The Berman Method
The Berman Method
Episode #193: Is Your Quality of Life Negotiable?
Most of us envision our future selves as stronger and more mobile than we currently are—a cognitive illusion that leaves us woefully unprepared for the realities of aging. In this thought-provoking episode, Dr. Jake and Jenni Berman, PA-C challenge listeners to establish concrete health standards that will determine their quality of life as they age.
Drawing from their recent observations at a family reunion, the Bermans contrast the remarkable mobility of an 83-year-old aunt who prioritizes daily movement with others who've gradually declined like "frogs in slowly boiling water"—unaware of their deterioration until basic functions become challenges. The key difference? Non-negotiable health standards that preserve strength, balance, and independence.
The conversation goes beyond surface-level fitness advice to address a fundamental mindset shift: moving from treating exercise as optional to making it non-negotiable. Through compelling examples from Fortune 500 CEOs who universally exercise first thing in the morning to practical strategies for meal preparation, the Bermans provide actionable insights for maintaining functionality throughout life.
Whether you're currently struggling with mobility issues or planning ahead for healthy aging, this episode offers a wake-up call about the gap between our idealized future selves and the daily habits required to actually become that person. What small health standard will you make non-negotiable today? Share your commitment with us—we want to hear what this episode inspired you to change.
This is the Berman Method podcast, featuring Dr Jake Berman and physician assistant Jenny Berman. We are here to treat problems and not symptoms. Disclaimer this podcast is for entertainment purposes only and not to treat anyone or to give medical advice. If you are interested in any information that we are giving and would like to use this for yourself, we recommend that you contact your primary care physician or reach out to us and ask us questions about yourself specifically. Enjoy.
Speaker 2:And we're rolling baby with the Berman Method podcast. Dr Jake Berman here with my beautiful co-host.
Speaker 1:Jenny Berman, physician assistant.
Speaker 2:What is happening? We are, david, going against Goliath. Goliath being the corporate medical system, big pharma, your health insurance company. They do not have your best interests in mind. They will choose profits over patient outcomes every single time. The population is getting smarter. We are doing more and more research and you are starting to learn that you know what there is another way. Maybe Western medicine isn't perfect most of the time.
Speaker 1:Absolutely, and investing in your health to actually get the answers that you want and the longevity that's probably the biggest mindset shift that people are starting to have.
Speaker 2:Is we don't even think about it? You know we're. So what is the right word? Groomed or I don't know. It's such a normal part of living that we'll go out to dinner and spend. You can't go out to dinner without spending 200 bucks anymore. Right. Especially if you got kids. Like you just can't do it Right. Unless you're going to Chipotle or something else, You're not going out for a decent meal of food and leaving there for under 200 bucks.
Speaker 1:Right, you're just not and you're just doing it. You're going out every Friday, saturday night, swiping the card, putting it on the tab.
Speaker 2:Well, it's me and you are doing that.
Speaker 1:A lot of people.
Speaker 2:How many other people are doing it? Monday, Tuesday, Thursday, Friday, Saturday, Sunday.
Speaker 1:Multiple nights a week as opposed to just two.
Speaker 2:Yes, yeah, and at the end of one week you've spent a minimum of $1,000. So we're talking $4,000 a month, $50,000 a year, minimum on going out to eat, right right, but you're gonna balk at Jake's prices when it's X amount to fix your chronic back pain. That gives you a chance to avoid surgery and pain pills and live the highest quality of life. Well, you know, you're starting to not balk because you're starting to realize that, oh, maybe I should be spending money on my health care. Maybe my health insurance is not going to cover something that's proactive and even something that's reactive.
Speaker 1:Well, and even still, if they are covering something like the physical therapy that they're covering, you still have your co-pays of $60 per visit, and then you end up going three times a week forever, so you're still paying money to not get results. So then you've paid all this money and you're not any better, as opposed to paying a little bit higher prices and actually seeing some change.
