Mark Bell's Power Project - Bedros Keuilian - MASCULINITY is NOT TOXIC and Dealing with Trauma as MEN || MBPP Ep. 806

Episode Date: September 21, 2022

In this Podcast Episode, Bedros Keulian, Mark Bell, Nsima Inyang, and Andrew Zaragoza talk about  how Bedros helps men turn very traumatic events into small "speed bumps". Bedros shares how success in fitness can be the gateway to success in business.  Follow Bedros on IG: https://www.instagram.com/bedroskeuilian/ Join The Power Project Discord: https://discord.gg/yYzthQX5qN Subscribe to the new Power Project Clips Channel: https://youtube.com/channel/UC5Df31rlDXm0EJAcKsq1SUw Special perks for our listeners below! ➢https://www.naboso.com/ Code POWERPROJECT for 15% off! ➢https://thecoldplunge.com/ Code POWERPROJECT to save $150!! ➢Enlarging Pumps (This really works): https://bit.ly/powerproject1 Pumps explained: https://youtu.be/qPG9JXjlhpM ➢https://www.vivobarefoot.com/us/powerproject Code POWERPROJECT20 for 20% off Vivo Barefoot shoes! ➢https://markbellslingshot.com/ Code POWERPROJECT10 for 10% off site wide including Within You supplements! ➢https://mindbullet.com/ Code POWERPROJECT for 20% off! ➢https://eatlegendary.com Use Code POWERPROJECT for 20% off! ➢https://bubsnaturals.com Use code POWERPROJECT for 20% of your next order! ➢https://vuoriclothing.com/powerproject to automatically save 20% off your first order at Vuori! ➢https://www.eightsleep.com/powerproject to automatically save $150 off the Pod Pro at 8 Sleep! ➢https://marekhealth.com Use code POWERPROJECT10 for 10% off ALL LABS at Marek Health! Also check out the Power Project Panel: https://marekhealth.com/powerproject Use code POWERPROJECT for $101 off! ➢Piedmontese Beef: https://www.piedmontese.com/ Use Code POWER at checkout for 25% off your order plus FREE 2-Day Shipping on orders of $150 Follow Mark Bell's Power Project Podcast ➢ https://lnk.to/PowerProjectPodcast ➢ Insta: https://www.instagram.com/markbellspowerproject ➢ https://www.facebook.com/markbellspowerproject ➢ Twitter: https://twitter.com/mbpowerproject  ➢ LinkedIn:https://www.linkedin.com/in/powerproject/ ➢ YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/markbellspowerproject ➢TikTok: http://bit.ly/pptiktok  FOLLOW Mark Bell ➢ Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/marksmellybell ➢https://www.tiktok.com/@marksmellybell ➢ Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/MarkBellSuperTraining ➢ Twitter: https://twitter.com/marksmellybell Follow Nsima Inyang ➢ https://www.breakthebar.com/learn-more ➢YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/c/NsimaInyang ➢Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/nsimainyang/?hl=en ➢TikTok: https://www.tiktok.com/@nsimayinyang?lang=en  Follow Andrew Zaragoza on all platforms ➢ https://direct.me/iamandrewz #PowerProject #Podcast #MarkBell #FitnessPodcast

Fat Project family, how's it going? Now, we like to look good in the gym and out of the gym. That's why you always see Mark and I and Andrew is stepping up on the short, short game, wearing shorts from Viore and clothes from Viore. And honestly, the number one compliment that I've seen that I've gotten and even Mark's gotten is, damn, your butt looks good. And that's because, well, the clothes we wear make our booties look delicious. Andrew, how can they get it?

Yeah, you guys both have pretty big wagons uh you guys can head over to viore.com slash power project that's v-u-o-r-i.com slash power project to receive 20 off the most amazing apparel that looks so good inside and outside it's gonna make your ass look fat and your ass will look fat links to them down in the description as well as the podcast show notes. God damn it. That was a good one. That was a good one. Make your ass look fat.

You know our homie The Muscle, right? Yeah, I was just at his house. Yeah. Speaking at his event. I got a cool clip. I just sent it over to Andrew. He just said something cool the other day and I was like, man. I, man, that's some Bedros Koulian type shit right there. He was just talking about not getting led around by your emotions.

How did some of this start in the first place of you starting this kind of group to assist men? I know you went through your own issues that we talked about on previous podcasts, but what ultimately led to you diving into this? The catalyst was my book, Man Up, which is not a book about masculinity. It's a book about humaning up to your higher potential. And in fact, in the book, I think like the first chapter, I talk about how women can man up, men can man up we're not we need to live beyond our emotional needs and our reactive needs and go to a place of higher consciousness and so one of the ways I talk about doing that is

constantly putting your place yourself into a place of discomfort. And since 2010, I do about two to three, some years, four six-week challenges. I pick a discipline that I'm not good at, or I've told myself the story that I'm not made for running, right? And then I'm like, all right, you're going to hire a running coach, and you're going to train for six weeks and run the San Diego Marathon. Damn. And so that's how the first six-week challenge began. So I talk about this. I talk about how I did MMA and jiu-jitsu challenges and surfing

because I was afraid of the water. And here I live in Southern California. Yet, I was like, what if I drown? What if I'm not a good swimmer? What if I get towed out to the, you know? He's scary for me. I'm very, like, I'm not good in the water bro at the moment i would yeah you guys are probably negative buoyant yeah that that too i have a hard time

floating man yeah yeah i'm negatively buoyant as well my ass is like an anchor yeah however when you're on a surfboard you know you do have a pretty big flotation device right so so you're good but some of the challenges that i've done stuck like jujitsu i loved the mma not so much um the running not so much like i won't go run another marathon but hey guess what i'll i'll go do a three or five k you know on a weekend and i'll enjoy it but most of the time like i was telling you earlier my form of cardio is swimming i enjoy that so um i talk about all these different six-week challenges that i've done, rock climbing and guitar lessons, salsa dancing, anything that scared me or that I've told myself this false narrative that it's not what I do. And these guys are like, oh my God, who read my book,

you ought to put together a challenge for us where we could maybe do a combination of all the different things. I'm like, bro, just go sign up for a marathon, go hire a running coach, go do jujitsu. But when enough people keep telling you this, you're like, you know what? I think there's something there. So I'm like, you know what? If I could put together something for men that's not just a physical challenge, but I could also, it's almost like wrapping the pill with cheese. The pill would be self-development, vulnerability. We would talk about the traumas that took place because what I talk about in my book is the six-week challenges that were very physically demanding were also

dovetailed with therapy. I went and worked with Kevin Downing, a psychologist out in Brea, California for 15 months straight every Monday. And I did so much journaling and self-work and self-reflection and, you know, worked on that inner child and realized that, holy crap, man, having been molested when I was a kid, I carried with me as an adult into the workplace, into my business partnerships, into my marriage, right? And so I'm like, well, if these guys want a challenge, I'm going to do it where it's more than just a physical challenge. I'm going to wrap it up with personal development and breaking through any kind of emotional limits they might have and vulnerability trauma all right so what do i need i'm gonna need a navy seal because i know how to challenge myself

but i don't know how to fucking challenge you navy seal knows how to do this especially one that's taught a bud's class and then the universe literally brings down Ray, not from the clouds, but I ran into him at a speaking event in Miami and he goes, I'm here to see you speak. I'm like, cool. What do you do? He goes, well, I work for a three letter government agency. I'm like, FBI, CIA. He's like, oh, that's the one. I'm like, all right, got it. All right. And he retired or former Navy SEAL working for the government doing missions for our great country. I'm like, hey, listen, you know, you look jacked. Like, you know how to run a fitness program? He's like, man, I ran, you know, some programs at Bud's. And I'm like, perfect. I go, if I run like this three-day experience, would you help me bring

the physical component to it? And he goes, absolutely. I'm like, cool. Like, I'm also going to need someone who's just the devil reincarnated. Well, I already knew this guy. He's a coaching client of mine. A Marine, owns two gyms in New York, very successful, been coaching him for three years, but just angry and upset at life, bitter, but completely self-actualized. I know those two things sound like it's a dichotomy. That's just how he rolls. I'm like, hey, Steve, I'm going to need you for this. He's like, got it. I'll do it. Well, then we're going to need some hand-to-hand stuff. So I got an MMA guy who happens

to be at the time the VP of my supplement company. Then I'm like, well, we're going to need to teach him some pistol and rifle combat. Like, hey, every guy should own a gun and you ought to know how to use that gun and be comfortable with that pistol. And so a friend of mine had reached out. He's a former SWAT guy in Idaho, Boise, Idaho. He's like, hey, man, I want to come to California and work for you. All during this time as I'm thinking about this thing. And I'm like, work for me?

To do what? Like, you operate a kill house out there. Like, what? We can't do Like you operate a kill house out there. Like what? We can't do that in California. No kill houses allowed. Like we're a fucking democratic out here, right? And he goes, no, man, I work in your franchise. I just want to be around you.

I want to learn to be an entrepreneur like you. The kill house that I run is like breaking even. Someone's losing money. And you guys know what a kill house is? I don't want to. I don't think so. Okay. So what a kill house is when you see like the fbi or the cops or the navy seals or any kind

of special operations they're stacked up one after another on a door and they're about to kick that door in or um blow the door open this guy goes forward this guy goes left this guy goes right boom boom boom they clear the house right a kill house is where they practice in and so it's ballistic walls that can be moved around so that the next time you go through you're like oh shit it's not a center fed room it's a left fed room and uh bullets can't go through and then there's a catwalk there's no roof so the instructors watch and i've gotten to go out there to idaho and me and andrew my, we did the whole kill house experience, which was cool. And, um, I'm like, dude, well, I'm going to do this thing. Maybe you can teach pistol and rifle tactics. He's like, fuck. Yeah. So we set the date and the date was going to be in between Ray's deployment, Ray being the Navy SEAL. And so I didn't have a website or nothing. I'm like,

Hey, we're going to do this project for men. This is how it got named the project. We're gonna do this project for men. We did the math probably about 75 hours. I was going to teach entrepreneurship and have them do a lot of personal development work and vulnerability work and ice baths and stuff. So I just wrote a couple of posts on Instagram and Facebook. I said, it's 12 grand a piece. We need 12 guys within two days sold. I knew I was onto something. What they didn't know, what I didn't talk about in the post was that we're going to be doing a lot of self-reflection, deep work. We're going to talk about traumas that took place and what narrative we carried. All that's like hidden in the fine text. Yeah, exactly.

And so Ray, of course, is like, hey, we're going to need a bell. For what? These are entrepreneurs who each paid $12,000. No one's paying $12,000 to ring a bell. a bell he goes trust me between me and steve they're ringing bells sure as shit two guys out of that first class ring a bell and quit and left the other 10 who graduated from class one which was july of 2019 uh're the first 10 dudes of the Brotherhood now that is almost 200 men strong. Wow. Yeah.

And we've had 14 classes. The 15th class of the project takes place October. What do you think is maybe missing from some people that maybe, like, it seems to be helpful to, if you, like, make something of yourself, it seems to be helpful to if you like make something of yourself, it seems to be helpful, but it doesn't really cure you of your past. You know, if you had traumas in your past, if you make money, it seems to make things easier. Maybe make some of your life less complicated, but there's still like that shit from your past or people have anxiety and certain stresses that they don't really learn how to, I guess, interpret or reinterpret. Good point. So money is very much like ego. So certain things in life, it's like, oh, man, if I just get fit, people start giving me compliments.

And I think it's good self-work. And I do believe, I always say this, that fitness is the gateway to personal development. Like if someone's like, I don't know how to get rich, I'm like, get fit first. If you can control this, you can control that, right, outside. And so, but fitness alone is not going to heal your traumas, but it is going to do what the ego does, which is the same thing that money does and fitness does

and buying a nice car does. It allows you to do what the ego does, which is the same thing that money does and fitness does and buying a nice car does. It allows you to soothe and shield. Your ego is there to soothe and shield, to shield you from the people that might say there's something wrong with you. Because if you're rich, you can surround yourself with a lot of yes people. If you're rich in our culture, if you're wealthy, you make good money, you are considered successful. our culture, if you're wealthy, you make good money, you are considered successful. Now,

how successful is a man who has money, but is sitting in his car every afternoon, wondering the best way to kill himself without causing too much drama and trauma for his family who are going to find him? These are the men that I deal with at the project. And so success, if we just define it as money, is not enough. Money will temporarily make you feel good about yourself because people are telling you, hey man, congratulations, you're successful, you're doing awesome, way to go. And that is one element to success. But another element to success is peace of mind. Yet another element to success is being purpose-driven, having your source of meaning.

