EP 2: Bill Matthews | The Tahoe 200, Finding Your Mountain, Identity & Resilience (PT 1)

Welcome back to The Space for Being.

In part one of this two-part conversation, Bill Robertson sits down with mindset coach, ultra runner, and mentor Bill Matthews just one day before he steps to the starting line of the Tahoe 200 — a multi-day around Lake Tahoe featuring 200 miles and over 36,000 feet of climbing.

But this conversation goes far beyond running.

Bill shares his remarkable story of transformation — from addiction and self-destruction to nearly four decades of sobriety, becoming a coach and guide for men, and discovering the lessons that endurance teaches about identity, resilience, presence, and the stories we tell ourselves.

Together, they explore how suffering can become a teacher, why small daily actions matter more than intensity, the difference between reacting and responding to life, and how every person has their own mountain worth climbing.

This episode is for anyone seeking greater purpose, personal responsibility, and a reminder that who you are today is not who you have to remain.

In this episode:

• Why Bill runs ultras and what he means by "seeing who shows up when things get dark"

• Preparing for the Tahoe 200 and the mindset required for an 80-hour effort

• Why most people quit mentally long before they reach their physical limits

• The power of language and why words create our experience

• Bill's journey from addiction and a jail cell to 38 years of sobriety

• How running became a catalyst for reclaiming his health, confidence, and identity

• Why identity isn't fixed and how small daily actions shape who we become

• The importance of rituals, meditation, reading, journaling, and intentional living

• Enlifted coaching, story work, and becoming the author of your own life

• Victim mentality versus personal responsibility

• The compound effect and why consistency beats intensity

• Living in alignment rather than resistance

• The difference between reacting and responding to life

• Breath, presence, and learning to become the observer

• Why everyone has their own mountain to climb

• Bill's mantra for the Tahoe 200:

Mentally strong. Physically relaxed. Spiritually grateful.

Part two of this conversation, recorded after the Tahoe 200, will explore what unfolded over 200 miles and the lessons discovered on the other side.

The Space for Being is a podcast about being, becoming, and belonging — exploring the practices, ideas, and conversations that help us live more fully alive.

Connect with Bill Matthews: 

Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/bill_matthews3/

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Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/hivemke/

YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/@TheSpaceForBeeing 

Learn more: Hivemke.com 

"Find your mountain. Nobody regrets trying. But many people regret never beginning." — Bill Matthews

Transcript

SPEAKER_04 0:00

Bill Matthews. What's up, brother? Welcome to the Space for Being podcast, my friend.

SPEAKER_00 0:04

Oh man, thanks.

SPEAKER_04 0:05

It's uh it's a pleasure. I'm your host, Bill Robertson, and um right now I'm gonna sit down with a legend in the space of mindset and identity coaching and ultra marathon running, a wise stage to say the least. Man's been on quite the journey since he has been ushered into this planet. Um and I just want to dive right in. So I'm gonna I'm gonna start with a quote. And here it is. The reason I run ultras is because it's a way for me to see the part of me that shows up when things get dark. I'm curious for you to unpack that, Mr. Bill Matthews.

SPEAKER_00 0:47

Wow, legend, legend in my own mind. Um, dude, it's uh, you know, doing what I do is really hard to explain to the average person. They don't get like when you tell somebody you want to run 100 miles, they're like, dude, I don't even want to drive a hundred miles. That's very common. Yeah. How would you why would you do that? What are you running from? Why would you want to torture yourself? And the only way I can explain is like me putting myself in an uncomfortable position on purpose is the only time I get to see who's going to show up when life gets really hard. It's kind of like the boss at the end of a video game. You gotta beat the boss. I want to see who that is, and when you walk through that uncomfortable and come out, you know, the other side. You come out of the other side with confidence, knowing I know who shows up when it gets tough. It's a resilient man that's able to continue to you know maintain his presence in low and slow and just keep putting one foot in front of the other. So often people don't know who's gonna show up. So they're nervous, they're uncomfortable really when things get uncomfortable. But if I know what it's like to be in an uncomfortable position and know who shows up, I'm a lot more calm and confident. You know what I mean? Yeah. So who do people count on when tragedy happens? They're looking for the guy that seems like really seems to feel calm and collect, like, yeah, man, we got this. Just breathe a little and slow. Right. Um, so I continue to put myself in those positions. I know there's there's a quote was like, I would rather uh sweat lead or sweat during peacetime than bleed during war. Like right now, there's kids in San Diego Capitolton practicing war games so that when war happens, they're like, yo, we got this, we've been practicing. So this is a real life practice in in difficulty. And why do I keep doing it? Because it's just the next challenge. I believe life is about pushing yourself to that next challenge. And uh I'm not much of the hustle grind culture. I'm not saying, you know, I I said a quote a couple weeks ago that you know what doing hard things teaches you how to do hard things. But like I'm not all just push, push, push. Hey man, I like relaxing. I like to watch a movie when absolutely, but I do believe life is about finding the limits and crushing them and enjoying life and putting yourself in an uncomfortable position. I don't believe we're supposed to just be safe and comfortable our whole lives.

SPEAKER_04 3:47

Yeah. Yeah, I I resonate with that a lot. And I used to scoff at the idea of ultra running. I thought it was a ridiculous thing for a person to do. Why would an individual ever put themselves in the position of dealing with that much pain, um, you know, imposing that level of strain on their body and beyond? And I was just in the mindset of thinking that there are just much better ways to go about doing it. I actually just thought it was unhealthy to do it, which is an interesting question to ponder in general. Is ultra marathon running healthy at the level of 100 and 200 miles, which I think you could argue either way, like running 200 miles probably isn't that great for the body. Um, but in the long run, as far as spiritual fortitude and like um identity curation, uh really becoming the person you want to become and connecting to these deeper aspects of self, connecting to the component of us that is divine and unmoving, building a relationship with that, learning how to transcend the mind and just sensory experience in general. That's been a big takeaway for me when it comes to doing these longer endurance events and really just investing myself into the running process. So, with that, I would love for you to paint the picture uh for everyone, uh, the listeners here. What is going down tomorrow, Bill Matthews? What are you doing here in Lake Tahoe?