Speaker 2:And it's not so much just the monetary value that you've lost. Correct, it's time.
Speaker 1:The time, the quality of life.
Speaker 2:How much time are you losing going to the shitty cookie cutters are us and trying their crappy assembly line program?
Speaker 1:It's three months minimum most likely six months Right right To have no improvement and you're actually regressing and not progressing in your quality of life and your abilities.
Speaker 2:And this goes back to the person that's 70 years old. You know not to be grim or bleak or whatever the word is. How many months do you realistically have left, right, if you're 70 years old? Realistically, how many months do you realistically have left If you're 70 years old? Realistically, how many months do you have left Now? You just wasted six of them going to some crappy insurance-based rehab clinic because you don't want to pay out of pocket. It's not that you're financially strapped, you're not worried about paying your bills, you can pay your bills. It's not that you're financially strapped. You're not worried about paying your bills, you can pay your bills. It's just this mental block that you can't get over, where you're so stuck in your old ways where it's like, no, I've got Medicare and they better pay for it. Damn it, right, right. No, I've got this amazing secondary, so I don't pay for anything.
Speaker 1:Okay, well those days are gone. Right right, your time is money at this point, yeah.
Speaker 2:So one of the things that we wanted to get on today is we just got back from a family reunion and it was great Saw some family members that we have not seen, or we've seen them, but haven't really got to hang out with them.
Speaker 1:Right In quite a while.
Speaker 2:Yeah, and it was just amazing. And it was so cool to catch up with everybody and you know, jake and Jenny never stopped working. We're constantly assessing.
Speaker 2:We're not judging not judging, but we are assessing. You can't turn it off, and it was so interesting to see how people change over realistically 10 years, since we've spent that much time with some of these people and some of them did really well, some of them not so well and the topic that we wanted to really get into today is what do you want your quality of life to look like as you age?
Speaker 1:Right, and what are your standards to achieve what you want your quality of life to look like? Of course, everybody's going to say I want to live till I'm 90 and stay active, or I want to live till 100 and stay active. But what are you doing to be able to make that happen?
Speaker 2:Yeah, there's not a single person that says I want to be confined to my recliner for the last five years of my life. There's not a single person that says I don't want to be confined to my recliner for the last five years of my life. There's not a single person that says I don't want to be able to get down on the ground and back up again confidently in the last five years of my life. Nobody says that I want to be fearful of walking across the grass. Nobody wants to say I don't want to hold a grandbaby because I don't want to drop them.
Speaker 2:But, yet it still happens.
Speaker 1:Right, because we're not doing the right things, we're not holding our own standards to prevent those things from happening.
Speaker 2:Correct. And here's the reality. Here's the psychological reason why it happens, and I wish I could remember what study this came from. I wish I could remember what study this came from. But there was an actual study that proves that the human nature is to see your future self as a much stronger, more agile, mobile version of yourself than you're actually going to be, and the study even went as far to show that most people see their future self as stronger and more mobile and flexible than they currently are. Like think about that for a minute.
Speaker 1:Right, right. If you're not that strong now, how do you think you're going to be that strong 20 years from now if you're not making any changes?
Speaker 2:Yeah, so at 60 years old people tend to picture themselves at 70 years old as a more stronger, agile, mobile person. I'm going to be able to get down on the ground and back up again. I'm not concerned about that one bit at all. Wait a minute. Can you even stand on one leg right now?
Speaker 1:wait a minute, can you even stand on one leg right now? Right, right. So then it just says it just starts to happen because they're not doing the things to be able to become stronger or to maintain that strength.
Speaker 2:The simplest way to see or to understand what's happening to all of us if we don't do something about it is that classic example of a frog placed in a lukewarm, room temperature pot of water. The frog will stay in that pot of water and if you slowly, gradually increase the temperature over a long enough period of time, that frog will stay in that water until it boils to death because it doesn't understand what's happening around it. Sure, it's so slow over such a long period of time that his body's acclimating to it right to, ultimately, he boils to death, which is the exact opposite. If you take a pot of boiling water and you throw a live frog. Take a pot of boiling water and you throw a live frog into the pot of boiling water, it's going to jump right out, jumps right out. I don't know if they've actually done that study.