We're all on this planet to have money and meaning. And if we don't have meaning and significance, we feel this hollowness, this emptiness. And if we're unfit, we're sick, we practice poor mental and emotional hygiene, how are you successful if you're constantly dealing with the demons and anxiety and white-knuckling through life and putting on this false bravado? And so money and all these things, ego will put you in a place of soothing and shielding, but temporarily, but truly dealing with your traumas

like me, because I was sexually molested by two older boys between the ages of four and six in Armenia. I was molested over and over again by these two older boys. Now I, the narrative, the story that I kept telling myself subconsciously was that I'm broken. I'm unlovable. I had this level of guilt and shame. No one can find out this level of guilt of like, how could this happen to me? Like, did I do something about it? Did I make that happen? And then the sense of rage, how come the babushkas in Russian, that means the grandmas, there's always grandmas in an Armenian village who are just always around watching and like your grandma would, could, could slap me around and, and, and feed me the next minute.

Right. That's just how it is. All these babushkas who would take care of us, yet they never protected me from these two older boys, right? So I had shame, rage, confusion, felt unlovable. And I carried that in my life into my marriage, into my business partnerships, into my relationship with men who I was like, hey, bro, we're cool. But there was this level of I can't trust you, right?

And sooner or later, you'd feel it or it would come out. And at 38 years old, I had this massive panic attack. Now it was financially successful in great shape, but it finally caught up with me and I had this massive panic attack that I thought was a heart attack. And I remember feeling like, who's going to walk Chloe down the aisle when I die right now? In that moment, I accepted death. It was that awful of a feeling. But I was like, who's going to walk Chloe down the aisle? Who's going to teach Andrew, my son, to be a modern day knight? And how dare I break this promise to my wife that I'll be with you till death do us part? Death sure came early.

Whatever it was that happened, I stumbled out of my guest house because I was in my guest house. I just got done getting my shoes right. I left my shoes up there the night before. I had my drum set up there. I play the drums barefoot. And I walked out of the guest house like stumbled down down the staircase and i felt a sense of relief and i was like all right maybe it wasn't a heart attack after all but holy crap that was the beginning of my self-development a true self-development like dealing with the traumas that took place that created this false negative cognitions that created this

false reality in my life where I felt like certain people are the enemy. People can't be trusted. I'm only lovable, lovable up to a degree. And one thing my wife had told me for many years was like, I feel like if me and the kids are in a room, you're always in the hallway. You're never quite in there with us because I couldn't trust people. Right. Because when I trusted those two older boys, that's what happened. So anyway, that's the project is all about healing, but men who are financially successful or have some level of success or great things happen to them, for a moment of time, it'll be soothing and shielding takes place. Where it's like you can shield yourself from the realities of what took place.

You have a lot of people telling you good affirmations and that's soothing. But the reality is you must go deal with it. And if you don't, it will come back up uglier and uglier every time until you have that panic attack. So you're sitting in the car wondering what's the best and cleanest way to kill yourself. You know, I'm really curious about the vulnerability aspect that you were talking about. I think you're going to have a lot of you're going to have a lot of experience and wisdom when it comes to this. when it comes to this, but within the idea of masculinity, within the men's space of like YouTube and all of that, there's a, there's something that I hear echoed where men talk, when they talk about vulnerability, they say, and they mentioned, you cannot be vulnerable with your wife or your girlfriend. You cannot do that. You need to be vulnerable with you. You can do that

with other men, but keep that away from your family and your wife and your girlfriend because they can't handle that. Whenever I hear that, I'm like, that seems kind of off. And I'm curious about your experience with everything that you were going through. I mean, 10 years ago, you were 38. So you were going through a lot of that then too. Were you vulnerable with these aspects of your life with your wife as time went by? Or did you need to find a group of men to be able to be more vulnerable with? Good question. After that significant life event, and every man will sooner or later have a significant life event. Mine came in the form of a panic attack, a massive panic attack. The men that come to the project give themselves a significant life event. One way or another, either the universe will give you a significant life event. One way or another, either the universe

will give you a significant life event, which is not on your terms, and it's going to suck, could be in the form of a divorce, could be in a heart attack, anxiety attack, something, some financial disaster, or you better go find some significant life event that's going to help you flip the switch and become the version of yourself that you're supposed to be. But post panic attack, so after the age of 38, as I started to do the self-work, I started to become more vulnerable with my wife. Now, maybe part of the reason people say this on social media, and I don't know their background, but maybe they're not with the right woman. They think that women can't handle that.

They think that women see men as weaker when men – because, you know, there's this narrative that, oh, women do want men to be vulnerable. But on their side, when they're talking about those things, they're like, your woman is going to see you as weak. She's not going to like seeing that side of you. She says she wants the vulnerable side of you. But when she sees it, she's going to think you're weak and she's probably going to leave you. That's the narrative that these men have and that they put out. I'm going to tell you this right now. These men are fucked up. And the reason they're fucked up, and I'm going to be very direct and honest with you, is because they are right only in the vacuum of if you only show up as a lamb, like if you're a needy little boy. So in other words, if you and your wife have two sons and you show up as your wife's third son, where you're like, that's fucked up. Your wife did not marry that. You need to show up as a lion and a lamb, right? And so when I go to fucking battle for my family and I work and I create businesses

and I create empires and I create legacy fucking wealth and I'm able to donate to Shriners Children's Hospital, Toys for Tots, Compassion International. We've got 97 kids adopted through Compassion. Three charity-based, kid-based charities, all because it's healing for me, right? My wife's like, you're a fucking savage. But then I come home and I can be a loving servant. I could be a lion out there and be like, hey, me and – like I was telling you guys, me and Fleischman just bought this 26-acre fucking ranch and we're spending $8 million just outfitting it. Jesus.

Just outfitting it just outfitting it with fucking obstacle courses in this mega barn that's going to hold 800 people for live events right she's like you're a fucking gangster like that's fucking you're a dangerous man right but then i'll lay down and let the puppies and the cats fucking crawl all over me and i'll pull my wife into the group with us and i'll just like treat her like one of the puppies and she's like holy fuck like a lion and a lamb right but nowhere do i show up as my wife into the group with us and I'll just like treat her like one of the puppies. And she's like, holy fuck, like a lion and a lamb. Right. But nowhere do I show up as my wife's third son.

And that's the problem is when these guys fucking show up as a needy little boy that ask their wives for permission. Well, where do you want to go for date night? I don't know. Where do you want to go? Do you want steak or sushi? How about you go, hey, honey, tonight is date night and we're going to go for steak and we're going to go for 7 p.m., okay? She will literally go boop right in her panties

because she's like, I fucking want a man to tell me what to do. Like in the most fucking awesome way, date night. Because otherwise it's like, oh, okay, well, you're making plans with your boys. You're dating your fucking company. Like as an entrepreneur, it's easy for my wife to see my businesses as the other woman, that I can make plans for my company. I can fly out here and do this podcast and then fly back and then do this and then do that. But then it's date night and I'm like, oh, I don't know.

What date do you want to go? Tuesday or Thursday? Do you want sushi or steak? And all of a sudden it's like you became a little bitch all of a sudden as a man, right? And all of a sudden it's like you became a little bitch all of a sudden as a man, right? But if you could show vulnerability in terms of, hey, honey, I love you. And just so you know, many men think about suicide. And there was a time that I did as well, but I'm in a good place now.

But every now and again, I wake up with that dark fucking energy. And just so you know, when you see that on me, I'm not thinking suicide anymore, but it is going to take me a few days to get out of it. I literally say that to my wife these days. She's like, cool, got it. I'll stay out of your way. Versus before, I felt like I couldn't say that to her. She, of course, all women are pretty intuitive. Like, hey, what's wrong with you?

Something's wrong with you. And they, look, we are the superior species in terms of strength and ability to produce money. superior species in terms of strength and ability to produce money. And so the story she starts telling herself is this motherfucker going to leave me? Should I be worried? There's something going on. Is there another woman? But if I could be vulnerable and be like, Hey, I woke up a little dark and cranky. I got the fucking case of the darkness again, because I do believe that is my superpower. I, I, I can feel what other men are feeling and I can articulate it on social media or podcast and be like, dudes, we will sit in a fucking parking lot. You will sit there long enough to fucking think of all the different ways of killing yourself.

But then you won't because you think about the responsibility and you think about the fucking work that you still have to do with your kids. And then what is the trauma that that's going to leave on a lingering effect? But there's another option. The other option is to not make a permanent decision on temporary feelings because what you're feeling in the car in that moment under pressure is temporary. And these guys are like, holy fuck, no one's ever said that. You felt that too? I'm like, fuck yeah, I felt that.

I just was thinking I was the only one that ever felt that. So when I share that with my wife, she's okay with it because she also sees that I go and fucking kill the saber-toothed tiger and bring it home. And men need to do both. Be the lion and the lamb, the savage and the servant, and your wife will love and respect you. Yeah. Andrew, see if you can pull that clip up of our buddy, the muscle. I just thought this was really cool. And it just touched upon exactly what you just said about the emotions.

Get some volume going. Because it's all white. I can't see it. You'll have better relationships. If you can make decisions without any emotion attached, 100% you will have a better lifestyle in everything. You'll have better relationships. You'll have better relationships. You'll have better businesses, better financial choices.

You'll be better mentally. If all you do is learn to withdraw emotion from decisions made and base them off of fact. But here's the caveat to this. 99% of people don't do this. 99% of people are broke, busted, and poor because they made decisions based off of how they felt at the time. That's what sales is. You want to change your life? Stop getting sold by your emotions to buy it that you don't need or even want. I'm telling you one principle, Find the most successful person you know. I guarantee you they make decisions based off facts and not emotion.

And 99% of the population make decisions in their emotions. And it's always wrong. How good was that? He crushed it. He did. Keaton. Yeah, I thought that was great. Yeah.

By the way, what's up with this? It's a little fidget stick. Fucking dildo. It's like a prickly dildo, and I didn't realize there was this heavy thing in it, so I picked it up thinking it was going to be light. Yeah, and it's got a little weight to it. I don't know. Would it be great if one of these showed up to my house?

It would be great, wouldn't it? Yeah, I'll send you my address. Yeah, we'll get you some stuff. No, really, what is it, though? It's just basically like a fidget stick is the way I look at it. It's from a company called Neboso. They sponsor the podcast. They make these other things, a toe

splay, you know, to help kind of relax your toes and get your toes to open up and then they make like a recovery ball you rub on. You know what, I love this. It's under my feet. Yeah, this is just, I don't know, it's just nice to just twirl around. I like it.

On the second aspect of the vulnerability thing because you mentioned the vulnerability with your wife. Now, most men or a lot of young men I know don't have other men that they can actually talk to about stuff. Like the conversation doesn't tend to lead in that direction. Do you – I mean I'm assuming you believe that's something necessary for men to have, but what sort of difference have you found that with men that have come to the project and even with yourself by being able to develop this large group of other men who are going through a lot of the same shit? So, so if I understand your question, right, what I've discovered, what I've found is as these men have come together so the project is 75 hours long right but

i always tell them right around hour number 36 i'm like guys if if the project could be just distilled down to his essence it's going to be the next four hours from hour number 36 to hour number 40 at this point they haven't slept for almost two days they strangers right because these are all strangers that come from all over the world. We've had dudes come from almost like nine different countries, including the U.S., 10th U.S. And so you show up and you're kind of, you know, man, what do we do? We size each other up, right? And when you don't know who this person is and how kind they are and how cool they are, you're just like, okay, a big dude, tall dude, whatever, jacked, fat, short, etc.

And they're all standoffish. That's how we roll. The job that Ray and Steve have over the next 36 hours is to get them to start calling each other brother. And the only way that's going to happen is put them through evolutions like crawling a 400 yard pit where you were made to restart over and over again in the middle of the night at 2 a.m. Beach torture, ice bath, pulling a truck, all the log carries on a four mile hike that has six massive hills in it. I mean, massive steep hills. All of these evolutions require a buddy to help you because you might be good at the truck pull, but you might be slow as fuck during the crawl through the pit. And so your buddy is going to push you along or pull you along.

And before you know it, you're operating as a team. You're calling each other brother, looking out for each other. Because at hour number 36, the only way we're going to get real true transparency is if you have suspended disbelief, if you have let down your wall of resistance. And now at this point, you're like, I don't give a fuck. All the weaklings have already rung the bell. At this point, like the last class started off with 38 men. By hour number 36, seven dudes had rung the bell. Three had medically rolled, right?