SPEAKER_00 5:27

I am going to tow the line of the Tahoe 200, which is a did anyone to call it a run? A race, it's a run, it's an endurance event. And uh me and 299 of my closest friends that I haven't not met yet, but we are gonna get to know each other very intimately on the trail because that's what happens. We I'm going to uh find out uh what I'm made of, you know, and and uh you talked about meeting myself intimately. I expressed to people that this is not physical. Like, yeah, I have to be physically capable of keep moving, and I have to have a certain level of of health and fitness to do it, but this is way more mental. You know, as a lifted coach, uh one that has worked on my mindset, what is the story I'm telling myself? This is an uh a very great way to not only prove to myself about the the uh abilities of of that style of coaching, mindset coaching for me and to be an example to others that the practical application of the tools that I've learned about storytelling is what's gonna get me to the end. Because I can keep going. Once you hit a certain level of movement, you just keep putting one foot in front of the other. But I will watch people fully physically capable of completing the race physically give up mentally. And the sad thing is they will be telling themselves a story about their ankle, their knee, whatever it might be. But in the morning, and next morning, they're gonna wake up and go, I freaking gave up. I only know this because I've talked to some of those people after, you know.

SPEAKER_04 7:19

This isn't conjecture, guys.

SPEAKER_00 7:20

Yeah, it's like I much love and respect to anybody that even attempts this. But there'll be a lot of people that don't finish, and it wasn't physical, right? It was mental. How long can you endure sit in that spot of uncomfortable and not give in? I have to be in control of the story. Jesse Itzler talks about it. Words freaking matter. I told you earlier, I told my wife, I do not want to speak the words. I'm tired, this is difficult. Doesn't mean I'm not gonna be tired and not it's not difficult. I don't want to give those words power because words matter. They create your state of being, which ultimately is going to create the experience that I have. So rather than saying, I can't believe I gotta climb up that mountain, I'm gonna, I'm gonna say out loud, you know how bitching it's gonna be when we get to the top of that mountain? It's a whole different thing. We I gotta do the same thing, but it's it's creating a different experience by the words that I'm using. And that's that's a powerful tool. My job tomorrow in the next 80 hours is my goal to finish this.

SPEAKER_04 8:25

You hear that, guys. Man's is gonna be out there circling around Tahoe over the course of 80 hours going up and down and up and down. How much elevation gain across the whole track?

SPEAKER_00 8:34

36,000 feet of elevation gain.

SPEAKER_04 8:39

I don't even know how many miles that is, but that's a that's a lot of miles of going up.

SPEAKER_00 8:43

Mount Everest is 29,000.

SPEAKER_04 8:45

That puts it in perspective. That puts it in perspective very well because that's a very well-renowned mountain climb.

SPEAKER_00 8:50

Yeah, and it's uh I think the highest total height that will be uh is close to 10,000 feet. And before we move, dude, thank you for coming and participating in this.

SPEAKER_04 9:02

I'm gonna be pacing Bill for an 18-mile section, and it's gonna be a monumental experience. I'm very excited and honored.

SPEAKER_00 9:09

Yeah, for anybody who's not familiar with ultra running that might be watching or listening to this is not an individual sport. Like there will be solo runners, but I got a pick crew, man, of some amazing human beings that do this, I want to say for fun and for free, because they're coming here to support me and they want nothing in return. Yeah, but then in return, I will go support them. This is an amazing community. Reciprocity, baby. Yeah, this is an amazing community of people that support each other. And any what's fun, is like my wife will be here. There'll be some other people coming to support my wife that have never seen what happens. I cannot tell you how often I hear people go, I think I want to run. I think I'm gonna become a runner. They see the spirit. There will be people that you see along this race going, I can't believe she signed up for this race. Like, it's this is not physical, like this amazing specimen of we are it's the heart, man. It it's it's it's really cool. It's really cool to see what happens. And uh, I don't know what's gonna happen. Yeah, I but I believe in the in the power of visualization. I've been visualizing what the finish line looks like. Having my family and friends there saying welcome, we love you. Congratulations. Because if you can see it, you can believe it. I would not even attempt this task if I didn't believe I can do it. Because with the power of belief, I believe we're capable of everything and anything. But it starts with right here. Do I see myself capable of doing this? And if you can see it, if I see myself finishing, then reverse engineering that going, well shit, what is a guy that ran 200 miles? What does he do every day? He doesn't sleep in, he didn't skip a workout. You know, when I create training plans for 100 miles or whatever, it's like I'm the one that created it. I will not look at that and go, ah, I don't feel like running 26 miles today. Or I'm supposed to run 26, but I'm only going to run 14. You know why I don't do that? Because when I'm on the mountain and I get tired, I don't want to have that going, oh, see, shouldn't have skipped that workout. Yeah. I will not. Now that doesn't mean I didn't adjust some things because you know what? Life happens. But I never looked at my training plan and said, I don't feel like going and doing that today. I did it anyway. Do it freaking anyway. Show up. No one's absolutely and I know that these events that I do they can sound crazy to a person that's never done that. I encourage everybody, find your mountain. I don't know what your mountain is. I don't know who whoever's watching this, what their mountain is. Mine's actually a physical mountain. But when I say go find your mountain, everybody just thought of it. Going back to school, get a master's degree, start your own business. I am encouraging you today to go do that.

unknown 12:12

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 12:13

Because no one's gonna at the end of their life regret trying and doing what they wanted to do. But they will regret. I can't believe I've never tried that. I will, no matter whatever happens over the next four days, I'm not gonna be on my deathbed regretting that I did it.

SPEAKER_04 12:28

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 12:28

But if I chose not to be here, I very well might sit on that my deathbed going, man, I wanted to do so much more.

