This is how we can approach it.
But what you're talking about iswhat he references is kind of
(34:27):
the level above that is that hasto do with choice.
So it's actually choosing.
Who do I want to be in thissituation?
So it doesn't matter whathappened, what situation it is,
whatever at all.
We can always choose who we wantto be in this situation that and
that references, you know, likeVictor Frankl's Man Search for
(34:48):
Meaning.
Like he is in like we've heard alot of the things.
Yeah.
Yeah.
But it probably, I mean, it'sjust like, it's kind of the
quintessential book on meaningwhere he is in.
As dire situations as you canpretty much possibly think, you
know, every right to say, whydoes this happen to me?
But he goes, man's ultimatefreedom is the ability to be
able to choose, you know, howthey respond to this situation,
(35:09):
choose their emotions.
And that's extraordinary.
Like that's some, like, that'snot just like a namby-pamby
thing.
He was in the worst situationand you, you're able to, you're
able to say that.
So that level of third level ofkind of being able to choose and
then that fourth level is theopportunity and when do you
focus on who you want to be?
A lot of times that opportunityjust naturally arises to provide
(35:33):
the solution for that situation.
But you have to train yourselfto recognize.
Am I operating?
You know, like you talked about,am I operating out of fear or am
I operating out of love?
Or who do I wanna be in thissituation?
Yeah.
Um, and it's, it's totallydifferent way to approach,
approach living.
And it takes practice, it takestraining, it takes, oh, it
Brad Carlson (35:52):
did.
Absolutely takes practice.
Yeah.
No, I've been doing this foralmost, I'm on my 14th year now,
and it's taken a lot of, I guessthey call it intentional
practice or awareness practiceand understanding that stuff.
Yeah.
You, you're hitting the nail onthe head.
Choose who you wanna be and thenstart to have everything
revolve, evolve, I should say,evolve around that.
Michael Bauman (36:11):
As far as your meditation routines or just kind
of developing awareness, do youhave any tips for how people can
go about doing that?
Brad Carlson (36:19):
You know, the two tips I would have, one is that
daydreaming, take a minute asmany times as you can a day and
just daydream, imagine the bestlife and the best version of
you.
There's a meditation that Istarted doing about six months
ago.
I don't even know how todescribe it.
But if I use the metaphor of acell phone, when your cell phone
is low on battery, you have acord and you plug it into a
(36:42):
charger.
Mm-hmm.
Okay.
And it charges.
And so what I do, and I actuallydo this when I'm laying in bed,
like the last 10 minutes beforeI actually get up in the
morning.
So that's, going back to yourquestion, my morning routine.
This is something I do almostevery morning now.
I lay there and allow your mind,your body, and your spirit just
(37:03):
to fill with joy and love andhappiness.
That's the only way I know howto describe it.
And for someone who's beginningat this, I would just say focus
on all the exciting, wonderfulthings that you have going on in
your life and focus on all theexciting and wonderful things
that you know, not, that youhope for, not that you wish for,
but you know, will be a part ofyour life in six weeks, a year
(37:24):
or whatever.
You just allow those feelings oflove and health and passion and
joy just to flow through you andjust allow it to charge
yourself.
And that is the most powerfulmeditation that I do now.
I do that and then a lot ofjournaling.
Mm-hmm.
okay, this is my life right now.
This is all messed up withregards to, I don't know,
coworker relationship orsomething like that.
(37:46):
So I'll just start journaling,just let the pen flow and I'll
get about three, four, I meanthree, four pages in, and I'm
like, oh my God.
I was being inauthentic towardsthat person because I had an
insecurity, I had a fear aboutsomething.
And then through the journaling,that fear of insecurity will
come out.
Then once I can identify that, Ican immediately replace it with
(38:07):
what I do want to, I want loveand peace and help and
happiness.
Mm-hmm.
And so next time I'minteracting, I know how to
better handle that situation.
But I would say the two things.
Yeah.
Do practice the daydreaming andpractice the morning meditation
where you just allow your heartto open up and fill with love
and joy and peace, and healthand happiness.
Those are the values that I wantmy life to be about.
(38:29):
That's who I'm stepping intomore and more every day.
and my vision is, is to becomethis bigger source and this
bigger version of love, health,and happiness for the world, one
person at a time.
Mm-hmm.
I'm so blessed to have the lifeI do.
My lifestyle has not made anysense at all to a lot of people
(38:51):
because they're so wrapped up insociety's definition of
lifestyle, the big house, thecar, and, okay, well, you're
stuck with, you know, X amountof mortgage every month and I'm
traveling to three differentcountries, which, you know,
again, what do you want yourlife to be about?
Such a simple question that somany people really have a hard
time questioning for me at thisstage in my journey.
(39:12):
And it, it evolves, it changes.
But for right now, I want mylife to be a big adventure.
Mm-hmm.
And that's tiny living, that'straveling, that's hiking in the
wilderness, you know, all kindsof stuff.
So yeah.
What do you want to be about?
Uh, if I could leave yourlisteners with anything, it's
that question.
Michael Bauman (39:30):
that's a super, super, great spot.
To kind of wrap up, I did wantto talk just a little bit about
what you talked about you know,just receiving, the love and the
joy and stuff into that.
A really powerful thing to beable to learn is to how to be
able to shift our state in thesituations like we're talking
about.
And, I've had some elite,special forces people on the
(39:51):
podcast and they talk about howbasically it's, it's the
principle for trainingeverything.
You learn to train something inan environment that has low
distractions.
And this is what essentiallymeditation a lot of times is,
you know, it's like, can Ichange my state to what I wanna
be?
Whether it's peace, whether it'slove, whether it's joy.
