When I stripped away the excesses from my diet—sweets, booze, and meat—I stumbled upon a transformative power that reshaped my life. It's Thad David here, your host and former Marine recon scout sniper, and I'm thrilled to share with you how the art of subtraction has revolutionized my health and personal well-being. This isn't just my own tale; it's an homage to the veterans and listeners who've dramatically altered their lives by simply taking away rather than piling on. Our 101st episode is a veritable celebration of the victories and revelations that come from letting go, proving that sometimes, less truly is more.
Prepare to be captivated as we traverse the journey of self-awareness, especially in the realm of what we consume, from the food on our plates to the media we absorb. I'll recount the eye-opening experiences of eliminating meat from my diet, unveiling its surprising influence on my body, particularly the disappearance of knee pain and the surge in sleep quality. I'll challenge you to scrutinize your own daily habits, urging you to excise certain elements for a spell to discern their genuine impact on your life. Join me as we discover the control we have over our health and happiness, not by adding more, but by masterfully editing our lives for the better.
Contact Thad - VictoriousVeteranProject@Gmail.com
Thanks for listening!
When I stripped away the excesses from my diet—sweets, booze, and meat—I stumbled upon a transformative power that reshaped my life. It's Thad David here, your host and former Marine recon scout sniper, and I'm thrilled to share with you how the art of subtraction has revolutionized my health and personal well-being. This isn't just my own tale; it's an homage to the veterans and listeners who've dramatically altered their lives by simply taking away rather than piling on. Our 101st episode is a veritable celebration of the victories and revelations that come from letting go, proving that sometimes, less truly is more.
Prepare to be captivated as we traverse the journey of self-awareness, especially in the realm of what we consume, from the food on our plates to the media we absorb. I'll recount the eye-opening experiences of eliminating meat from my diet, unveiling its surprising influence on my body, particularly the disappearance of knee pain and the surge in sleep quality. I'll challenge you to scrutinize your own daily habits, urging you to excise certain elements for a spell to discern their genuine impact on your life. Join me as we discover the control we have over our health and happiness, not by adding more, but by masterfully editing our lives for the better.
Contact Thad - VictoriousVeteranProject@Gmail.com
Thanks for listening!
Where do you feel you want to add more things into your life so you can gain something? And really ask yourself the question have you considered cutting some stuff out? Have you considered removing things out of your life in order to maybe get a better result? And as I think about it, I realize the difficulty of this concept, because I only have this in hindsight. I didn't realize the gains that I was going to get by subtracting. I was just slashing stuff out. Whatever I could cut out, it was just going. In fact, I was cutting out, adding stuff in all over the place, and once I realized what the cutting out was doing, it really gave me perspective to really understand how these things were impacting my life. And so I realized for you, you might not know, you might not understand exactly what to cut out. I know that I didn't when I was starting out. I just know that once I started cutting things out, it really put me in a space where I could add it back in and see what it was actually doing. And once I actually found the benefits of subtracting stuff out, that became a focal point for me.
Speaker 1:My name is Thad David. I'm a former Marine recon scout sniper with two deployments to Iraq. As a civilian, I've now facilitated hundreds of personal and professional development trainings across the country, and it struck me recently that the same things that help civilians will also help veterans succeed in their new roles as well. Join me as we define civilian success principles to inspire veteran victories. Again, before you add, through the last 18 months I've had several messages from veterans and people all along the way that have been turning their lives around in a positive direction. It's blown me away to see the reach that we've been able to have and just the lives we've been able to help out all along the way. So I wanted to take a moment to say thank you. Thank you to all of you, keep putting in the great work, and please let me know how I'm able to help. I love to hear what we can do to support you in a better way. I'm also proud to mention that we've been able to put together our first hundred episodes. In fact, this one is number 101. And I've been looking back and reflecting on all of it, at how much time it's taken to create this much content, and I wanted to really reflect on what was the biggest lesson that I learned from all of you from all of this content all along the way, and anytime in my life that I've wanted to do something different, change something.
Speaker 1:It usually comes with me asking the question what do I need to add into my life to make this happen? What do I need to add something different? For instance, if I wanted to get in shape, what workout do I need to add in? What pre-workout or post-workout drink do I need to add into my diet? How much earlier do I need to wake up so I can add more time into my day?
Speaker 1:As my knee and my back pain got worse during these intense training sessions, I started looking at what supplements don't need to add in. What joint supplements can I add into my regimen to maybe help mitigate the pain that I was experiencing? And if I wanted to improve a relationship with my kids, what conversations should I add into my day with them? What activity can I add in to really enhance our lives and the things we're doing together? Where can I add something?
Speaker 1:No matter the thing that I was looking at, the starting question for me always, it was always the same what do I need to add into my life in order to make this happen? And what I discovered was I get far more gains from subtracting things out of my life than I do from adding into them. For instance, when I was training for that pike-speak marathon, losing weight became paramount. It was a really important thing, and I didn't notice much from adding stuff into my life until I started subtracting things out. I was adding miles like crazy, but nothing seemed to change, and then I decided, on a whim, to cut out sweets, booze and meat for two months, and the chocolate was tough. For me, that was the dumbest part to drop, but the moment that I did those three things whether it's I cut them out weight started shredding off.