SPEAKER_04 12:37

Right. Yeah, it's it's interesting to think about like where is the true limitation when it comes to great endurance events like this, and where do you draw the line? Because you have people like Max Jolief, who is a recent winner of the Moab, no, Cocodona 240, or no, Moab 240, Moab 250, Moab 240.

SPEAKER_00 13:02

Moab Moab's 240, Cocodonus.

SPEAKER_04 13:04

Moab 240, also known as the King of Moab, who I think he recently failed in an event because he had a cellulitis infection. The dude literally couldn't stand. And then you have other runners that get rabbed though, which is an issue with muscle breakdown and the kid who's not eating your own muscle. You're actually and you can like this is these are things that can literally kill you.

SPEAKER_00 13:28

Oh, for sure.

SPEAKER_04 13:29

Um, so obviously that's a clear determining variable as it relates to like I can't go any further. Um, but so many of us throw the towel in way before we ever reach our true personal envelope. And I think endurance events in general really teach us how to keep going despite the mind stories and learning how to transcend that and recognizing um we can go so much further than our you know potential cultural conditioning and stories are implying that we can. Um I'm curious for you, Bill. What what has been I would love to hear, and I know the listeners would too, some of the journey of who you were in the past. Someone I know you've been sober for 30 years. 38 years at this point. And how many years young are you? I am 59. He's 59, and he's running 200 miles around Lake Tahoe, everyone. If that doesn't speak to the sentiment of what else is possible in this life, I don't know what does. Um, but I'm curious just to speak to as much as you would like on the matter of who you were in the past and who you have become as an individual and some of the core tools and outlets that have supported you in getting there, becoming the person you are now, somebody that is so caring, so loving, community-oriented, someone that is truly a man of service and that can accomplish these great feats of um yeah, overcoming the limiting beliefs, overcoming uh just true physical adversity.

SPEAKER_00 15:18

It's interesting. I I I will come back to that, but I want to say something about just this mindset thing and this this pain and this this inner battle. I've trained people to do ultras. And I was out doing a training run with a guy, we're gonna run 20-something miles, and he's like, Oh my god, I stopped him. I said, Hey, are you injured? Or are you tired? Yeah, because hey bro, if you're injured, we're gonna stop right here, we're gonna turn around, and we're gonna walk back to the car. I get it, we're good. But if you're tired, suck it up, dude. Because you're gonna be tired when you run a 50 miler. That's the game. He goes, I'm done, bro. I'm just tired. Let's go. Because there's you gotta know your limits. Ravdo, the the the the different things that happen. You gotta know when it's time to pull the plug. Yeah, but if it's just tired, if it's just mental, it's just wore out, if it's a blister, dude, you gotta keep going. You gotta learn how to put that in a pocket. Like, I gotta blister. Okay, let's go. We'll deal with that when we get to the aid station. What has transpired in my biggest transformation? I got sober when I was 21 years old. Prior to that, as a youth, we talked earlier. I got my first trophy for basketball in 1971. It was five years old. My whole life I wanted to be a basketball player until drugs and alcohol got it away. So everything I loved, everybody I loved, I pushed to the side, and uh drugs and alcohol became my focus. And at 21, I got myself in a heap of trouble. Ended up in a jail cell on a metal bench, thinking my life was trash. There's no way I'll return from this. At that point, I had a three-year-old baby girl I hadn't seen in a year. Sadly, I was a piece of crap. But I thought there's no turning back from this. I was introduced to a program that involves 12 steps and an amazing community of people, a tribe of people that support each other. And through a process of uncovering, discovering, discarding things that have been blocking me from uh the universal love of everything, God, whatever people want to call it, I found a path that has helped me not have a drink or drug for 38 years. And I continue to have that be my foundation today. But also understanding that sobriety wasn't the finish line, getting sober is the starting line. However, I got caught up for years in the nice house, nice car, beautiful wife, sober, but at 45 years old, there's a picture of me that says, Oh, I'm fine. I'm 230 pounds just about. No sense of athletic ability. The kind of guy that wouldn't want to take his shirt off at a pool. I was embarrassed to who I was. Smoking a pack of camel filters a day, drinking rock stars or monsters, eating sneakers bars, little Debbie's was in my lunch. But I had a badass job. I was making six figures a year, and I had a beautiful home. But I had lost me along the way. And I don't know what triggered it, whatever, but I saw my wife's treadmill, and I'm like, hey, I wonder if I could run a mile. And I just got on there and I tried it outside. That felt pretty cool. And I did that a few times, and it was like, hey, I'm gonna get outside. And it was just this process of like I do have some physical abilities, and along the way, I started losing a couple pounds. But along the way, I also learned a part of me that was capable of doing something and pushing through some discomfort, and I started feeling good about myself because movement is just not physical, it's mental, it's spiritual, it's medicine. I started believing in myself again that I could do something, and then I set out to run a half marathon to prove to my kids that hey, I'm not too old. And running's been my teacher. You're talking, that was 15 years ago. You know, somebody asked me the other day, how do you go from never running to running a 200-mile foot race? And you don't. You go from never running to getting on your wife's treadmill and seeing if you do a mile, or getting outside and getting some sunshine and just walking to the corner, yeah, and then proving to yourself, I made it, and then doing it again. And then the body builds, and then you just build confidence and you just keep putting one front and front of the other. And then you become afraid, train. And that's who it's it's and it's how do you get sober? How do you get 38 years of sobriety when you're not sober today? One choice. You don't. It's one day. Can you get today? How about an hour? And then it just builds on itself, just like anybody else. You don't not have a degree and then get a master's degree. No, you have to get the AA, then the bachelor's, you just take one step. But so many people don't take the step. But if you want to change who you are, your identity, it's who you are today is not permanent. Personality is not permanent, identity is not permanent. Identity is created by the actions that you repeatedly take every day. I walked in a meeting the other day, someone says, Oh, you that's runner bill. Runner bill? Like, why do they call me that? Because that's what I repeatedly do, and that's what they see me do. So if your identity is not what you want it to be today, you can change that starting today by taking a different action. If you want to be somebody different, do something different. Even you, I've watched you change. You know, look at who you might have been two years ago. Look at even, man, we're always changing. Yeah. So running is just a teacher. It showed me what I wasn't good at at first, and then it taught me that I'm capable of doing some pretty amazing things. And there's amazing athletes that do this. You know, you think 80 hours, that's phenomenal. The winner of this race will probably do this in about 54 hours. I am going to be beat by somebody, and a lot of times it's a badass female because females are unbelievable ultra runners.