Speaker 2:It seems like animal cruelty but, I, can imagine that that's true. Right the same thing's happening to every single aging adult that is stuck in la la land.
Speaker 1:I don't need to exercise, I'm in good shape or I'm just gonna go walking for my exercise yeah, I mean, I walk five miles a day, so I'm healthy yeah I'm in good shape right, but there's zero strength behind that. What? Like are you kidding me? How are you getting up and down off the toilet? Are you using your hands to get up and down off the toilet? Yes, so walking five miles a day is not helping you to get down and get back up. It's not strengthening. Yeah.
Speaker 2:Do you avoid a really cushiony couch Because you don't know that you'll be able to get out of it?
Speaker 1:Right, right, no-transcript, where we have all of our bags and we have to walk a half a mile to baggage claim and then another half a mile to get on the Uber, and then we have to get on three buses and a tram to even make it that half a mile to the Uber. And I actually said to you I don't know how elderly people do this Like this is a lot of work for us to be carrying all these bags and moving all of this. And if you're not staying active and strength training and building that endurance, that muscular endurance, even traveling through the airport would be cumbersome, it would be very difficult and a lot of people can't do it and won't do it. So anyway, I was telling my aunt I was like I'm really proud of you and she goes. You know, I never stopped moving. I'm moving all the time. I'm doing my exercises, I'm working in the garden, I'm doing some you know band work, whatever all the things.
Speaker 1:And she's like, in fact, one day I told my husband that I was just tired and I'm going to sit on the couch today and I'm going to do nothing. She goes. After three hours of sitting on the couch watching TV, I was so stiff I could hardly move. And I got up and I said I can't keep doing this, I'm moving backwards, I have to start moving. I am so stiff and uncomfortable and I was like that's exactly it. You don't get old and then stiff. You get stiff and then old.
Speaker 2:It's so true. And the same aunt that we're talking about. She's so badass, 83 years old, just sharp as a tack. So the Airbnb that they all rented, this massive house with a guest house and pool, is just gorgeous house. Thank you, kimbo, for finding it for everybody Outside in a screened in porch around the pool. They've got a couch out there and she goes. I'm going to sleep on that couch tonight and for no reason.
Speaker 1:Right, she had a bed that she could sleep on.
Speaker 2:No reason other than she just wanted to be outside in the fresh air 80 degree Florida heat with a 80% humidity. And we're all looking at her going. Are you crazy? You have a bed and she goes. No, I want to do it and she did it every single night, every night, on the trip and I'm going. How many 83 year olds do you know would willingly sleep outside on a couch and even be able to move the next day?
Speaker 1:wake up and be totally fine, like moving around. Still went out to the beach, still walk the beach, got up and on and off of my parents' boat Like just incredible. But she said it you have to keep moving, you have to keep active, and not just about the walking, but the, the strength training behind it, the getting down and getting up. She's like I sit down in my garden and I get back up every single day so I know I can get up and down out of the garden and that's a key factor to this longevity.
Speaker 2:Yes, she is not the frog in a pot of water that's increasing in temperature. Right, she's constantly moving. So that's something that we all can take note of, even in your 30s and 40s. Think about it when you're in your 30s and your 40s, you start to have kids and as those kids get older, you start to try to interact with them, or at least, hopefully, you do like playing ball with them, running, playing catch. How many people hurt themselves? Right, because I used to be able to run. Really, when's the last time you really were juking around in the yard playing tag? Right, it was 25 years ago. Right.
Speaker 2:You haven't done it in 25 years, so your brain tells you that you're young. Your brain tells you it wasn't that long ago and I should be able to do it right now, but you can't.