Um, can I change that in asituation?
(40:12):
Maybe there's no kids around,you know, it's quiet, you know,
I have headphones on, I'mlistening to lovely music.
But then you start to add insome of the different things
that of life, right?
You start to add in thesedifferent situations.
So for instance, these elitespecial forces, if you're
learning how to shoot, you learnshooting downrange with earmuffs
on with very littledistractions.
Then you start to add indifferent situations.
(40:34):
Maybe you add in movement.
Can I still hit the target?
Maybe you add in, explosionsnoise, other people shooting at
me, right?
All of a sudden you ratchet thatup.
Can I still perform this skillin complex, chaotic situations?
So the question is, can youstill access those places of
peace and joy and love in thecomplex, you know, situations?
That's what you talk about,having these things throughout
(40:56):
your day where you're resetaround accessing those things
in, in the context of your, ofyour daily life.
So I wanted to, you know,highlight.
Brad Carlson (41:06):
Can I, can I say something on that real quick?
Yeah.
I used to have, well, I stillhave a philosophy.
Can you do it when you're tired?
You had a good night's sleep andyou got a full breakfast and you
can show up and, and you're hotshower and all that, and you
can, you know, perform at a highlevel.
But what if you didn't have anyof that?
What if you got a terriblenight's sleep?
What if you haven't had a mealin two days, you haven't
showered for a week.
(41:26):
Can you still perform at a highlevel?
And the answer to that is yes.
And the way you do that is,again, who are you?
If you know in the bottom ofyour heart that you are an elite
warrior, you will, before thesituation, you will show up as
an elite warrior.
If you know that you are afather, a husband of love and
compassion and kindness beforeyou're in the the chaos of the
(41:49):
situation, you will show up asthat, and then in the middle of
it, you just take a deep breath,quiet, center yourself and
remind yourself who you are.
I am a, I am a husband andfather of joy and compassion and
love and repetition.
Like Tony s says, the more youdo that practice, that skill,
the stronger you'll get and theeasier it becomes.
So to switch your state in themiddle of the situation, it's
(42:12):
still possible to do that.
But to do that you've got todeep breath and focus and center
yourself.
Show up as the person you wantto be, know who you are and show
up as that person.
And the more you practice, andthe more you do that, the easier
it gets.
Another reverend minister friendof mine, she called it your
peace bubble, so that whenyou're in that situation, your
peace bubble doesn't get burstBecause if your peace bubble
(42:33):
burst, you're allowing it to beburst.
You're allowing those people torob you of your personal power.
Michael Bauman (42:39):
Mm-hmm.
And I would say, and this goes,in general, obviously we started
talking about like nutritionand, and things like that too.
Um, even in these situations,like this is, a challenge for
me.
I have times where I do thatreally well, and then I have
times where my kids, where Ihaven't gotten to sleep, it was
crazy and I just go off on it.
But using that in a, in a verynon-judgmental way and just
(42:59):
going it's like the fitnessthing.
It's like, maybe this is aweight that at this current
point I can't lift, or I haven'ttrained well enough to lift this
weight.
But it's feedback.
And I go, I need to learn how tobe more peaceful when I'm tired
and when, when things are crazy.
And same with the exercise andnutrition.
Like when you fall off, quoteunquote the wagon, you know,
whatever that means, it's notgoing, I'm a terrible person,
(43:22):
it's going.
oh, I need to learn how, whenthings are maybe stressful or
chaotic or I'm busy at work orI'm really tired.
How can I still maintain thesebehaviors that support who I am?
So I, I think that's a greatspot to kind of wrap it up on
going.
Like, you don't have to use thatas, as judgmental against
yourself, but you can use it asfeedback and go, this is
(43:44):
something I need to work on.
And it's not like you failed in,in terms of what you're doing.
Brad Carlson (43:48):
Self, self-care, self-compassion.
Yeah, you're right.
Yeah.
Even for me, I won't be perfect,I guess, or whatever.
I won't show up as the person Iwanna, I wanna show up as, and I
used to really beat myself up,but self-care, self-compassion,
self-love, self-forgiveness,goes a long way.
So I've learned to be morekinder, gentler on myself,
starting with myself.
(44:09):
Yeah.
I've made myself a priority.
Mm-hmm.
um, I kind of mentioned thisalready, but make your health
and wellbeing for yourself firstand foremost.
So, for me, my three prioritiesare God, health and family.
So that's my number two priorityin life.
My health and wellbeing.
And that's another way I'm ableto sustain this journey.
Some people, their health andwellbeing is their number 10
(44:30):
priority.
Everything else revolves aroundyour health and wellbeing.
So better relationship with yourwife, your kids, all that.
It starts with you and your ownpersonal health and wellbeing.
Yeah.
Michael Bauman (44:40):
Yeah, absolutely.
It's very, very important, veryimportant conversation.
So where can people go toconnect up with you if they want
to coach with you or just followwhat you're doing?
Brad Carlson (44:49):
Yeah, absolutely.
Thanks.
Thanks, Michael.
www.trainingwithcoachbrad.com ismy website.
All my social media handles areon there.
The link to my own podcast is onthere and yeah,
trainingwithcoachbrad.com
Michael Bauman (44:58):
awesome.
I really, I really appreciatethe conversation and like I
said, you're somebody who'sliving it.
You know, living that tiny RVlifestyle and, you know, being
happy and joyful every day andit's, it's really important and
sharing with other people aswell.
So yeah.
Thank you.
Thank you for the time.
Brad Carlson (45:13):
Thank you.
Thank you for having me,Michael.
I appreciate it.
Michael Bauman (45:16):
Absolutely.
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