SPEAKER_04 21:29

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 21:30

They will beat me by a day.

SPEAKER_04 21:32

That's one of the things that really speaks to me about ultrarunning, is that the playing field is equal in between females and males. Um didn't a female just win the Rokadora 250?

SPEAKER_00 21:44

Rachel Ekrin, I believe is her name. She beat uh Killian, who was destined to win. He was the triple crown winner from last year. Unbelievable athlete. Ended up taking a fall, but he was behind her even when he fell. So uh she beat him behind. An hour and a half. She ran 250 miles in under 60 hours. She slept for 19 minutes. She did it with a huge smile on her face the whole time. I mean, she's got an unbelievable crew. She's an unbelievable athlete. But women, I mean, because you got uh I forget her name. Courtney Del Walter. Courtney Del Walter. She won the Moab 250 a few years ago. She beat the closest man by 20 miles. She beat him by eight hours. She could have gone to the hotel room, slept for six hours, came back to congratulate. Yeah. But guess who who was waiting at the finish line to congratulate the other people? You know what I mean? And there's a trophy in these uh in these races called DFL. I think it's dead eff in last. Literally the last soul to cross the finish line. Congratulate the person that kept.

SPEAKER_04 23:02

Oh my gosh. Yeah, if any, if anything, that's more impressive because the experiences and doing these races is totally relative. The strain level that it that one incurs from an experience like this is relative to the person's fitness level. So, like, you know, for you, you're you're easily able to run 30 miles plus. Uh, that level of difficulty is going to be equal to someone else's one mile. So just getting out to you know, participate in physical activity at all relative to what you're available for is the ultimate win. And yeah, just to speak to your point on the momentum aspects of making choices and how that opens up the doorway for you know moving in the right direction as far as who you truly want to become and who you want to show up as in the world, one choice at a time, and then just continuing to expand on what that personal envelope is. And yeah, we were having conversations about running earlier and how the body's in an adaptation machine. And I think we're just adaptation beings in general. We're very remarkable at adapting to whatever things are thrown our way, and just continuing to show up for any process really allows us to evolve and blossom in ways that we never could have imagined. I never foresaw myself running doing 50 mile efforts last year. I was telling Bill earlier over breakfast that uh he was doing a uh a running challenge last year, February. Uh four miles every four hours on the four hours for 72 hours, and that equates to 100 miles. 72. 72 miles, 72 miles. And um, I did one of the four mile efforts with him, and I was injured for over a month. I couldn't run for a month, and now today I can easily, maybe not easily, but I can show up for 50 miles on the trail no problem uh since last February, just with continued input and deposits into showing up for the running process, and my body has responded very well. Granted, I already had a really solid athletic foundation, but just to really point to the fact that yeah, we are our bodies are incredibly capable, and whatever you throw at them, it will respond in a in a good manner.

SPEAKER_00 25:30

Yeah, you know, um there is tribes on this planet that run a marathon a day. It doesn't kill them, the body just adapts. People come to me as fitness things and they they're gonna run to lose weight. And I'm like, oh, do not run to lose weight. Can you lose weight running? Yeah. But then your your your weight is tied into the run. Running is not a weight loss program. Running physically is for cardiovascular health, right? I've been running, I've run 1100 miles in the last six months. I haven't lost a pound. Because the body adapts. My metabolism has just slowed down. The run does not make me lose weight. So if you tie in running to weight loss, you're gonna stop running. So running is just for my mental health, it's a spiritual thing, and I'm cardiovascular healthy. And like I said, all credit to the unlifted method because it's what really has allowed me to sit with the voice because little Billy tomorrow night, the next night, is going to show up. Little Billy, for those who who don't know, is that little voice that's always been running in my background and just so happens to be little Billy, he's gonna show up. My job is not to get rid of him, it's to not give him the power that he's looking for. The words of this is tough, this is hard, what are you doing? It's like pushing through that and being capable of moving past that limiting belief that we all have, and teaching others that they can do that as well. Like I said, running has been a great teacher, and I don't care if you're 100 pounds overweight, just start walking.

SPEAKER_04 27:21

Walking is such a crazy thing. There's a lot of and there's a lot of people that are that overweight that will get out and do slow miles. There's specific Instagram pages of individuals that I've seen blow up over the course of the last year or two where they're getting out and getting their miles in despite the extra weight that they're carrying on on their body.

SPEAKER_00 27:43

What's really great about running is I'm the competition. It's just me again. I'm not racing anybody. Not trying to beat anybody. I'm just trying to beat me, my my limiting belief over and over again. I'm the competition. So the only thing that could stop me is me. I love that. You know, and when it comes to life, I'm not here to compete. I'm really not. I'm here to contribute. I'm not in competition with you, Bill. You're an amazing, one-of-kind creature, one of one of one. For me to compete with you would be silly. It actually is diminishing my own uniqueness because I'm one of one of one as well. So in any community that I'm involved in, whether it's the 12-step community running, I'm not here to compete. How can I contribute to you, to the community as a whole? That's bitching. Because if I'm putting my focus on another individual, I'm taking the focus off of me and my abilities and diminishing my own, like I said, uniqueness or abilities. It's kind of like the analogy of you're racing somebody, you see that guy look to the left and see where the other guy is. That's typically the guy that loses the race because he took an eye off the goal and put the focus on another guy. I'm not here to beat anybody, I'm here to lift everybody up. My goal on the trail over the next four days is to tell people to keep going. You know, a couple weeks ago I was doing a training run and they happened to be doing a hundred miler on this trail, and I saw a guy, he was deep in the dark, and I said, Hey, look at me. Just for a second. This is mental. Hey, take a breath. Just keep going, dude. Just keep moving. You got this. Because that's what it is. And I want to encourage people. My sole purpose in life is to inspire people with my actions because people are watching. Encourage encouraging people with my words because people are listening. And to serve with love. If I'm doing those things now, I'm good. Anything that I win or do along the way is great. You know what I mean? I want to make an impact. Because uh, when this is all said and done, you know, I want people to know that Bill was a guy that cared about anybody. You know, did his best to make an impact on anybody. I was selfish and self-centered for a long of my life prior to getting sober. And uh the last 38 years have been an opportunity for me to pay that back to people.