Fire department came and took them away. And we got like two full-time medics on hand who are just fucking on top of these guys. We keep them as hydrated as possible. We keep the electrolytes going, but the body does what the body does. But by our, our number 36, we start the evolution called toxic cognitions. And it's a journaling experience where I walked them through what happened to me. The first sentence of that journaling is, um, the worst thing that ever happened to me in my life was and i literally write down what i wrote i was molested by two older boys in armenia over and over again next question is that did this to me right listed off that made me feel and then here's how it showed up and so they write i write they write i write now they're writing and you can tell they're kind

of looking around like fuck i see where this is going at some point i'm gonna have to talk about this like b's talking about it now as he's walking us through and so once we're done journaling and i read a few pages from that journal we call it our battle book and my therapist helped me build out that exercise of toxic cognitions i'm like all right who going to be the brave soul to start? And you can just see like everyone's butthole just clamped shut, right? So I'll typically pick one and we'll just start to his left. And one by one, we realized that we're not all that different. He was molested. He was abused. He was physically abused. He was sexually abused. He was mentally abused.

That guy, his brother committed suicide. No matter the trauma, it did the same thing. It lit up this part of our brain, the fight or flight system, like a Christmas tree. And now that part keeps getting re-lit up every time we experience something that triggers our trauma body. So if you've had trauma and you haven't processed through it, when something feels like a threat to you, you go back into that same state that you did in my case when I was four or five, six years old. That's your trauma body, right? You shut down. In my case, I would disassociate and go away. And my wife would tell me like, are you even here? We're arguing. Do you even care about this marriage? We're arguing. But at that point I was feeling the trauma. I was gone. I was

physically in front of her, but gone. So as these men start talking about this and connecting and they see that, holy fuck, we're all the same. What they don't realize is on the next page is the superpower that I've gained from what took place, what happened here. Let's not forget that every superhero that we watch, you know, Spider-Man got bit by that spider and he gained superpowers. Every superhero has gained superpowers from something bad happening to them. My superpower from what happened to me as a child is that I've got a tremendous amount of care, vulnerability, empathy, and compassion for men. of care, vulnerability, empathy, and compassion for men. My wife, since the day we met and dated, she was like,

because we met in the gym and I was a personal trainer in that gym, she goes, it seems like all the broken men are attracted to you. I'm like, how do you know? She goes, well, all the broken men keep asking me out. And I say, no, and you seem to be the Pied Piper of broken men. She called me the Pied Piper of broken men while we were dating 22 years ago. Right? Turns out I was the king of, I was like the king broken man. Right. And so as I've done the work, but had that not happened to me,

I would not have been so open with dudes. I would not have taken the time to listen to them and cared. And so each of these dudes, when they flipped the page and they continue to journal, they realized that what happened to them has also created a superpower within. We just have to now take that big mountain on your timeline of life that you think is so ugly and no one can know about because they'll look at you in a nasty way and realize that all these awesome dudes that you call brothers who have helped you out the last 36 hours all have a very similar experience. All have this big, ugly mountain on their timeline of life that they were embarrassed by, and we just took all the air out of it. And the way Kevin described

it to me was, he goes, hey, you're a big, strong dude. So imagine if you go in your pool and I give you a beach ball and I say, hold it down underwater. He goes, you can do that for a while, right? But sooner or later, your arms are going to get tired or you've got an itch on your nose. And when you go to scratch that nose, your arms get tired, the ball pops up. He goes, how long do you want to keep that like muscling through your trauma? What if we can just take the air out of it? No need for that ball to be held under anymore. So my job at the project, really the project is four hours long, but it takes 70 hours to get 75 hours to get through, is to take that mountain and just make it

a little speed bump on their timeline of life. No different than the time you tore your bicep, the time you tore your ACL, the time you, that's it, man. You didn't ask for what happened. That's all of life is suffering with brief moments of bliss and you've had your share of suffering. That's all. And so these men all of a sudden end up becoming force multipliers. suffering. That's all. And so these men all of a sudden end up becoming force multipliers. They end up now going back to work and to their friends and to their kids and having better conversations. No more side conversation. I teach them how to hug. Hey man, we hug belly button to belly button. That's, that's how we hug. Yeah. Oh, you don't do no sideways hugs with your kids. You hug belly button to belly button line those parts up yeah line

those parts up exactly i want a sword fight while we're hugging right see i always say my my wife cringes like we'll go to a restaurant we'll go to a restaurant and i'll be telling my wife a story and so the waitress comes by and she goes are you guys ready to order yet i'm like oh my god i'm sorry not yet i was molested as a child so it takes me longer to order right and she's like my wife's like what the fuck dude, dude? I'm like, what? I was molested as a child. Yeah. Yeah.

I got to be open about it. It's therapeutic. I got to talk about it. If I want to make the mountain into a little speed bump, bro, I've got to take the air out of it. Right? And so, of course, my wife's just like sinking under the table. She's like, date night's over.

I'm like, nah, baby, it's just starting. But so these guys become force multipliers. And what's really cool is they realize that the guy that has got the blue check Mark and the guy that has a fleet of private jets and the guy that owns an HVAC company, who's just starting up as an entrepreneur, we're all the fucking same. We're all the same. And so you can be a force multiplying, go start having conversations and go talk about the things that you don't want to talk about. No more super superficial conversations like, Hey, what's your sports team doing? I don't know, but I can pull up the fucking answers on my iPhone.

Or how's the weather in Sacramento? If I'm asking you that, bro, you should fucking punch me because I can get the exact fucking humidity level in Sacramento now. No more superficial conversations as men. Like, let's go fucking deep. And that's what the project does. And these men realize that it's okay to do that. It is okay to show up as a savage, like do fucking hard shit.

They've never, many of them have never fought. They've never wrestled. They've never done pugil sticks. And they fucking get their bell rung. Like that fucking felt good. And I didn't die. Right, right. But if you don't do that, your wife is going to piss you off.

And you're going to go passive aggressive on her and then blow up and show up like an asshole because you know you can beat up your wife and so you're like ah put your hand through the wall well how about you fucking fight a man let's fight a man we're in a controlled environment and really get that aggression out now they go and do jujitsu or or muay thai and they realize they're much more peaceful they're much more calm they're much more confident and capable and uh going back to what you were saying earlier, bro, you know, my wife, like one of the best nights of sex we had was when I had to help zip tie a dude on an airplane. Did I tell you guys the story?

No. All right. So remember I tell you I do those six week challenges? Great segue. So I did the MMA challenge with Aaron Weatherspoon. He was at the time King of the Cage welterweight champion. Tiny, short, little black dude who's just very peaceful and zen-like. And we meet in the parking lot.

Now I've known of him because he lived in Chino Hills. And we'd see each other in the gym, like 24-hour fitness. And I'm like, hey, Aaron, you're a great MMA fighter. I see you on TV. I want to do a six-week challenge. Okay, sure we'll do it in a real calm and meet me in the parking lot of millennial mmm mma got it meet him we get on the mats and he fucking has his way with me right and i'm like cool this guy's a fucking badass signed up for six weeks of training with him three times a week and always these six six week challenges have to end with a challenge, like run the marathon or climb the highest rock face that

the instructor feels you can climb. And so at the end of six weeks, he goes in the ring with me to fight me at my level. Obviously he could have just cleaned me up, but right. And so he had, you know, MMA involves kicking, punching, as well as jujitsu. But I had not done a jujitsu challenge yet up to this point. So I'd learned to rear naked chokehold, arm bar, guillotine chokehold. But also when you're paying a dude to coach you, in the back of my mind, I'm going to be honest here. I'm like, maybe this motherfucker is just saying that I'm really getting in a good chokehold and he's tapping. But he's really not.

Like he can get out of this if he wants, right? There's always this lingering thing in the back of my mind. So after that six-week challenge is over, about three weeks later, we're in Maui, me and the wife and the kids. We fly back. We're flying back, 11 p.m. flight. We're about an hour and a half into the flight on the pacific one of those big mega jumbo jets and me and andrew are sitting in first class on the right side of the plane in the far back of first class my wife is in the middle rows with chloe and then behind my wife is some other dude and way up front is some guy who's going bonkers so it's about 12 o'clock 12 a.m we're over the mighty pacific he's going bonkers he So it's about 12 o'clock, 12 a.m. We're over the mighty Pacific.

He's going bonkers. He's hitting the seat in front of him. People have spread out. The flight attendants are losing their shit. He's foaming at the mouth. The flight attendants come down our aisle with zip ties, like interlinked, black zip ties interlinked, like thick ones,

the kind we use at the project. And Ray's like, we're going to need hoods and zip ties. I'm like, why're gonna need hoods and zip ties i'm like why do we need hoods and zip ties i think it all makes sense yeah i never never questioned the seal but um but i'm like ma'am uh i see he's going crazy is everything okay what can i do to help and me and the guy behind my wife we just kind of made this eye contact like if shit goes down we got each other this is post 9-11 Like you always hear about like everyone dog piles on the guy trying to light a shoe on fire to blow the shit up, right? And so she goes, well, by law, we have to ask him to put these on. I'm like that guy who's fucking yelling and screaming and doing the gun gesture, you have to ask him to put these on.

Yes. Now Andrew's looking at me. I'm like, buddy, everything's going to be okay. Di's looking at me, my wife. I'm like, honey di's looking at me my wife i'm like honey everything's gonna be okay chloe's knocked out sleeping i'm wearing my helo hattie shirt bro it's like i've got flower print on it i've had a couple of my ties on the fucking airport and i got flip-flops on because it's fucking hawaii right everyone should be in a good mood well this guy's fucking freaking out so the flight attendant's going cut in front of him to create a distance between the pilot and him.

And you can tell they're like, hey, sir, can you put these on because you're a flight risk? And he goes off. He goes off. I'll fucking kill everybody on this plane. She looks up at us with those eyes and goes, help. And then me and the dude just get up and we start running. I don't even know what I'm going to do at this point. He goes, what the fuck are you going to do?

And he goes to shove me. And I parry out of the way, just like Aaron taught me. Get behind him and get him in a rear naked choke hold. He's taller than me, so he's bucking. I remember when Aaron said, when you're with someone taller, if you take a deep breath, you cinch up harder. You cut off the air. This fucker collapsed, just like Aaron said he would.

Now I'm whispering in his ear bro relax be cool no one's gonna fucking die here like my wife i'm telling about my wife and kids like he gives a shit he's bucking i also know that lapd has killed a few motherfuckers with a chokehold right so in the back of my head what's running is this guy's not killing anybody today not now not on this flight number two some motherfucker has an iphone up right now and they're probably taking video of me. Number three, I'm slipping out of my fucking flip-flops because I'm sweating because I'm so scared and nervous. And number four, you cannot kill this guy like the LAPD does.

Those things are swirling through my head. So I'm talking in his ear. Loosen up so he can fucking relax, and he starts bucking again, so I tighten up again. In the meantime, the other guy who came to help, he's got the zip cuffs from the lady. By the way, no one else is helping. Yeah. And he's trying to wedge, grab the guy's arms and wedge them between my gut and the guy's back to zip tie him. And I realized this is not going to work. So I squeeze harder until he goes limp.

And I quickly turn around just like Aaron taught me and get him in a guillotine choke hold. Holy fuck, that worked too, right? So now his back is exposed. And now the fifth thing I'm thinking about is if Aaron was here, if Aaron was just sitting right there in first class, he'd be fucking proud of me. Right, exactly, right? Like I can't wait to tell Aaron. I don't care what time we land.

I'm fucking texting him, right? And so homeboy zip ties him and out of his nerves, I don't blame him. He zip tied so hard, he just cut right into his fucking wrist. And I just saw blood coming out. I'm like, I don't give a fuck. He can fucking bleed to death for all I care, motherfucker. And so anyway, flight attendants asked us to put him in the back. And he and I took turns sitting next to him until the plane landed.

And the whole, that guy's family, my wife's family, my family got free hummus and chips on the whole ride. Did he talk to you at all? Like when you were having a sit with him? Like was he? the whole that guy's family my wife's uh my family got free hummus and chips on the whole right did he talk to you at all like when you were having to sit with him like was he bro he would wake up from some weird stupor and be like fuck you man i'm gonna kill you when we fucking land i'm like all right bro whatever right like just elbow him in the face yeah you're a zip tie yeah and so we're like but now i'm thinking like motherfucker i'm supposed to be in first class but i'm sitting by the toilet drunk or high or like I couldn't smell anything on him. I'm guessing he might have popped a few pills or something.