Speaker 1:You don't reflect how fast 25 years goes by. Well, and you're not continuing. You know, life changes, our schedules change. We have to start catering to the sports and the school schedule, and the first thing to go for most people is their own time, right? So for a mom, the first thing they stop doing is taking care of themselves to take care of everybody else, and oftentimes with that comes they're giving up their exercise or, you know, just getting in steps for exercise and act instead of actually doing their strength training. They're forgetting to eat, they're not getting nearly enough protein, not drinking nearly enough water, because they're so focused on helping everyone else and doing everything for everybody else that they forget about themselves and that also not getting enough protein, not getting enough water, is just eating away at the muscle mass in addition to not doing the strength training exercise. And that could go for dads too it's not just moms, of course.
Speaker 2:Yeah, of course it could go for anybody. It's just an excuse, is all it is. I'm too busy to make time for myself. I work 15 hours a day and then I have to make time for the kids. I don't have time to exercise. Right, really Right. Well, jenny does it. I don't know how she does it, but she does it.
Speaker 1:Well, and it's all about creating a schedule and making sure you're setting those standards that are going to work for yourself. It's not about motivation, it's simply a disciplinary. And I remember in PA school going to the gym with my note cards and I would do a set and on my rest I would be on theairmaster or the treadmill reading my note cards and then I'd go back to a superset. So I was multitasking of studying and working. And same thing now when I'm on the Stairmaster or the treadmill, I'm constantly looking at emails or responding to things.
Speaker 2:And I never look at emails.
Speaker 1:So don't email me anything.
Speaker 2:But I want you to notice everybody. Take note. Rewind this episode 60 seconds ago and note what Jenny said on her rest while she's on the treadmill or the elliptical.
Speaker 1:It's called multitasking. You get shit done where you have to.
Speaker 2:I'm going to rest.
Speaker 1:It's about finding a standard. I keep using that word standard it's not a goal. Goals don't mean anything. You have to write it down. You have to have something that you're holding yourself accountable to and have somebody else hold you accountable. And that's where a lot of our clients will come in. They know how to eat, they know from chat, gpt the meal plan that they should be doing for their goals. But it's about having the support and the guidance and the adjustments, modifications and the accountability to maintain your quality of life and really putting yourself in a even if you're not putting yourself first, putting yourself in a position where you're trying to make changes for yourself a position where you're trying to make changes for yourself.
Speaker 2:Yes, I mean both you and I have had people come into us for years, years, just regularly, because you need check-ins. You have to hold yourself accountable and I can't tell you how many times I've heard this. I've listened to so many leadership podcasts, motivation podcasts, all these books and everything over the past 10 years trying to make myself better, and I can't tell you how many times I've heard really successful people explain this in a very simple way Exercise is non-negotiable, like it's non-negotiable, negotiable, like it's non-negotiable. If you just tell yourself that exercise is non-negotiable, you will not sit there and battle yourself mentally, fighting yourself to go. As soon as something's non-negotiable, you don't even think about it, you move on to the next thing and you try to negotiate with that. So when that alarm goes off at 420 every single morning, I've never thought about hitting the snooze button. Right.
Speaker 2:It's just, it's non-negotiable. Get up.
Speaker 1:Get moving Right. Go do something mindless for the first five minutes. Drink your cup of water.
Speaker 2:Yeah, that's what I do every single morning. I roll out of bed, I go to the kitchen and I put away last night's dishes. Five minutes later, you're awake, right, and you're not thinking about the pillow anymore, right? But it's non-negotiable. How many of you listening to this right now are negotiating with yourself every single time it's time to go to the gym?
Speaker 1:Or to prep your food, or to be prepared for the week with your grocery shopping. Oh, I'll do it tomorrow, oh, I'll do it tomorrow. And then we're stopping and picking up something to eat, or we aren't eating because we don't have our snacks prepared.