SPEAKER_04 30:20

Beautiful. And what have been some of the outside of running and the identity curation slash mindset work through the enlifted tools, uh the 12-step program, um sourcing really nourishing information. What are some other outlets, or I would say some of the primary outlets that have supported you in maintaining alignment with being this person that you aim to be, if they haven't already been mentioned, uh being someone truly of service, where it's you know, you're not totally self-absorbed in making the experience about you, or um yeah, I guess I'm I'm curious to hear more about what else may be there for yourself.

SPEAKER_00 31:14

Well, what I do to maintain this and things that I do, I am a very ritualistic person. I think there's a difference between having a morning routine and morning rituals. The last six letters in in uh spiritual is ritual. I have morning rituals. I'm an avid meditator, I'm an avid reader, I'm an avid writer, I share my writing online every day. So those are things that I do. And uh whether it's a page a day, a minute a day, whatever, I do them every day. Um I'm a coach. So what's is what's a coach? The actual definition of a coach is something that transports something, right? So I'm a primarily a man's coach, however, I do. I hate to call my word a coach. I hate to use the word, I'm more of a guide. I'm not here to be the hero in anybody's journey. I'm here, I want them to be the hero. But I'm primarily a men's coach, you know, and I help men uncover, discover, and discard the things that have been keeping them from not living their full potential, whether it's mental, physical, or spiritual, and and utilizing my tools that I've learned along the way to help me. And I don't tell anybody what they need to do. I'm a great, I ask a lot of questions. So, oh, what do you think you should do? Have you ever tried this? What if you did this?

SPEAKER_04 32:33

And I'm teaching them to be the author and hero in their own story and develop the capabilities and dissolve the codependence on like needing things outside of yourself to create an extraordinary life. I think that's so important. And something that is core to the enlifted method is like, I'm not the know-it-all coach. I'm not the guy that has it all in order. You're the person that knows what's best for you. Let's ask the right questions, excavate some of the stories that may be getting in the way alongside the energy that comes with that. And hopefully some really pertinent solutions will come through for you. And you learn how to have the capacity to actually lead yourself as an individual, which is just the like the reparenting process. I think that's how a lot of people refer to it. It's like we need to get out of the child archetype, you know, out of this immature, I am a victim and things are happening to me. I don't have agency over my own experience. Um, X, Y, Z is the issue. I haven't gotten to hear, which of course, you know, we're all in different circumstances. We're dealt a different hand, some quote unquote objectively worse than others. But the one thing we can all do is take responsibility on some level for what's going on and start to move in the right direction.

SPEAKER_00 34:03

Speaking our language, right? So the victim mentality. And I truly believe that life is not happening to you, it's happening through you. You know, and is there victims and is there true trauma? When I was a child, things happened to me that shouldn't happen at all, and and I don't never want to diminish somebody's actual trauma or visualization. But as a grown-ass man, I'm not the victim. I either am allowing this to happen or I'm creating this. Take true responsibility. That's what I help men understand. And I do that through the framework of story. What's a story? It's the thing that you're telling yourself about the event or what should, could, whatever you're imagining. There's my foundation of teaching, story. What's the story you're telling yourself today? What's the state that's creating in you? The state of being. How do you feel as a result of that story? Then from that feeling of being, what actions are you taking or not taking as a result of feeling that way? And then what is the life you're creating as a result of taking those actions or not? So you can reverse engineer your whole life. Your current results reversed is started by what were the actions that I took that got these results, what caused me to take those actions or not was the feeling that I was having. What created those feelings? My state. I'm responsible for my thinking. We have thousands of thoughts every day. We get to choose which ones we want to focus on. And for some reason, the human doesn't focus on how cool shit's gonna be. It's it's what if this all goes wrong? What if it doesn't work out? What if I fail? Well, what if it does work out? What if the good shit happens, as we say in the elliptic community? Let's focus on that. And story, what's the story? I don't have a story. You're telling me you don't have a story is a story. Let's get it out on paper. People don't understand what story is. So I have a unique way to draw out information to create journaling prompts. Because if I just tell a person to write, they don't know what to write. But if I ask them, hey, when's the first time this happened and you felt this way? All of a sudden they got they're spilling their guts. Because we all have stories, and a story in your head, as you know, has no beginning and no end. It's in in the in the recovery community, we call that resentment, which means to refeel something over and over again. We've been replaying this story in my head, and some days it's not so bad. Other days it's terrifying, but it's on repeat. But if I get it out on paper, which is a level one breakthrough in the lifted, holy crap, I see the physical beginning and I see the end, and it sure looks different when I put it on paper, especially when I start paying attention to the conflict language, the soft talk, the negations, the drama, the projections, the she did this, that oh my God, this always happens to me. And I should have got rid of all that crap. Now we're rebuilding something in architect language of where we got some momentum and we can take some action. Because, like I said, life is not happening to you. It's happening through first and foremost, the story and the actions that you're taking. And if I got, I'm gonna be 60, if I got 40 more years, 30 more years of spinning around on this rock flying through the universe, and I'm gonna be the victim of Bill or whatever somebody thinks of me, I'm tired of giving the remote control. Giving saying she did this to me is like taking the remote control of your life and handing it over to another human being, going, I sure hope you're having a good day because I want to have a good day. I man, I'm giving men the opportunity to take the remote control back, and you get to choose the experience that you have because she ain't making you feel anything. You're feeling a certain way based on how you're interpreting what she, they, the boss, whatever. And you can continue to live like that, but life sucks as the victim. I get to choose the experience that I want.