I'm convinced that he was not a real threat. Yeah. Right. But he had fucking lost it mentally. And so, of course, we land in LAPD and the LAX police department take him off. And true to form, as we were filing out of the airplane, the guy who sat behind my wife gone in front of me. And so the flight attendant is telling the captain and the police officer, like,

these are the two men that helped. And she points to the guy in front of me, goes hero number one. And then this is hero number two. And she points to me and my wife elbows me. She goes, as always hero number two, right?

Like she can't even be number one. Right. So, but, but anyway anyway all this to say that like these guys at the project like every man needs to know that the limits of their strength their ability to take another man down like to be able to just fucking put your put a hook around another man's neck and to feel the man's strength like that's a very primal thing

that we need to feel man and you feel and you're like fuck man i can hold a grown-ass man by his fucking by his limbs it's a powerful feeling and it makes you calmer more confident and then you realize a little dude like fucking aaron weatherspoon could fuck you up and you all of a sudden start walking around like i'm peaceful i want no trouble from no one because big dude will know jujitsu little dude will know jujitsu i'm not gonna fuck with anyone you know i mean and so confidence capability stress management it's all there and then they walk out of the project feeling so open and honest seeing all these guys who they looked up to during the project as equally i always tell them you're not fucked up you've just had fucked up experiences in life that we're gonna help unfuck you but you don't come in here thinking you're fucked up and I'm broken and I need to be fixed.

No, man, it's broken. I mean we're just – you've had some fucked up experiences. That's life. That's the human journey. But yeah, man, they become force multipliers of this impact that we're having and this is why the project keeps growing bigger and bigger. Hence, we got the ranch so that we have a bigger compound to serve the men. Yeah. So that's's but that story

though it started off by saying the best night of sex you ever had oh i was wondering where that was yes i mean i have an idea but i jacked off so hard like dude i still have a rear naked choke no um but that that night like my wife was like, I think she was fully turned on. Yeah. Like, I mean, I don't know how to say this, Di, I love you if you're hearing this, but, like, my wife's very modest. She went to Biola, the Bible Institute of Los Angeles. So, you know, like, she's like, don't talk about me.

And here I am, like, my wife was turned on, bro, and we fucked. But how cool, right? That's great. So you can be vulnerable. Going back to what you asked earlier, you can be vulnerable if you could also show your wife that you can fuck a man up right and she's like i fucking respect you yeah and that's a cool feeling but if you're just her child then she's not going to respect you power project family i hope you guys are enjoying this episode now mark andrew and myself have been cold plunging for a while now we actually use the cold

plunge xl but the reason why this has become part of our daily routine every single day is because of honestly how good it makes us feel coming out of that water. Now, if you want to take a cold shower, that is beneficial and you need to be doing that if you don't have a cold plunge. But if you do get a cold plunge that goes all the way down to 39 degrees, it's crazy because Andrew Hurman actually talked about the benefits of dopamine post-cold plunging. Now, cocaine gives you a 2.5 rise in your dopamine release. Cold plunging gives you that also, but it also gives you a sustained higher level of dopamine throughout your day. That's just one of the benefits as there are many. So if you guys want to get on it, Andrew, how can they? Oh yes. You guys got to head over to thecoldplunge.com and check out enter

promo code power project to save $150 off. And before we drop off here, I do have to say that this has been the absolute best thing I have ever done for my mental health. Every single day I get in this cold plunge and I come out a happier, more positive and more vibrant human. I can't recommend this enough. Again, thecoldplunge.com promo code power project to save $150 off. Links to them down in the description as well as the podcast show notes. I can't recommend this enough. Again, thecoldplunge.com promo code POWERPROJECT to save $150 off. Links to them down in the description as well as the podcast show notes. How do you get people or even in your opinion, is it important to like reinterpret what has happened to you? Or as you're mentioning, turning it into like more like a little speed bump.

Yeah. And you mentioned talking about it, writing about it. What are some other things that are helpful? Because it is a choice, right? You can go around angry about it your whole life, but I think sometimes people will think, you don't understand, man, you never went through this. But somebody else did go through something that they felt was just as challenging

or maybe even more challenging to some extent. That's exactly it. So one, it is a reframe. You have to reframe it that this mess could actually end up being my message. Like I knew long ago that I could have become a predator if I didn't choose the path of being a protector. Because kids that have been molested or raped have a higher probability of repeating the cycle. I was scared about getting married and having kids. I've often thought about before finding Di that if I find the

woman to get married, I may not have kids. I'm afraid of what I might do to them. I don't, I've read enough books and trying to work on healing myself was like, Oh shit. Like I'll go as far as to say very openly and honestly, I had a deal with myself. I still make deals with myself. I don't know if you guys do or not, but I make deals with myself. I remember thinking that if the thought of doing something pervy to my kids crosses my mind,

I will go get my Glock 19, go in the backyard and kill myself. That won't happen. This will happen instead. If I can't control the monster within, then I worked my whole life to turn the monster into a protector. And so that mess that happened to me as a child became my message through the project, right? And weird how life unfolded. So one, it is a reframe. You have to turn your mess into a message. Number two, we're so good at telling stories to ourselves as humans, right?

So as men, we do one of two things. We will put things in a box and we'll like, I've dealt with it. Well, how'd you deal with it? I don't think about it. We can do that for a very long time, but it will show up during the weirdest fucking moments because my sex life was also pretty crazy because of pre getting married um i gotta get down on the record because and kevin explained to me he's like wait you fucked how many women i was like oh not only the number of women but sometimes the number of women in one day kevin and sometimes the way i fucked him was fucking crazy kevin and he's laughing right and you got a picture kevin i got to draw a word picture for you guys for kevin and kevin's your therapist therapist kevin downing bray california um all of you should go to him

there you go now he's got a 16 month waiting list i've sent literally 28 men to him already and he everyone every guy loves him because he's a guy's guy yeah he's about 70 years old uh white hair that just like einstein but then it took like three sessions i'm like looking at the guy like something's up with his face and then on the third session i'm like motherfucker you don't have eyebrows laughing he just has no eyebrows bro and so you know like someone's face looks weird yeah then you're a guy like that yeah right right. Right, right. I was like, wait. Oh, yeah. Yeah, like when someone's got

like a fucked up nose or something, you could see that your nose is all fucked up. But if you're missing something that's supposed to be like so kind of nonchalant, it's like something's up with you. Like, oh my God,

you got no eyebrows, bro. What happened, right? So anyways, long story short, where are we going with this fucking story? You were... Your sex life. Yep. Yeah, yeah yeah yeah yeah so anyway it shows up in the weirdest ways because i'm telling kevin like because he asked

right like well you know how's it showed up whatever i'm like man i was fucking all these chicks and all these different ways and blah blah blah and he's like oh well okay let me explain to you why he goes you probably thought you you were gay because as a young child or you did something to attract those older boys to do that to you. Let me explain to you why you weren't. Young boys look up to older boys or their older brothers or their dads as a rite of passage. And you just trusted these older boys. And so you did not invite that.

They took advantage of a very – what was the word he used? I want to use the exact word. Basically, they took advantage of a very sacred, sacred, of a very sacred thing that young boys look up to older boys to mentor, and then here these guys take advantage of me. But he goes, you went on to bang all these chicks just to prove to yourself that you're straight and that you're not gay. I go, damn, Kevin, you know what?

You're right. He goes, well, let me ask you, did you ever look at any gay magazines or anything or go? I'm like, no. And he starts laughing. He's like, isn't that funny? They could have just, it would have probably been easier for you to do that,

but you had to prove it to yourself with this way, right? And so while we can put it in the box, our trauma and say I've dealt with it, it will show up in the weirdest way, whether you're with a chick, a business partner, something, it will come up. That ugly monster will come up when not dealt with. So to all of a sudden be in a room and to hear other powerful men who are doing something hard and difficult with you and to hear all the instructors. Ray, and he talks about his trauma, how his dad died when Ray was 11.

And he may have talked about it on the show. Like, what a traumatic experience. Instructor Matt, the SWAT guy, nine fucking dads. He doesn't know who his dad is. Mom would start grooming the next dad as she was divorcing this one, grooming the next dad as she was divorcing this one. And you ready for this? Mom's a therapist. So he grows up, like, with four different last names, finally decided, fuck it. I'm just keeping Matt Schneider. Like I can't

keep changing my last name. So he's like the dad that I liked the most, I kept his name. Right. Aaron, the MMA guy, instructor of the project, raped or not raped, molested just like me during when he was young.ve the angry marine he goes everything i learned about how to be a father and a husband i learned from my dad because he did everything fucking wrong and he talks about how his dad was just a piece of shit wouldn't even go out and play with them like the mental and emotional abuse that steve suffered like he will come on the show if you ask him to come on the show he'll be your worst guest ever he'll just stand here and then he'll answer a question with one word answers because he doesn't have much to say but he will fucking the most

therapeutic thing for him is the project he will bring holy fucking hell on those guys and he says my job is to do one thing to either get you little fucking bitches to quit he says that within the first minute when we start when i ask him the instructors to introduce themselves to either get all you fucking little bitches to quit and ring the bell or to welcome you into the brotherhood at hour number 75. And if one of you accidentally slip by and make it through because the other instructors want you to make it through and I don't, he goes, I will take my fucking knife. And he carries this big K-bar knife on his hip because he's a Marine. He goes, we all have this crest tattooed on our hand. And he goes, I'll fucking cut this crest right off my hand. And I know he will. He's fucked up. So when all five

instructors share their story, and then all of a sudden all these guys are sharing their story and you realize this is the human condition. And I don't need to be embarrassed about what happened to me anymore because I like you. You're a good dude. I like you. You're a good dude. You're a good dude. And we've all shared into something that, so odds are, and when I share the stat that one out of every three dudes, guys or gals, have had physical and emotional abuse. One out of every four have had sexual abuse. So odds are, just in this building alone, like there's a lot of great humans who have had trauma. Whether they've dealt with it or not is a different story. But if you can take that mountain, make it into a speed bump, if you can reframe it into a superpower, and if you could actually not

just put in a box and say, I've dealt with it, but air it out and realize that it's not this dragon that's haunting you, but it's actually just a little lizard where when the sun hits it just right, it looks like a scary dragon that's been haunting your whole life. It becomes that little speed bump. And that's all we want to do. And these men are testaments to the project because how about this? These men are testament to healings. Not no one. I, if the project never happened again, I'd be fine with it. Men just have to heal. Men just have to heal their traumas. So I'm going to say these men are a testament to healing because then they go home and we call it – you either have project babies or project divorces. Project babies, if your wife is fully on board with your personal development, your self-development, your non-negotiables, your new morning routine, et cetera, if she's on board with it, cool, man.

You guys are going to live an awesome life. If all of a sudden she fears the man that comes back because you've changed now. You're not – basically you're not – I can't control you anymore. You're not my little boy. Deep down inside, she wants you to be a man, but she also wants you to stay weak and docile. Then there will be a project divorce. But it's either project babies or project divorces. As far as the – before you got Kevin as a therapist, did you ever view therapy in a negative light?

Like was it something that you looked down upon? Because you mentioned you sent 16 people over to Kevin. 27. 27 people over to Kevin. So men in therapy seem to be like oil and water. Yeah, yeah. I didn't look at it as a negative. Like I didn't look down upon it.

I just was like this is so – this is how dumb we are as men bro i was like oh that's for men who are really fucked up yeah well how much more fucked up can you get being molested by two older boys uh feeling unlovable broken shame rage confusion having the nastiest fucking sex life ever like so nasty where i would go to the doctor and be like i I fucked four chicks this morning and things are all popped out around my crotch. Like you got to give me medicine. And he's like, that's actually just from the waistband of your underwear because you've just been hot and sweaty and nasty all. That's just fever blisters.

Yeah, just wash yourself, son. You're just chafing. Are you wearing a condom? No, it doesn't feel good with a condom like that's not like if that's not fucked up yet I'm like

oh therapists are for fucked up people so I never look down I'm like I'm just not fucked up I'm normal it's so easy to I'm guessing

who's that dude who would eat boys Jeffrey Dahmer right I'm guessing he's like I'm normal everything's fine like you like hamburger

you like steak I like eating humans why would I need help why would I need help and I think Everything's fine. Like, you like hamburger? You like steak? I like eating humans. Why would I need help? Why would I need help? And I think that's the problem. Like, we don't see our own shit. Again, the ego will shield and soothe. So my ego was like, no, no, no.