Speaker 2:Here's one thing. So I've been listening to David Novak's how Leaders Lead his podcasts. I've been listening to it for years now, and what he does is he interviews CEOs from various businesses and 100% of them exercise first thing in the morning. 100% of them Not a single one of them says they exercise at any other time other than first thing in the morning. So these are the most successful people of the Fortune 500 companies. They've led the most successful companies in the world and 100% of them exercise first thing in the morning. Because it's non-negotiable.
Speaker 2:Right, it's a discipline, and nothing can get in the way, right, when you say you're going to exercise after breakfast or after work, there's always something that can get in the way, absolutely. But nothing can get in the way if it's the first thing that you do. Same thing with your meal preps. Right. So it's non-negotiable for Jenny, every Sunday afternoon to meal prep for the entire week. Like there's, there's just nothing that can get in the way of it.
Speaker 1:Right, and meal prepping looks different for everyone. Of course mine is to do pick out all the meals we're going to have for the week, do the grocery shopping and prep all of our snacks for the whole week. But then I'm actually cooking our individual meals per day on a daily basis. But I'm prepared. I know what I'm gonna make every day. I have all the groceries to be able to make it. I'm prepping it first thing in the morning. Well, I work out and then I prep our meal for that night, so it's ready when we get home. And that's again part of a discipline of being able to do that.
Speaker 2:Love it. So I think we should wrap things up there, and I think that we should wrap this up with. What is it in your life right now that you are negotiating with? Right and make it non-negotiable as soon as you make it non-negotiable. It's black and white and this is unofficial, but I even after this past weekend being at the family reunion, I think it is officially official. One of the small things that is non negotiable for me is I don't eat donuts anymore, like it's not happening. I'm not putting that piece of dough that's been deep fried into my system anymore. It's just not worth it to me anymore. But it's just one of these small things. It's a small thing, it's non-negotiable. So whenever there's three boxes of gorgeous donuts that the family got and everybody's mowing them down and I'm going it didn't even look attractive to me Because it's non-negotiable. That thing's not going into my body. It's not happening. 420 every morning when the alarm goes off. It's non-negotiable. Get your ass up out of bed, right, absolutely. So what are you negotiating with?
Speaker 1:And pick something small like donuts Right Small steps every day. It doesn't have to be a big thing to swallow.
Speaker 2:Yeah, it doesn't have to be a big thing to swallow. Yeah, soda it's non-negotiable.
Speaker 1:I'm not drinking soda. Lots of sodas going through that house.
Speaker 2:Lots of soda. The only time that I'll drink soda and I can almost count it on two hands for the entire year is if I'll have a rum and coke Rum and diet.
Speaker 1:Yeah, rum and diet.
Speaker 2:Yeah, but oh my gosh, it's got to be less than 10 in a year. Like it has to be.
Speaker 1:And you have five of them in Jamaica. Yeah, five in Jamaica.
Speaker 2:So pretty much done for the year. Okay, so share this episode with somebody that's constantly negotiating with going to the gym, eating, meal prepping, whatever it is.
Speaker 1:Getting started on their gut health. You know what you guys should Stop negotiating, yeah whatever, you guys should text us, email us.
Speaker 2:let us know what you are officially making non-negotiable because of this episode.
Speaker 1:I love that yeah.
Speaker 2:Email us. I want to know what it is.
Speaker 1:Awesome Ciao for now.
Speaker 1:Thank you for subscribing on your social media and podcast platforms to the Berman Method Dr Jake Berman with Berman Physical Therapy and Jenny Berman, physician Assistant, with Berman Health and Wellness. You can find more information on our website wwwbermanptcom for physical therapy, wwwbermanptcom forward slash wellness for the health and wellness. You can also find us on social media, facebook, instagram and on your podcast platform, so be sure to follow us, like us, subscribe to us and, if you would like any further information, definitely visit our website and reach out to us. You may also find our free reports on the websites as well, where you can download this free information for yourself. Have a great day.