SPEAKER_04 38:11

Yeah, it's a sad story to embody and to like walk within. Um, and I and I really feel for people because we're all going through the unlearning process, and it's it's a painful thing to look in the mirror and start to actually take actions forward in which you're reclaiming sovereignty over your own life. It's confronting, it's it's like a muscle you never learned to build. And now you, if you were to compare it to like maybe you're 600 pounds overweight and you need to go out and run a half mile, that's gonna be near impossible. But again, like you were speaking to before, small incremental actions compound over time, um, moving in the right direction. And I really do see it as a fundamental step in creating a meaningful life and being able to actually influence the world in a positive manner. Because if you're continuously at the whim of the reality at hand and telling yourself disempowering stories about your participation in it, then um yeah, it just becomes like a very, again, yeah, tragic experience for oneself.

SPEAKER_00 39:33

I have used your example without using your name to encourage people of something really cool. Because you made a commitment. I'm gonna run one mile every day for a year. So a guy that runs 100 milers, that's not a lot of miles. But knowing what I know about you and life, it's not about the mile. It's about what kind of man runs a mile every day when he's tired, when he's sick, and for gosh sakes, you live in Milwaukee when it's snowing. I saw shit on explosion. I got nosebleeds. Explosion on your face. It's not about the mile. It was about who did you become along the way? This 200 mile, this is not about this. What kind of man, what what happened in me training for six months today? It's not about the event. This will be over in 80 hours. What transpired? What did I do? What did I walk through, the uncomfortable, all that? You know, and you were talking about something uh a minute ago, and I want to for a long time of my life, I was reacting to life. I believe there's a big difference between reacting and responding. Victor Frankel talks about there's a there's a choice between stimulus and response lies choice. How do I get that choice? I want to make sure I make this point. You you you gain that by going like this. Yeah, the breath. Breath gives me just it stops me from reacting and responding is breath. If I can pause for a second, I'm not reacting, I'm not responding. I'm choosing my response to what I create. And for a large, large part of my life, I was reacting to life, not creating. Hey, the people we admire and respect and love, they ain't waking up on Monday going, I sure hope money don't crush me. They're going, shit. What do we want to create today? That's the man I am today. The only analogy I can give this, and it's funny because I'm not a great chess player. Do you play chess? Barely. Okay, check it out. I'm incompetent about it. I play chess, I know each piece, how they move, whatever. But the moment the game starts, you know what I automatically start doing? How do I not lose? How do I protect my team? So the whole game, I'm just protecting my my king. The guy on the other side, how do I attack? How do I get his king? So I am constantly being attacked, trying to protect. No, that's how I try to, that's how I live my life. Just trying to survive and not don't get my king, don't kill me. So life was happening at me. I don't live that life today. I wake up and go, how do I want to attack life? Not people, not take there or anything, but what do I want to create? Yeah, that's choice. I have a choice to do that. I anybody that says, Man, I'm just trying to get through Monday. I'm like, what? Monday's like a waste day? Like it's a throwaway? There's people that that are in a hospital right now just wishing you, hey Bill, can you roll me towards the the window? I just want to see the wind. And you got a day to waste, man. I can't wait till Saturday. And what are we doing Monday through Friday? There's a woman I I met years ago. She was speaking at a meeting, and someone walked up to her and she's like, Hey Sally, man, you always seem so happy. Why are you so happy? She says, You know what? I might as well be happy. I'm gonna be here anyway.

SPEAKER_04 43:12

Yeah, there's a choice to be made, like you said. And it boils down to awareness and mindfulness. And can we be mindful enough in the moment as to realize that we do have a choice instead of reacting based off of conditioning and um just causes and conditions in general, which predate us even being born? So that's again a key part of the awakening process and being an active participant in life, somebody that can truly make a difference. Can we be mindful from moment to moment as to how we're showing up and just recognizing the influence that that has on the grand scheme of your whole life and everyone you surround yourself with? And the enlifted tools have been really important for me in general, as far as cultivating that awareness, being able to slow down. Enough to actually observe my story, to become the observer, to recognize that that's even a possibility. I'm not just collapsing my identity with the story that's unfolding in my head and just letting it run amok nonstop, totally unconsciously, being ruled by my unconscious. I'm getting to take a step back and recognize I'm so much more than this story. I'm so much more than this unsavory sensory experience I'm uh going through on this long run right now, than this emotion, which has a start point and has an end point. I can practice being the observer, and I see that as again a very key element to being someone who is positively contributing to the planet. And I see you as someone who's the walking embodiment of that. Clearly, you are you've been making intentional choices for a very long time, and it's culminated in um just a very profound way, right? In the way that you've been able to influence others and inspire people, the way you're able to communicate and just flow with your being in general. So yeah, it's it's nice to illuminate all these things because it's, I mean, of course, as human beings, we forget and we remember, we'll make an unconscious choice, and that'll have a negative ramification. But of course, we get back on track and recognizing this as an element of fitness, right? Like this is mental fitness. This is, and it's also a perspective and paradigm in which we can be a part of our own lives and our own process in general. Um so yeah, it's yeah.