A therapist is for fucked up people, for hurt people, for broken people. I'm fine. I'm fine. So I did it. But thankfully, that panic attack that I had, this is how funny the universe is. That panic attack that I had when I was 38, 10 years ago, led me to the doctor because my wife's like, let's just have your heart tested. EKG test, stress test.

Hey, your heart's fine. But you have stress, anxiety, dealing with all that shit. Yeah. Here's Xanax. Four days of Xanax, like I'm like drooling out of the side of my mouth. I got zero creativity. I called the doctor. I'm like, hey, man, at this point, my business is going to collapse if I just keep using Xanax because I have no urgency and desire to work.

What's another way? But good news is I don't feel anxious for four days. Like this is fantastic. All right. What's the alternative? Do you have another drug? He goes, no. Have you considered talk therapy?

I was like, fuck, fuck. But because I love money, because money to me is a vehicle to meaning I get to help those charities like I said Shriners Toys for Tots Compassion International I was like I need a lot of money I want to give my family the fucking awesome life that we have I want to make that even better and I want to help these causes that make me feel good so I reluctantly went and found a therapist the first therapist I found was a woman. She cried more than I did in the first fucking session. I was like, all right, one, I'm going to be honest with you guys.

This is all while I'm married, and I did not fuck her, but I'm like, one, I want to fuck her. Because I'm fucked up. You understand that, right? So a woman who cries is like a fucking gazelle that's got a broken leg, and the line's like, I'm not even hungry, but I gotta eat you. Yes. Did her mascara run though? Because like that one.

Okay, look, I can't. On the off chance my wife hears this, I'm not going to go into great detail about it, but I was like, alright, this is going to lead to very, very bad things. And like all types of weird fantasies because it's her couch, her office. I get the power. You get it. Second therapist, I'm like, dude, go find a male therapist.

He was probably in his late 30s, young, and I can tell he was intimidated by me and I could wordsmith him because I'm pretty intelligent. I could wordsmith him and not talk about the stuff that he wanted me to talk about. wordsmith him and not talk about the stuff that he wanted me to talk about. When I accidentally found Kevin, the third therapist, the first two sessions, I'm trying to make small talk and asking him, hey, what did you do? And he's like, oh, this weekend, me and the family, we went to the lake and motorboat. Oh, what kind of motorboat is it? And I'm like, if I can kill the sour, I can do this for a while. And even though I'm there to get help, I don't really want it because I don't want to talk about the things I don't want to talk about.

And he's like, hey, Betos, we can talk about the boat that I have all day long, but that's not why you're paying me $175 an hour. How about you let me ask you some questions? Is that okay? And I was like, well, fuck you. Fine. Ask away. And that's how it all began. And full disclosure, man, I'm a dude of routine.

And so I was like, Kevin, I'm, I'm a dude of routine. And so, um, I was like, Kevin, I like coming here on Mondays after work. Mondays are my most stressful days, days. And I feel like if you're going to help me, you're going to help me the most on Mondays. So I would come at 6 PM on a Monday. Some Mondays were just so busy at HQ, um, you know, growing a franchise that I was like, Kevin, could I just pay and just sleep on your couch here for an hour? Like, take a nap? And he wouldn't let me just take a nap, obviously, but we'd have lighter conversation. Just about his hobbies, my hobbies.

I learned that he plays the saxophone. Really awesome dude. Like, I really love him. Awesome, awesome human. I still see him once a month. Because I went there every Monday for almost 16 months. And then some Mondays, it was just such fucking hard, like so many layers of your heart is just fucking pulled apart

and you get to the fucking pain of the ugliness. And then you're walking out to your fucking truck and it feels like I'm walking through molasses. I don't know what else to describe good therapy other than days of walking through molasses. And then three days after the session, you're like, fuck, that's what happened to me. That one time, that's it.

Something he said on Monday, boom, Thursday, it hit me. I got it. And obviously, you're not walking through molasses only to go back on Monday and find yourself in molasses again. But one molasses-y trip at a time led to that. And Kevin ultimately made me write a letter to myself, to my younger self. And he gave me the first sentence between the ages of four and six. While in Armenia, I was molested by two older boys. But today, you're.

And then just that's the, right? And I wrote nine pages to myself. Took me a couple of months to write it. I tried on my iPhone. Didn't work. Tried on paper. It didn't work. Laptop. It didn't work. Finally, I said, Thanksgiving is coming and I will not sit at the Thanksgiving table. Again, I'm extremist. I give myself rules. I will not be at the

Thanksgiving table if I don't fucking write this letter to myself, to my younger self. And so two days before Thanksgiving, I typed it all up sitting in my car close to a Starbucks so I could ride their Wi-Fi crying in my Tahoe I was driving to Tahoe just fucking crying on the keyboards typing out to this young fucking kid what happened to him and who he is now and the impact that he's making now and I fucking hit send to Kevin and it was just such a fucking relief and then we spent the next few months going line by line and unpacking nine pages that I wrote to this little boy because what I didn't tell you is when Kevin asked me

what happened to you as a little boy, I said nothing happened to that little kid. What happened to that little kid I've dealt with? He goes, can you say what happened to me? And I started crying. This was kind of like month number one and working with him and when you can't even say what happened to me that's called disassociation which is the first step in creating multiple personality so I was this close to having a multiple personality disorder because of the trauma that had happened to me. So it was a very healing experience and I feel like that has allowed me to speak openly about it.

Ten years ago, I would have never thought that I'd be on stage, on TV, in front of a podcast like this and just talking about it. But it's just a speed bump. It's just like if I talked about the time I tore my bicep. That's how it feels. And I want every man to know, every woman to know, every human to know that that does not, that is not your identity. That is not the story that has to get continued. Your book of life has so many more pages and you can take the pen back and start writing how the next chapter and the chapter after that and the chapter after that looks. But that only happens when you begin to heal. And healing does take a lot of work.

It's also important for people to understand you're nearly 40 years old. Yeah. You were 38 when you started to like, I don't know, I guess like find your groove and start to, I mean, you must feel so much better the last 10 years. Oh, dude. I look better physically. People tell me that I just, that I carry myself lighter. Like I'm not as dark and angry and bitter.

And I really believe like there is weight to trauma. There is emotional weight to trauma. It's interesting because I think like for our own kids, you know, you're wanting them to like, I think a lot of parents are wanting them to like pick, pick something to do. Like, what is your son doing? Like, is he going to college? Is he doing this? He's doing that. It takes a really long time to try to figure out how to become a man. And you're still probably in a long working process of still working on figuring that out. Right. I'm a work in progress. Like I, you know, that movie, um, catch me if you can. Yeah.

Right. It was great. And they were like, man, we understand how you faked forged the checks. We understand how you even keep created a fake ID and you sat on the cockpit. You didn't fly the plane, but you sat on the cockpit. How did you, how did you run a university class? He goes, I just had to be one chapter ahead of all the other students. And that's how he ran a whole semester of university and gave tests. And that is a very powerful thing because I just have to be one chapter ahead of all the men that I want to serve. So if I know my calling on this planet then is to serve men, I cannot stop doing the work. I have to put myself around good men. I have to keep digging. If I sense pain now, I don't just let my ego shield and soothe and I turn towards it and then just jump at it because I know there's goodness on the other side of the molasses.

If I have a question, I'll text Kevin and he'll add it to his list of questions that he'll answer when I see him at the end of the month. Whereas before the old me would be like, I wonder if this is, you know, if I have this pattern in my relationship. Ah, it doesn't matter. You know, move on, make more money, right? I wonder if I have this pattern in my relationship. Ah, it doesn't matter. Move on. Make more money. And so I will always stay a chapter ahead of all men, and I feel like I'm a work in progress. And if I do my job right, maybe, just maybe, I'll come to some level of self-actualization moments before I die when I'm 100 years old. What about the people that met you before 38?

Is there a wake of people that got chewed up and spit out by the old Bedros Koulian? Yeah. Yeah. And that's got to be painful too to try to, I don't know, reconcile or figure those things out. Did you have to go back to people and communicate and say? Every single one of them I did. And there's four really good dudes. One of them, my former business partner, Fit Body Boot Camp.

We started Fit Body Boot Camp together. No one's made me laugh as hard as him. My coffee, I would like, like in the, like in the sitcom, I would spit my coffee out. He would make me laugh so hard. He once sent me a video when the iPhone first came out. Um, we, we, we launched Fit Body Bootcamp in 2010, became a franchise by 2011. He sent me a happy birthday video because of my birthday, but he had taken a Sharpie and painted eyes on the head of his cock.

Yeah. And then he held the camera and he's squeezing the head of his cock. So his, so his pee hole is moving like a mouth. You guys picture this, right? And it's, it's moving like a mouth.

It's like, hi, I just want to wish you a happy birthday. You guys picture this, right? It's incredible. Yes. And it's moving like a mouth. It's like, hi, Bedros. I just want to wish you a happy birthday. You're a wonderful guy. God, we need friends like that. Yet, so sadly, like here we are laughing

and it's like, I'm telling you, no one's made me laugh that hard. Like he just, and that's just one of 10 things I can tell you about this guy. And we're family, friends and all that.

But I had so much fucking like, and our work ethics did not match. Full – and our work ethics did not match. Full disclosure, our work ethics did not match. I'm a fucking Clydesdale of a workhorse where business is concerned. Like I'll put my fucking head down and work. And him, not so much. He's a funny dude who just had a good idea called the Fit Body Boot Camp. And so when we came to a fork in the road, I spent a whole year building this resentment against him until I finally sat him down and went off at him, chewed him out and said, one of us have to fucking go.

It's either you or me. Well, he didn't have the money to buy me out. I had businesses before that. So I bought him out. But that conversation today would have been different. The first time he frustrated me, I would have been like, Hey bro, sit down. You're funny, but you're a horrible visionary. This is the lane that you're good at. Don't do that stuff anymore. And I say this with love. That's how I show up today. And so there's four dudes who tell me to go fuck off, and they have every right to.

I'm a bull in a china closet pre-38 and um that monster still lives within me um but that monster is now used for good for the most part unless we're on an airplane i gotta choke a motherfucker out and i will yeah there's something else i want to kind of rewind to in terms of your younger self you taught we got to kind of go about the sex stuff because when you were talking about that, there's a lot of really, really young guys in their early twenties who are like, that sounds like heaven having sex with all these women. That sounds great. And there's a community, it's the red pill, right? I don't know if you've heard of it, the whole red pill type of ideology, but those men generally look at the ability for just men to sleep with multiple women as an ideal.

Like even if you become a high-value man, as they call it, meaning women want you, you have a high net worth, whatever. At that point, yeah, you can have a woman and a family. But since you're such a high-value man and women want you, you should be able to sleep with kind of as many women as you want, even though you have somebody at home. Now, it's just interesting how you were, you know, you did all the things that these men want to be able to do. And you were also rich at the time, right? But you now on the other side at 48 years old, you have a loving wife, a family, all that copious sex, at least from what it looks like, doesn't seem to be a focus of yours or

something that you're seeking. But a lot of young men hearing the young you, they're like, I want that. So what would, how would you kind of like look at your life now and what would your message be to those guys? Because that's what a lot of guys are looking for. That's what a lot of guys want. So rather than sharing what my message would be, let me message Napoleon Hill and his conversation with the devil and outwitting the devil. Napoleon Hill's best book written in 1938, published in 2011 because the book was so edgy that his estate was like every person in the Hill genealogy has to die before this book gets published. So while everyone thinks his other book, Think and Grow Rich, was his first book, it was actually Outwitting the Devil. It was so extreme.

He's literally having a conversation with the devil. And if you're going to read Outwitting the Devil, you should do yourself a favor and download the audio and listen to it because Napoleon and the devil's voice are very different and you hear the bellowing voice of the devil and I will tell you the truth if only you address me as your highness. He goes, okay, your highness. So how do you control the thoughts of man? Well, and so there's a couple of times where he goes, so devil, he goes, I said your highness. Oh, I'm sorry, your highness. And so it's just really like cool banter between Napoleon Hill and the devil.

I'm getting goosebumps talking about it. I've read that book, listened to that book 19 times now. The only other book I've listened to so much is The Power of Myth by Joseph Campbell. But he talks about the drifter. Joseph Campbell. But he talks about the drifter. In life as men, we must either have definitiveness of purpose or we will drift through life trying to attach our belly button, our umbilical cord to everybody's belly button. So all these young men that are drifting through life and trying to attach their umbilical cord to the belly button of Andrew Tate and any other dude who – nothing wrong with Andrew Tate. I think he's a marketing fucking genius.

Oh, yeah. He has so many brilliant things to say. However, the devil will tell you that the drifter drifts for these three reasons. Overconsumption of food When we overconsume food Our body is unable to He says Process all that food and therefore It has to create poison and that poison has to

Show up in our Some of it is feces and urine but others It goes into our system This man is writing this in 1938 Causes toxicity And shows up in your bile Into your blood right and so fucking true It goes into our system. This man is writing this in 1938. It causes toxicity, yeah. It causes toxicity and shows up in your bile, into your blood, right? And it's so fucking true.

Like what we have studied today, he predicted back then, overconsumption of food, overconsumption of sex, overconsumption of sex because it will lose. Sex is a very powerful, drawing thing. However, a man can get consumed by it so much that he will lose his focus on his definitiveness of purpose. And in the absence of purpose, a man will dig holes in his life, no different than a German shepherd will dig holes in your backyard when it doesn't have a routine, when it doesn't have a sense of purpose, and you're not playing catch with it every day at the same time. I've got a German Shepherd. I know her name is Cookie. And so a man will dig holes in his life through infidelity, stress, anxiety, pornography, drugs, alcohol, vape pens, all these things, all these vices that control you when you are over sexed sex, just like a cocktail, you've got to have it as a reward. And you wouldn't just,

at least I would hope that you wouldn't just drink anything. Like I guess when I was younger, I was drinking Natty lights cause they were cheap. Speaking of Natty, did you hear that Michael Hearn is all natural? He's going to be here tomorrow. We can talk to him. That's right.

Please let him know. But, but today if I'm going to have a cocktail, man, I'm going to be here tomorrow we can talk to him yeah that's right please let him know but but today if i'm gonna have a cocktail man i'm gonna have i'm gonna have chopin vodka with like real fresh squeezed pineapple juice i'll have one cocktail maybe two if i'm feeling saucy and that's it that's it i'm not gonna wake up the hangover because it's fucking potato vodka it's like the good shit but i share that with you because over sexed, and I know this from firsthand experience, you just want more and more of it because it creates validation, creates approval. And then you lose track of what you're supposed to be doing, your defensiveness of purpose. And then when you're not fucking, you feel a sense of hollowness and emptiness. And that's where the anxiety, when there's a space in the man's heart of hollowness and

emptiness, it is only filled by anxiety and, you don't have purpose. And so it's overconsumption of food, overconsumption of sex, and then sharing your opinion when it's not asked for. When a man will constantly share his opinion when it is not asked for. He is seen as a weaker, attention-seeking, validation-needing man. And no man should be seen as that. So my opinion is it's unnecessary. And I speak from firsthand experience. And secondly, if our job of all men is to leave people better than we found them, and I really believe my job is to leave people better than we found them. And I really believe my job is to leave people better than I found them. I can tell you that there was one woman who two days after we had sex killed herself.

Not, not, not because of me. I don't think she apparently grabbed her boyfriend's gun and killed herself. Um, but I had no business fucking a woman that had a boyfriend, did I? So just because you can and you're a high-valued man, a high-valued man leaves people better than they found them. A high-valued man can control his consumption of everything. A high-valued man will live a life of definitiveness of purpose and not become a drifter who seeks to plug his umbilical cord into everybody else's belly button. Yeah, I think sometimes not acting on stuff is a very powerful thing that a man can demonstrate.

Somebody does get loud, somebody does get charged up, and you don't kick their ass because there's no threat. There's not a reason to, but you could, right? I think there's like other situations, um, where it doesn't make sense to abuse that power or, uh, high powered men that, um, uh, we'll take advantage of their situation, uh, with women and we'll take advantage of wherever they can, you know, take advantage wherever they can. And it's like, well, from what I've seen, I've always admired the guys that I, that I think are showing the constraint.

You're like, oh man, that girl's really sweating that guy. But he's like, he's, you know, I don't know what he's doing behind closed doors, but it's looking like he's keeping it together. And it looks like he's playing it cool. And you respect that guy. He's not putting on any vibes. No, not only do I respect him, those are my favorite people yeah 100 yeah same exactly um i guess uh i'm trying to figure out how to formulate this into a question but i guess i'll just ask for motivation for people because through your project you're explaining how you're

trying to turn these traumas from mountains into speed bumps. But when you're saying that you were about to seek therapy, that you're like, I don't have a problem. Like, no, that's for fucked up people. So I know that there's going to be a lot of people that are like, oh, yeah, I got some shit, but it's not that big of a deal. And then it's like, well, if I address it, I'm going to have to walk through molasses. Like, that sounds even worse than what I'm dealing with right now.

Sure. It's going to be uglier before it gets better. So how can you like, yeah, like I said, motivate somebody to kind of work their shit out. So I have a high amount of optimism in me, but I'm predisposed to being a pessimistic, bitter human.

I woke up, I wake up every morning angry and bitter and pessimistic. I listen, I have Jack, Jack Johnson, uh, radio always pulled up on Pandora. That's some happy music. Yep. I send out three gratitude text messages first thing in the morning after I don't hit the

snooze button. So don't hit the snooze button at 530 when I wake up. Turn on Jack Johnson on my iPhone, which forces my wife to get up. Send out three gratitude text messages. Chug-a-lug 30 ounces of water because Shawn Stevenson said so, and then shit, shower, and shave. And then I go downstairs by 6.30, so one hour. Later I'm downstairs working on my laptop on my GSD list,

get shit done list that I made the night before. That is it. That is my routine. So my pessimism is going to shine right now. As I tell you this, I'm convinced that we all play a role, but we're not really changing the world. I'm changing the men that are going to change during my generation. And as I move on and die, whoever steps into my shoes will change the men of that generation. And then you'll change them the way you're supposed to and the way you're

supposed to and the way you're supposed to. No different than that parable that went something like this, I'm going to slaughter it. But this old guy, he's walking along the beach and he sees that the tide has brought up all these jellyfish. There's all these thousands of jellyfish just slapping around on the sand, trying to gasp for air. And he's frantically just grabbing jellyfish and throwing it back in the water, throwing it back in the water,

and throwing it back in the water. This other guy who's jogging by stops and he goes, dude, what are you doing? There's no way you're going to be able to save all of these jellyfish. Just stop. It is futile. He goes, but I saved those jellyfish. And so there is no motivation I can give to every man. The man, the men, the handful of men, the hundreds of men who need to hear this have heard this and they will do as they must. They will go walk through the molasses and things will get uglier and you might end up divorced. You might end up in a better marriage like I did on the back end of this. But you have to do the work. So there's no motivation I can give.

I can tell you that I'm playing a role in life. This is my role during the time that I'm on this planet. I can't save every jellyfish, but I've saved those jellyfish. Those jellyfish matter to me. And the ones listening to this, you know who you are, you feel the gnawing in your gut that fuck, I think he's talking to me. So I should probably just maybe try out a couple sessions. And if you do, don't do one a month, go one a week and give it at least four sessions. And if you think they're not a good therapist, trust your

gut, trust your radiance and go find a better therapist. And if you're a guy listening to this, work with a guy and not a woman, because a understands a guy. We're wired a certain way. And beyond that, I don't – most guys will just justify. Well, I don't think I need it. Pedro sounds a little weak. He sounds a little soft. Cool. That's okay too, man.

I'm 48. I don't give a fuck. We were talking in the gym and you mentioned something that happened earlier in the project, but you also kind of alluded to how the, I don't know if it was your thoughts or the words that you say just are a really big deal and how you kind of guard those. I don't know if you could kind of tell us or retell the story of what happened and what you came to. Yeah, yeah, yeah. So this is how powerful the universe is, man. Whenever thoughts you think, good or bad, which is why I know I wake up angry, bitter, and pessimistic, I know that I will bring bitterness and anger and pessimism and bad things into my life if I keep in that state.

So I've got a routine, a rule. My whole life is based on rules, rituals, and routines. That's it. The three R's is what I live by. I'm a fucking robot. Like I will get in my car right now and fucking go to my hotel and work. That's what I will do. And cause you didn't want to have lunch with me. Kettlebells, fucking kettlebells, whatever. Want to stay and do kettlebells? No, I don't want to do fucking kettlebells, bro. Can you fucking attach the two kettlebells with

a barbell in the middle? Then we can talk. I'm kidding. Kettlebells are awesome. Don't fucking send me messages. I love kettlebells. Anyhow, I lost my fucking train of thought. Rules, routines, rituals. Rules, routines, rituals is what I live by. I think the safest thing, the best thing a man could do is to create his own set of rules, routines, and rituals that will then embody your core values and your character. And you will then live as a role model to society. I probably make more impact on people's lives outside of the

project just because of how I carry myself. Like what you see is what you get on social media. If I'm angry, uh, I will put up a angry post, uh post talking about how I don't feel like working out. This fucking sucks. I'm sitting in my car, da-da-da-da. And people are like, oh, my God, I feel the same way. And some of my friends who are like big-time celebrities that you see on sitcoms and TV shows and movies, they won't comment. And they'll text me like, bro, I feel exactly like that right now. I'm sitting in New York.

I don't want to fucking work out. And so like when you are so tuned in, when you're so dialed into your radiance, your gut, oh, I know what we were talking about. The universe, right? Your radiance, your gut. We were talking about 2020 and Fit Body Bootcamp. So I have this franchise. I used to be the CEO of it. I'm now the founder and president of Fit Body Bootcamp. Bryce is the CEO. We've got an awesome CEO in place. And we've got hundreds of locations across two countries, Canada and US. We're about to blow up in some other countries as well. But 2020 was not good to a franchise gym, as you guys know. And on March 16th, 2020, I announced to all Fit Body Bootcamp franchise owners that let's shut down and flatten the curve for the next two weeks. That was the plan.

curve over the next two weeks. That was the plan. As I saw that this lockdown, this pandemic is going to go on beyond two weeks, beyond two months, I was like, hey guys, I suggest you open up and start training people, but sanitize them and train in place. And we created a whole protocol, et cetera. Nevertheless, over the next 10 months in 2020, we lost 218 locations out of 800 at the time. So almost a quarter. Keep in mind, each of those locations pay us $1,800 a month in franchise royalty fees. So if you do the math, you could see financially how much I got hit in the shorts. That put me into a place of like, holy fuck, this sucks.

Like this is not, I'm experiencing a very bad time right now. I've matured enough to know that it wasn't having a bad life. I was having a bad few months. Nevertheless, having stacked a lot of few months like that in 2020 together really does a lot of wear and tear. And so I remember for a brief moment, late May, as we started losing franchise locations, I felt sorry for myself. And I'm like, fuck, what else can go wrong? Well, two weeks later, early June, we had class five of the project. And the universe said, let me show you what can go wrong.

At hour number 29, a dude died during the project. So now all of a sudden I'm like, you know what? Ask and you shall receive. I asked the universe because I felt pity for myself. I felt bad for myself. What else can go wrong? I'm losing all these franchise locations. And now a guy died at the project.

Now we got the coroner's report and as it turns out, he had an enlarged heart, 26% larger than the average heart. He didn't know. The family didn't know. No one knew. He could have ran a marathon and probably died. But the point is that which you think about, you will manifest in your life. And I had to be reminded of that because I was going through a moment of pity and feeling bad for myself because truly Fit Body Bootcamp, I spent a decade up to

that point building Fit Body Bootcamp only to see it crumbling in front of me in a 10-month period. And so when I asked what can go wrong, the universe showed me. And I said, you know what? Fuck you, Bedros, for asking. Go back to serving humanity. If you lose all of Fit Body Boot Camp, you will rebuild it when the opportunity is right. Thankfully, we didn't lose it. By beginning of 2021, we started the rebuild process. And today, we have more locations than we did when we started losing locations in March of 2020, um, or not March, May of 2020. So, but the universe will always conspire to give you that, what you think about, it will conspire with you to give you that,

what you think about. So be careful, the words you use and the thoughts that you have and the people that you surround yourself with. Well, I'm curious about this because it does seem inevitable because you said you kind of wake up a certain way anyway. So like it does seem inevitable that these thoughts are going to come like at some point. So when you have a thought, do you just immediately fight against that thought? No. Something negative I make.

No. When I have a negative thought, I can't fight against it. What I can, what I do is I learned this from Brian Tracy. You know what's great about being stupid? I'm a pretty stupid dude. Like, I still don't even know why I need to drink 30 ounces of water. Literally, Shawn Stevenson said so. Right? He's like, first thing in the morning, bro, drink 30 ounces of water. Okay, Shawn, got it.