SPEAKER_00 45:44

Well, you mentioned the the observer, and obviously there's there's two, you know, for a large part of my life, I was a participant in the story. I didn't even know I was telling a story, I was just living in it. And and Lyft has taught me how to become the observer. Like when you get something out of your head on the paper, you are the observer because now I'm not thinking the story, I'm seeing it. I literally bought a snow globe because everybody knows what a snow globe is. So I'll demonstrate with groups that I facilitate, like shake it up. That's how I live my life. See all that? I was living in that. But if you pause for just a second and I allow everybody to just pause, all that snow just settles, man. Clarity will return. Just pause for a second, take a couple breaths. Now, my ultimate goal for everybody is to become the one holding the snow low. Having choice, how do you want to? You know, you to be the observer gives you choice. And we talked earlier about the compound effect, you know. When I tell people that, hey, uh, I suggest you meditate for 10 minutes a day. How often I'll find people, I don't have 10 minutes to to meditate every day. Oh, you need to meditate for 20 minutes, 20 minutes a day. But 10 minutes a day does not sound like a lot. 70 minutes a week, you know, 280 minutes a month. It's 56 hours of meditation in a year. What do you think would trans what kind of transformation would happen to any human being if they meditated for 56 hours? Something will change. If you read five pages a day of a book, that's a 150-page book a month, and read 12 books. What's the last time anybody read a book? I know prior to me becoming a reader in 2018, I couldn't tell you the last time I read a book. I don't care. Read one page a day. It doesn't seem like a lot. It's kind of like if you get in the cat, you know, the carnival cruise line and click that little wheel, you're like, this boat's this ship's broken, dude. It didn't turn. It didn't feel like it turned. But over the next 500 miles, you're on a different continent. What you're doing today might not seem like a lot, but little by little by little, over years, I'm a completely different human being as make after making small changes every day. But have a floor and have a ceiling. My ceiling is I meditate for 10 minutes, I read five pages, I read, I write a full page. My floor, I meditate for a minute. I read a page, I write down something I'm grateful for. Guess what? Means I'm consistent. I don't miss it. I don't say, oh, I haven't done that in a long time. I might not hit my ceiling, but I hit my floor. I don't care if it's running, working out, whatever it is, yeah. Have a floor that you can meet every day. When someone tells me, hey, I'm gonna start working out. Well, how many times do you want to work out? Five days a week. I'm like, hey, let's do two. Hey, if you make it more than two, cool. But I want you to commit to two no matter what you do your two. You want to do five, cool. Because any goal that you set, I want the goal to be attainable. I want it to be sustainable and ultimately enjoyable because that's a long-lasting result. Yeah. How often do people go? I'm gonna run five miles a day. I'm gonna eat no carbs, I'm gonna there's this putting the cart before the horse. It's they just do this crushing thing. Yeah, you know, I'm not gonna eat, I'm gonna intermittent it fast. And they do these unbelievable, and you know what? They get good results. But I don't know what most people do after 70, 75 days hard. I know there's a second step to it, and I know it's a great program for people, but I imagine most people that I've met, I think most people fail that. 76, they're done, really.

SPEAKER_04 49:33

Or they never made it to 75. You would think there would be some, you know, at literal or some bigger shifts within committing to a process that long, that in-depth, where you got to do two workouts a day, you gotta read 10 pages, you gotta drink a gallon of water, whatever the heck it is, which I think is too much water for most people in general. Um, but yeah, setting the bar that high for oneself, especially some like because we we get into a tough spot, we get into a pinch, we're in a pickle, we're not feeling great about ourselves, maybe we're at rock bottom, and then we just the we we create these uh colossal goals, which are unattainable for where we're at. And I yeah, just hitting on that point again, again, of how important it is to set that bare ass minimum and then just commit to that and then expand as you're cultivating momentum and confidence and competency in actually being consistent in any given thing, and then you can add more things onto your plate. So there is a science to behavior change that that comes with this. That I don't know, chalk it up to shit. You don't learn in school, like Mark would say, things that are incredibly important that lead us to a place at the end of our lives, ideally, where we're looking back and we're going rad and we're actually happy, content, and at peace with who we are, um, aligning thoughts, words, uh actionslash deeds. It's it's so important. And if we can just do that on a daily basis, we're gonna end up where we want to end up in most cases.

SPEAKER_00 51:10

Yes, and and what I find most people, and I say that intentionally, are not living in alignment. Like I know what alignment is for me, mentally, physically, and spiritually. I know what living in alignment is for me. I don't know what it is for you. But if I ask you, hey, are you living in alignment? Right away, something just popped up where you're not. And when people are saying this out loud, like this is the man I am, but who you really are is what you do when no one else is watching. When you're not in living in alignment with who you say you are, man, you're living in resistance. You're living, you're like not you don't feel good about yourself. So, my ultimate guy goal is to get men to live in alignment and flow, go from living in resistance to flow. And setting a goal that you can actually, we often keep our commitments to everybody else. My wife, I have an amazing wife. We've been married for 34 years. You know what I mean? However, we keep our commitments to our wives, to our friends, to our children. But when it comes to keeping commitments to ourselves, we begin to negotiate. You know, I'm gonna start Monday tomorrow. I'm gonna get up at five and I'm gonna journal. Hit the snooze. We begin to negotiate. So then why even make a goal? I know I'm not gonna keep it. So now we're not even we don't even have an aspiration to do anything else because we've let ourselves down, and mainly because we set these crazy goals that are way not sustainable. I'm gonna juice for 60 days, or I'm never eating another car, all of these things that are big things. Yeah. How about if you just take a 10-minute walk and drink your 64 ounces of water a day? You know, I've had people do that. I've had people come to me to lose weight. I don't even give them a workout. A workout, I work the story, and I do some of these other things, and they're like, Bill, I lost 20 pounds. I said, Isn't that great? I didn't give them a diet. Yeah. You know, if you want to get gain muscle, you want to lose weight, it's all over the internet. Right. Problem is, why aren't you doing it? Yeah. Because you're telling yourself it's too hard. You know how men I have come, I don't have an hour a day to work out. I'm like, dude, I don't know what book you're reading that says you need to work out for an hour. I'll give you a 24-pound kettlebell. I'll I will kick your butt in 15 minutes, you'll wish you could stop it. And if you did 15-minute workout every day, once again, compounding. What happens to a man that swings a kettlebell for 15 minutes every day? Something pretty amazing happens. Yeah, but typically they get this big bench press, squat, deadlift, way too much weight. They tweak their back, they're out of the gym for three months. Meanwhile, this guy that's doing body weight squats and pull-ups is jacked, killing them. Why? Consistency. Consistency over intensity. And another great thing, don't chase aesthetics. Chase health. Aesthetics will follow. Yeah. If you chase aesthetics, these people that l have the most amazing bodies, a lot of them are in the worst health of their life. They're grumpy, they're they're their uh hormones are all jacked up, it's it's starvation, it's a lot of things. Yeah, but same way, if you chase health, aesthetics will follow. Like getting sober is not what the 12 steps is about. Getting staying sober is a result of what those steps are about. It's a byproduct.