Right? For all I know, he's poisoning me to death. Like, they're drowning in fresh water every morning. You know, and if I die, I fucking blame him. If I die of overhydration, I want you to fucking find sean stevenson and whack him he's in encino california i love that guy he's a good dude we were just at his birthday party turned 40 looks like he's fucking 30 uh anyhow black don't crack apparently yeah yeah uh fuck

bro what was your question adderall's wearing off when you because inevitably you do have a negative thought here. Yes. Do you fight it? I don't fight it because I don't know how to be like, no, no, you're a good human. No, no, you're going to do a good thing. I've tried that. It doesn't work.

And I tried meditation. Meditation doesn't do anything for me. What I do do is what I learned from Brian Tracy. Ignorance is bliss for me because Brian Tracy is like, hey, when I'm in a bad mood, I stand in the corner, jump up and down and say, I like myself. I like myself. I like myself. I like myself. I like myself. So you know what? Whenever I do have the thoughts and Jack Johnson is playing in the background, I'm literally – I slide the bathroom door closed because I don't want my wife to see.

I'm fucking naked as my cock is slapping around everywhere. And I'm having a – if I'm having a negative thought, I'm literally staying in front of the toilet before walking into the bathroom saying, I like myself. I like myself. I like myself. And so you can't help it. You are forced to smile when you say something so stupid while jumping up and down. Especially if you're naked. Especially if your cock's really flopping around.

You really like yourself a lot. Right, right. Thankfully, I'm hung like a Tic Tac, so it's just like that. Yeah, yeah. But it worked. I've been doing this since I read it in a fucking book, bro. 1997, 1998. And that was like my first tool that I'd gotten, right?

It was that and then I had gotten some like some dubbed DVDs of Tony Robbins off of eBay for nine bucks, right? And I still feel like I owe Tony Robbins like whatever the case of fucking DVDs would have costed because somebody sold me some dubbed DVDs. But like I just take tools from people who are far smarter, smarter than me. And I fucking add them to my arsenal. The whole gratitude text messages. Again, when you wake up bitter and angry at the world, best thing to do is remember just three people that have been good to you in your life and just send them a gratitude text message. It's like, oh yeah, well, that's not that bad after all. And then the most selfish thing happens sometime throughout the day. They text you back saying, dude, thank you so much. I needed to hear that. So I'm guaranteed,

even if my day goes to shit, three people are going to tell me I was really good to them by sending that. Like I'm guaranteed three good things every day because I put out three gratitude text messages. So it is also the most selfish thing I do. But I haven't been able to talk my way out of negativity. I'm able to laugh my way out of negativity, sing my way out of it. Music really has a big impact on me. Maybe some people can journal their way out of it. That works for you. That's a great tool. Use it. Some people can meditate their way out of it. Use it. I found that music and also laughter really helped me turn the tide from pessimism to optimism. What kind of rules you got with your food and with training so you don't get fat? Yeah. So with food, it's three protein shakes a day and two whole meals.

The middle of the day whole meal is Habit salad from Habit, the fast food restaurant. Chicken Caesar salad with double chicken, no croutons, Caesar dressing on the side. And then at night, whatever my wife makes, and she knows to keep it low carb. But it's basically, I guess, what is it called? Revert back carb loading? Carb back loading. That. It's that.

Because I found that I like carbs at night because I've got kids. We sit down. We watch Abby Lee Miller. Do you know who she is? No. Dance Moms. Dance Moms? I've never seen it. That fucking woman named Abby Lee Miller has this dance place in Philadelphia where little girls learn how to dance. And then she just fucking tears the moms up to pieces. And somehow it's funny. I'm probably contributing to child abuse also by watching that.

But we watch that. And if Chloe's like, hey, dad, I'm going to make a fucking dessert. I'm going to be like, yeah, baby, I'm going to eat it. So I learned, again, rules and rituals. to eat it. So I learned again, rules and rituals. If I keep all protein shakes and a chicken Caesar salad in the daytime, then I can have carbs at night and not feel guilty and not be like, oh, you guys eat this while I eat this. Like that's fucking lame, bro. I got a wife and kids, you know? Yeah. You want to participate in what everyone else is doing. Yeah. So that's my routine for eating. And then when I travel, my routine is always be hungry. Like literally,

like I fast, like right now I'm fasted. And after this, I'll break my fast. Whether I'm traveling to do a podcast, TV show or stage thing, I really believe if you speak when you're hungry, there's something powerful about like, hey man, stay hungry, stay hungry, be hungry, right? I do believe our senses are heightened when we're hungry. And then if I'm, if I've eaten, even if I've had my protein shake before I flew, I don't have the killer instinct. I'm not ready to hunt. I'm not going to deliver for you. And so I have a routine when I travel as well. Um, and I'll have the Uber pull over at a store. I'll get my waters, I'll get my fucking berries and then i'll eat the way i normally do otherwise but then my training is trained twice a day um first one is selfish

first thing in the morning on my own and i'll go across the street tyla park and i'll walk three miles not run walk three miles not listen to a podcast either yours or joe rogan or um a podcast, either yours or Joe Rogan or, um, um, whatever podcast that actually lately it's been a lot of, uh, Jordan Peterson as well. He's fucking awesome. But, um, and then at night I work out, me and the family go to the gym, go to my gym, BK strength, and we just have a fucking, me and my son beasted out while my daughter and Chloe do their own workout together. And it's just really cool to see that. And they've built this habit in them where my wife says, Hey, even when you're traveling,

kids make me take them to the gym. And I'm like, cool. Like what a great way to build a habit in them. You got any rules around your phone or around social media stuff? Like try not to be on there too long and things like that. Yes. Turn off all notifications on my phone from social media. Um, all notifications, like there's nothing, and I love Gary Vaynerchuk, there's nothing that Gary Vaynerchuk is going to say or anybody else or Ed Milet or Andy Frisella, or I'm going to say that you should have your notifications on for. There isn't. You should only be notified by your radiance on what you are doing next, your gut telling

you what you should do next. If a notification pops up and you're doing something so important to move your life and your life's mission forward and a notification pops up that Pedro said something on social media, you ought to go look at it. Then I just fucking own your brain. You don't. And so that's my rule. Uh, if you notice nothing's beeped and text and whatever, I also keep my text messages, notifications off simply because I am susceptible to messages as well. And so if I see screen flashing, I'm going to stop writing or doing to check that. And then where social media is concerned, I'm a 90-10 kind of guy. I will create 90% of the content, consume 10%. So I will never follow more than 500 people. So I literally unfollow people and they get butt hurt. But it's like, well, I needed never follow more than 500 people so I literally unfollow people and they get butt hurt

but it's like well I needed to follow this guy because now they're interesting to me more than you are but they were going to be 501 and I can't do that so I have to get rid of you since you haven't posted for a while it's funny they don't post

motherfuckers don't post bro for like months but then they're like aware the moment you unfollow like they get a note is that fucking crazy? like bitch ass motherfucker this dude's putting great content aware the moment you unfollow. Is that fucking crazy? Bitch ass motherfucker.

This dude's putting great content that's serving my life. You need like an app or something to figure out if someone unfollowed you or something like that. They have an app. Okay. So what motherfucker hasn't posted for six months but has the app,

probably the premium version of that app, where it's like immediately they're notified when fucking B doesn't, like, get the fuck off my job. It not only says he unfollowed, but it says why. Yeah, that's right.

And by the way, it'll always be people that actually have my number. So it's like, bro, you can text me. Yeah. We're friends. Who the fuck gives a shit about social media?

You know what I mean? But anyway, they get ass hurt, but even that's a rule. I won't follow more than 500. What about the comments and stuff like that? They throw you off sometimes? You're like,

oh, fuck this. Does it mess with you much? No. They used to. You know what's great about getting older? You just run. I'm fresh out of fucks.

You just run out of fucks, bro. People are like, you Trump-loving Republican. And I see it. I'm like, whatever. They're like, Biden's the best. OK, cool. Whatever, bro. I can pay $8 a gallon.

I don't give a fuck. I got like fucking super trucks that get like eight miles to the gallon. I don't give a fuck. Inflation doesn't bother me. I got more fucking, I got double glass doors from my gym so I could see my cars in the back of my fucking garage. You think I give a fuck? I'm worried for you

about the fucking car. I wish we had the rich bitch sound. You know what I mean? Oh, yeah. So, anyways, but gone are the days where I give a shit about the comments when people call me a conservative and this. And my son actually for a while was like, dad, you're very right wing. I'm like, bro, they should legalize prostitution. They should legalize cocaine. They should legalize fucking abortion because a fucking chick should make her own decisions.

He's like, holy fuck, you're middle of the road. I'm like, yeah, but also when you legalize all that, tax the fuck out of it. Stop taxing me. I got shit to do with my money. Like I got to buy those lifts where you could fucking have a car up here and one under there. Yeah. That shit costs money, bro. Fucking A, man.

Yeah, you need to have a car for each day of the week. There's seven days in the week. It's like that's a lot of days. Yeah. It's a lot. He didn't create the week. It just happened. It just happened. It's not lot of days. He didn't create the week. It just happened. It just happened.

It's not your fault. How can people, like what's kind of a simple tip for some people to lean in and to figure out where they can make their money in their life? Oh, man, that's the easiest answer. And sometimes simple doesn't work for people because the human mind wants to complicate things because making money must be complicated. No, it's easy. Figure out what you're really good at solving. Like there's got to be a problem that you're good at solving. And if you're like, holy fuck, man, I'm a lame bitch and I can't solve anything.

And first, go slap your mom and dad for not teaching you any skills. Secondly, learn to solve something. YouTube will teach you for free. But once you learn to solve something, offer that to people who have the problem and then charge them for it. That's literally it. All my companies, Fit Body Bootcamp, Trulene, The Project, my $100,000 a year coaching program, my $25,000 half day, four hour coaching session with me. Every fucking thing I do, the apparel company, we solve problems that people have in exchange for money. It's just that

simple. And then people go, yeah, but the American dream is dead. I know how to solve a problem. And I know there's people that have the problem, but competition. I'm like, wait a minute. American dream is dead. The barrier to the American dream is lower than it ever has been, bro. I'm an immigrant and I came to this country and there was no social media. I had to learn the language, understand the culture, solve problems, and then sell it without social media. You don't even have to go into work. Right. Right. All you do is you take this goofy little fucking phone you have and you make a how-to video every single day, even on the days I don't feel like it. Yes. Even on the days you don't feel like it, you make a how-to video. Well, that's hard. What if you don't feel like it? How

do you motivate yourself? You don't. You fuck. You get disciplined. And so you make a how-to video. Well, that's hard. What if you don't feel like it? How do you motivate yourself? You don't. You fuck. You get disciplined. And so you make a how-to video every single day, whether it's how to do underwater basket weaving. You know, as my friend Wes Watson says, he goes, if you were passionate about a plastic bottle, plastic bottles are bad. They're bad for the economy. They're bad for the fucking world thing. They're bad for landfills.

And they have, what's the chemical in it? Phthalates. BPA. Yeah. They have the whole fucking alphabet. And they have, what's the chemical in it? Phthalates. BPA. Yeah, they have the whole fucking alphabet and so when you drink, you fucking take the poisons in, right?

You talk about plastic bottles enough and you will have like 100,000 followers in a year who hate plastic bottles as much as you and they will have you come to their companies to consult them

on how to get rid of plastics. They'll have you come and talk at an event that's anti-plastic and you're making a shit ton of money about plastic bottles. The problem is people just do it when they feel like it. So if you make enough how-to content where you add value based on the solution that you

provide to the problem that society has, this fucking technology that TikTok and Instagram and Facebook and YouTube has will literally find your demographics and they will follow you and you do it long enough and they start seeing you as a demographics and they will follow you and you do it long enough and they start seeing you as a specialist and then you keep doing it. They see you as an expert and then you keep doing it. They see you as an authority. And before you know it, you're like, I can also coach you or I have a course if you want

to buy it. And then they start buying your shit and that's how you make money. Like that's how easy it is. Like it will find your audience for you. But people are too fucking lame because I don't feel like making a video today because I feel a little anxious. Fuck you, bro.

Like go to fucking Russia where I came from and like wait in line for six hours for moldy bread. And so that someone can tell you that it's unavailable in the snow, by the way, and then see if you're anxious. Like that's, that's right. Or have water rations.

Like we had fucking water rationed, bro. Like when you grow up like in fucking, in the Soviet Union, in Armenia, where water is rationed, electricity is rationed, food is rationed. And then you come to the United States stage of six only to experience section eight housing where the black gangs and the Mexican gangs are beating up on the foreigners because they're like, they were fighting each other until they're like, we don't fucking recognize you. You're a foreigner with funny clothes and a funny haircut. We got to fight you. And then you're eating out of dumpsters because your parents can't afford to buy food and keep the power on in this fucking section eight housing. And there I had lice, bro.

They washed my hair with gasoline because my parents couldn't afford a lice treatment. My mom had my dad siphon out gasoline from a fucking ford ltd he siphoned out gasoline in a fucking plastic jar my mom washed my hair with it because we can afford life like deal with real adversity and then tell me how anxious you are about making a fucking how-to video for instagram bro yeah do you think it's harder to uh do you think it's harder for a person to get themselves really lean let's say be under 10 body fat and be jacked or is it harder for somebody to be a millionaire oh i think i mean obviously it probably depends on the person. It depends on the person. But I would say for most people, I think it'd be harder to keep themselves under 10%. I really do.

Because it is so easy to eat food. I met these two scientists. I met these two scientists. They work for Doritos. Their job is to figure out how a Dorito chip can, how it breaks down in your mouth to tantalize the taste buds so that you'll grab another one. So they got scientists working for them. Like you're fucked.

You're fucked. Like McDonald's has figured out like inflation goes up. Biden's like fucking everything's going to cost a bunch. And McDonald's is like, Hey, everything's still 99 cents. And you're like, fuck,

I've got to go through the McDonald's drive through, right? These fucking civilians have to drive through the McDonald's because they're afraid to fucking make money. But I do, that's why I believe it's harder for people to stay fit and athletic and healthy and practice good mental, emotional, physical hygiene.

It's easier for them to just stay fat and bro, fat women are attractive apparently. They got fucking, what's it called, where you fucking pay the only fans. Yeah. Fat chicks, fat dudes, fucking, I's it called, where you fucking pay the OnlyFans. Yeah. And make some money. Fat chicks, fat dudes. I know a bunch of fucking people making 15 Gs or more on OnlyFans.

And they hit every fucking branch on the ugly tree on the way down. And I'm not judging. I'm no fucking Brad Pitt myself. But I'm just telling you it's easier to make money these days than to stay lean. I'm curious about this. Within the project, there's a martial arts component. You mentioned the, what are those called? Pugil sticks.

Pugil sticks. And then there's also grappling. And I'm curious because, you know, you mentioned that physicality leads into personal development. And a lot of guys, they go to the gym, they get fit, they run, they do a lot of things. But how important do you think it is for men to have a martial arts component or that a fighting component into in their routine as they continue to develop do you think it's necessary or do you think it's just something you should try and experience and keep on whatever i think i think you should probably try and experience you don't necessarily have to go and become a black belted jujitsu or or fucking muay thai or whatever but you should have enough skills so that if you find yourself

on an intersection or in an airplane thinking somebody should do something about that and you're a grown ass man and you can't do it, you're a fucking asshole. You know what I mean? So I did not, I had six weeks of MMA training, bro. This is before I even did jujitsu. I had six weeks of MMA training and I didn't want my wife and kids to die, nor did I want all the other motherfuckers with their iPhones up to die. Um, so I was like, I guess I got to do something because Aaron would be disappointed if I didn't. Right. And let's see if this fucking thing really

works. And it did. Um, so by no means, like I love lifting weights. Like I'm just a meathead. Like we can lift weights and go eat all day long. Like I will never give that up. In fact, when I did the jujitsu challenge,'m like listen just so you know i say this with respect i know you can kill me but i love lifting weights like that is my life it is good for my sanity it is good for my physique jujitsu i can take or leave and so please make sure that i can my shoulders are fine my knees are fine i could squat i could deadlift i could fucking bench like okay cool no worries and even then i was all fucked up for those six weeks because it's three times a week for six weeks.

And then I brought in a fucking Brown belt to fuck, fuck around with me and treat me like his bitch. Uh, but anyway, I started again in November and I'm excited for it. Okay. Shit. Um,

so I know this could go down another like really, really long section of the podcast, but when it comes to your kids, um, like I told you before we started, uh, my daughter's 14 and we're doing a really good job with her. My son is one and a half.

So I have a completely fresh start with him. And I'm also a different person now than I was going on 10 years ago when I met my daughter. So I'm a lot smarter now. So I feel like I have a little bit more ammo and a little bit more tools to raise a strong young man. But I'm also more successful now. And I don't want to fuck him up, you know, because we have a lot more things now. A lot more stuff. How can I make sure that I raise a strong, respectful young man?

That's a really good question. And I happen to know the answer for this one because I've been able to raise a young man who just went through it. And I was telling these guys earlier without getting into details, he just went through a little, a little journey of being a jerk because he's 16 and, but he learned a great lesson at, in school when you shouldn't just because you know how to fight, you shouldn't start a fight, uh, unless it's justified. And it wasn't, uh, that fight would have been justified off campus when there was no cameras. That's a different story.

But one, start by reading a great book called Raising a Modern Day Knight. Wonderful book. And my wife's uncle gave me that book when my wife was pregnant with Andrew. And then I'm going to find another book for you here to read. Wild at Heart by John Eldredge is the other book you want to read.

And John Eldredge talks about that every man, since he's a little boy until we become an old man, we always need an adventure to have, a battle to fight, and a beauty to rescue. And nothing could be more true. And every young boy is looking for his dad to say one thing, you have what it takes. When a boy has not heard that from his dad, you have what it takes. He will walk around in life looking for validation and approval from the opposite sex or from these false alpha males who beat their chest on social media and he will go walking around. This brings a full circle.

He will try and take his umbilical cord and try and stick it to every other fake alphas, fake daddies umbilical cord so that he can get their validation approval. But in all, you know, I tell these guys, look, getting ready for the project, you have an adventure to have. Like you're getting ready for an adventure because you're like, man, I felt like I was never more alive than when I was prepping for the project. And then, of course, you're an entrepreneur, so you're always finding a battle. But then you started disregarding your wife and just taking her for granted. There's no beauty to rescue. And before you know it, because you're ugly but you make money, chick starts looking at you and you're like, sup girl, forgetting that you

have a woman at home that you fucking would have fallen over before to date you. Let's not forget something that you didn't pick your parents. You didn't pick your siblings. You don't even pick the kids that you have. Like I didn't specifically pick Andrew and Chloe. They were born to us. Only one person in life that you pick, that is your wife. And then you fucking disregard her. And so if you can always have an adventure to have, a battle to fight and a beauty to rescue. And for me, every Wednesday night, I'm rescuing that beauty. That's my wife, man. During the whole week, we're texting back and forth. I'm like, you're just going to love where I'm taking you to dinner on Wednesday night. Cause Wednesday night is date night for us. You're texting back and forth. I'm like, you're just going to love where I'm taking you to dinner on Wednesday night

because Wednesday night is date night for us. You're going to love it, and it's going to be amazing. Tell me where we're going. Tell me what is at stake. Is it seafood? Fuck you, woman. I'm not going to tell you. You know, right?

Send her flowers and all this shit. And by the way, how easy is it to tell your assistant, hey, send my girl flowers, right? And if you're like, I ain't got an assistant. Well, guess what, motherfucker? Get rich and get an assistant. Or if you ain't got an assistant, that means you don't make enough money. If you don't make enough money, that means you have a lot of time. For a moment, pull your fucking pants

up from all that Pornhub bullshit and go on 1-800-Flowers.com and order your lady some flowers. Because if you ain't got money, you got time, bro. And if you got money, then you ain't got time. And in my case, I got two assistants. I got fucking Shelby and Joan who have to fucking do the assistant shit. Right? i can text them what i want them to write on the

fucking roses that show up so anyways raising a modern day knight wild at heart and then the other component there is find the men who are like raising sons the way you would want to raise yours and be like bro tell me what you're doing. Let me just be within their proximity. Proximity is very powerful because you will learn, as Ed Milet says, the better things are caught than taught. And if I hang around with a good dad long enough, I don't know what to ask you about how you parent, but I could just watch and observe and see how you parent and then therefore replicate that. And those are the only three things you need. And the fourth thing would be follow your radiance, bro, as you become more intelligent, as you become more self-aware.

Like I had a talk with Andrew a couple of years ago because he mentioned that under his breath. He's like, boy, I see how you're more patient with Chloe than you are with me. I'm like, son, you're right. You and Chloe are two years apart. You're older than her. Um, and I was not as evolved with you. You're right. I am more patient with Chloe and I'm so sorry for that. And I do wonder if that's left any kind of fucking animosity towards me. And if it has some laid on me and we had a tough talk and he fucking laid it on me. It's like, yeah, what about the time when you're all angry and you smash my fucking iPad? It's like, yeah, you're right. I'm so sorry for that.

I shouldn't have. Because with Chloe, I just would have taken away her iPad. You know? And so, but I'm also willing to say I'm sorry. I'm also willing to say, yeah, you're right. So part of it is follow your radiance. Put your ego aside. Listen to good men and read those two books.

You'll do just fine. your radiance, put your ego aside, listen to good men and read those two books. You'll do just fine. And he's still going to end up either beating someone up or taking a toot from a vape pen or whatever, because that's also what fucking boys do. Got it. Take us out of here, Andrew. Absolutely. Thank you everybody for checking out today's episode. Please drop us some comments down below before you guys head out and also hit that like button and subscribe if you guys are not subscribed already. Please follow the podcast at mb power project on instagram tiktok and twitter my instagram tiktok and twitter is at i am andrew z and sema where you at make sure to comment if you like this episode because i know you guys did a lot of good stuff go to discord too it's in the

description at and see my ending on instagram and youtube and see my yin yang on tiktok and twitter where can people find everything you do uh Best place to find me is at Instagram. Bedros Koulian. Don't you have a new show coming out too? I heard. Yes. Yeah, I did retire the Empire Show. If you want a master's degree in entrepreneurship and making a shit ton of money, listen to the Empire Show. 229 episodes

of amazing business growth and business development wrapped up with self-development. But I retired the Empire Show two months ago and October 4th, thank you for reminding me, we drop The Bedros Kulian Show, which is me ranting about anything that I find interesting from all the different fluids that we

pump out in the human body. I've identified 14 so far. All the way to, yeah, we're fucking gross by the way. You know how fucking gross we are, bro? Spit. Fucking pus. Cum. Blood. Sweat, all these oils. We're fucking nasty. But anyways, and then we hug and we hold hands.

Yeah, he's getting turned on. So anyway, I'll talk about the fucking nastiest things, and I'll talk about it from suicide to fitness to whatever the fuck I want. Because I've evolved, and so the show has evolved. It'll be the Bedros Kulian Show October 4th. Thank you for reminding me. What's this a ranch with Dan Fleischman? What do you guys plan on doing with it? Oh, so we, uh, so Dan and I, Dan texted me one day and he was, Hey man, what if we ran something like the project, but nobody dies, nobody rings a bell. They're entrepreneurs and they learn how to become like James Bond and Jason Bourne from like Navy

Seals and Green Berets, like Tim Kennedy and, and, and UFC Navy SEALs and Green Berets like Tim Kennedy and UFC fighters like Michael Chandler. I'm like, shoot, well, we know all those guys. I'll round them up and I'll say, you guys are going to teach these entrepreneurs. We got 20 entrepreneurs together for three days and they learned everything. So they learned how to be awesome. And then at night we would have dinners and that was called Operation Blacksite. At night we would have dinners and talk about business networking. So Dan lived in Hollywood up until recently. And Hollywood is a mess because it is right now.

I'm like, bro, you got to leave Hollywood. Move to Chino Hills where I live or somewhere in the suburbs. So I'm like, dude, what if we buy a ranch, call it Blacksite Ranch. We run more Operation Blacksites. I need to run – I'm going to run bigger project classes. I can run project classes there. We can have Airbnbs there, our own outdoor shooting range. Your wife loves horses and saving animals. And so we bought this beautiful ranch in Temecula, California, 26 acres, Black Site Ranch. And we're about to get crazy with it. Yeah, it's going to be fucking awesome. Awesome. Thank you for your time today. Always appreciate it.

Thank you for the opportunity. I'm at Mark Smelly Bell. Strength is never weakness. Weakness is never strength. Catch you guys later. Bye. Thank you so much. Damn! Yes, sir. Appreciate it. No!