SPEAKER_04 55:05

Yes. Um, all right, let's shift gears. So Tahoe 200 kicking off tomorrow. What do you have any just words of wisdom for yourself while you're, you know, you're gonna be there's gonna be peaks, there's gonna be valleys externally, internally. What do you want to plant uh in your heart, mind, and just the entirety of your being in this moment going in tomorrow's colossal event? Um, what do you have for yourself uh as you move forward?

SPEAKER_00 55:40

First thing that came to my mind was being present. Be present in the race. Don't think about the miles ahead or how far I have to go. Remember where my feet are. Be present, be pleasant while I'm being present. And and and being in the moment, how often I have thought about the destination or the top and forgot about this beautiful journey. I'm gonna be going around this most the largest alpine lake, I believe, in North America, or maybe even bigger. I want to embrace that. And I this race is not about me, it's about setting uh an example for other men and other human beings who are capable of doing amazing things. Reminding myself to put one foot in front of the other and not give up. Just one more foot. One more foot. One more foot. My first hundred miler idea, I did it for my mother. My mother was dying of cancer, and I held her hand on her desk and I said, I'm gonna run your age in miles. She was 71 years old. I've never run 71 miles before. But I set out to figure out how to do it, and I and I trained and I ran to San Diego 100. And when I was at mile 71, I stopped. I looked up the god, I looked up at my watch and I started crying. And I said, Mom, we did it. I was crying because of my mom and I was emotional, but I also was crying because I started I saw the marathon to go. But now I made that commitment to my mom and I finished the rest of the other you know 29 miles was about my commitment to myself. Improving one thing you can do. And uh the mantra that I have is a mentally strong physically relaxed. Spiritually grateful. Because a lot of times in this race, I'm not physically relaxed. My shoulders really tend to get sore because I'm like this. Yeah. I'm a huge nasal breather. Most of the time on a trail, I will not be going. I believe you get less oxygen now.

SPEAKER_04 58:17

Patrick McEwen.

SPEAKER_00 58:17

Yes, the whole action advantage.

SPEAKER_04 58:19

We just put you on game if you're a runner.

SPEAKER_00 58:22

And people think I can't nasal breathe, I go way too slow. Yeah, at first you will. But I can mouth take myself and run out of half marathon. People are look at me like I'm crazy and it might be a little crazy, but I prove to myself. And if you want to learn how to really zone two train, keep your mouth shut. You're gonna have to slow down so you keep your breath. But breathing, not only getting more oxygen in me, but also when you're thinking about the breath, where are you? Present. It keeps you present. That's why breath is such an anchor of meditation. But tomorrow is about just putting one foot in front of the other and being present and supportive of the other people and uh inspiring others and also uh having the respect of my crew. There'll be a time when I look at your eyes and go, we got this, brother. You know what I mean? I appreciate you being here in support of this. I am truly stoked.

SPEAKER_04 59:15

Give me more excuses to travel to beautiful places and be in the mountains and do what I love most. Please run more ultra marathons because I'll come support you.

SPEAKER_00 59:23

Yeah, this is not an individual sport to me, though it's me. It's me. It's it's a group that takes me. I have four or five men and a beautiful wife that supports me. I could not do this without the support of my wife, man. She is uh puts up with my shenanigans, and in return, I support her in her journeys of passion. She's an unbelievable potter and does some things, so I support her on hers. Mine just happens to be physical, you know, and I don't know what's next. Everybody's like, well, what I don't. This is what's next.

SPEAKER_04 59:56

First, we gotta conquer this 200 miles around Lake Tahoe. All right, chill out, y'all. Exactly. And it will happen.

SPEAKER_00 1:00:02

I see it happening.

SPEAKER_04 1:00:03

It's happening, it's happening. Amazing. Well, thank you so much for being a beacon and yeah, just being the light, being the change, all the things, showing up and sharing your gifts, really pollinating your gifts for the world to receive. Um, and therefore, yeah, being a net positive contributor to what's happening on the planet. And yeah, man, so I'm honored to know you. Thanks for being in my life. I'm glad the universe brought us together. Where can the people find you, Bill? Where can they inquire to work with you if they're curious to hear more about that? How can they get in touch?

SPEAKER_00 1:00:38

Uh mainly it's on Instagram, Story State Coaching, or my name, Bill Matthews. Matthews has two Ts. I mean, hit me up there, DM me. I'd love to have a chat, have a conversation. Like I said, inspire, encourage, and serve. And I make helping men, uh, I do it in such a way that I remove every block that stops them from being able to get help. I I I want to be of service to people. So find me there, follow me there. I write, I post there every day. And um I yeah, do my best to inspire people. So mainly there.

SPEAKER_04 1:01:13

Yeah, and if you're struggling with addiction in any capacity and you're looking, you've tried things and these things haven't worked, and you're continuing to find yourself in a tough spot, definitely you're in good hands if you're working with Bill Matthews. Like he said, I just appreciate your philosophy around sobriety. First and foremost, you're walking your talk, you know, you've been sober for multiple decades. And um, you know, when you get sober, that's the start line, like you said. You know, what's next after that? And and this man is well equipped for with a variety of tools that are tried and true, things I've applied to my own life and gained so much value from, so I can speak to them firsthand. This is the Space for Being podcast. Thank you guys for being here with us. We're gonna have more episodes in the future. Uh, give us a follow on all major streaming platforms, Spotify, Apple Podcasts, YouTube as well, if you want to watch the full length video of this show. And leave a comment, engage in the ways that you can. Oh, Instagram as well, space for being. We love you all. Big smooches.

SPEAKER_00 1:02:17

Be bitching.

SPEAKER_04 1:02:18

Be bitching.