Speaker 1:It was this process of subtraction, though, that made me realize that, as I started to remove some of these things, my knee pain started to go away. You know this knee pain that I, just in my mind, had told myself I'm just always going to deal with it. I'm always going to have this knee pain. It's not going to go away. But once I started subtracting some of these things out of my diet, the knee pain started to go away, and it was really amazing to see what happened with it, because I didn't know that was gonna happen. I wasn't expecting it. I also noticed that I was a much better father and husband because my stress level was much lower and my sleep improved. I cut the booze and my sleep skyrocketed. My tracker my sleep tracker went through the roof and my sleep was amazing. I could actually sleep less and recover more, simply because I had subtracted out things like booze and changed up my diet a little bit. And since the race I've been able to actually add meat and a few drinks on the weekends back into my diet and my sleeps remain solid.
Speaker 1:But, most importantly for me, I have a handle of things, you know. I know what I can cut back on if the knee pain ever starts to become a problem again while I'm running and I feel in control, which is what I want for you. And I said I don't wanna quit meat forever. That's not it for me. I love a good cheeseburger, but I don't love a cheeseburger more than I hate the knee pain that I have when it flares up. So if I have to pick one, that's an easy choice for me and for now, I'm happy to know that I have the space to manage it. And the same thing happened with Zone 2 heart rate training.
Speaker 1:I was consistently attempting to get things to get a handle on it by adding things into it, but I got far more help when I was cutting things out, which really brings it around to you Now where in your life are you hoping to see a change? Where do you feel you wanna add more things into your life so you can gain something? And really ask yourself the question have you considered cutting some stuff out? Have you considered removing things out of your life in order to maybe get a better result? And as I think about it, I realized the difficulty of this concept, because I only have this in hindsight. I didn't realize the gains that I was gonna get by subtracting. I was just slashing stuff out Whatever I could cut out. It was just going. In fact, I was cutting out, adding stuff in all over the place, and once I realized what the cutting out was doing, it really gave me perspective to really understand how these things were impacting my life. And so I realized for you, you might not know, you might not understand exactly what to cut out. I know that I didn't when I was starting out. I just know that once I started cutting things out, it really put me into space where I could add it back in and see what it was actually doing, and once I actually found the benefits of subtracting stuff out, that became a focal point for me. I was cutting stuff like crazy, and it might be where you need to start If you're unsure of what to do first. Sometimes the best way to create the painting of your life that you want is to start with a blank canvas and really clearing it all off and slowly start to add things back. This might give you the perspective that you need in your life to live the life that you want.
Speaker 1:And again, I mentioned I have no desire to be a vegetarian. I love cheeseburgers, I love meat. I don't want to be a vegetarian. However, that two month time period without meat really helped me understand how it was impacting my body, and so when I choose to eat fried chicken, for instance one thing that I absolutely love I now choose to eat it from a place that I know is not gonna wreck my system with a sodium bomb and really cause an inflammation and cause my knees to flare back up, because I have the clarity to know exactly what was going on with it. So I still get the fried chicken that I crave, that I want, but I also get it in a way that I know that I'm not gonna wake up and have me pain when I'm trying to run. And that's the power over your life that I want for you, because now that I have it all back, I feel like I have control. I can live the life that I want. I can eat what I want, I can drink whenever I want to, casually on the weekends, and I can do so pain free. I feel in control.
Speaker 1:So by no means am I suggesting that you cut out meat, booze or sweets, but I do recommend you take an assessment on the things that you bring into your life daily, and I would challenge you to consider dropping some habits just to see how they're impacting you. It's really. Are you asking yourself a question Are you getting value out of this item that you've brought into your life, or is it actually creating a negative impact that you're unaware of? For instance, for me with the sweets, which was surprising for me because I really I thought that I used to. I love that shirt that I work out so that I can eat tacos, and it felt like I worked out so much so that if I took some time to eat some cookies. I'd be like, hey, that's okay, I worked out a ton, I burned 1200 calories on my run, like I can eat some cookies.
Speaker 1:And the moment that I took those out of my life I was I mean, I really felt like an addiction to these sweets. It was crazy to think about and it was nice to be able to just take an assessment. But what I thought was a neutral space in my life that I definitely didn't associate it as a very big negative, I didn't realize just how big of a negative it was actually having as it relates to my knee pain and the things that I was dealing with. And for you, there's only one way to find out. There's only one way to find out and understand, and that's to start with a clean slate. So this could be anything diet related Mentally, what are you bringing into your mental diet? Are you constantly on social media? Are you constantly watching negative news type things? Because, again, I'm not suggesting that you remove one thing or another. I'm just offering that it might be beneficial to take an assessment and just see how it's impacting you today, today, because once you have an understanding of what it's doing, you can then make a better choice.
Speaker 1:I was happy last night speaking of sweets is I grabbed a couple of s'mores, girls' health cookies and I ate two and it was good. It was great. I could eat the whole box like I normally would have. And I also woke up this morning and I was able to run pain free. And again, this is the power that I want to give you in your life. So I challenge you consider where do you want to improve something in your life and then consider starting with a blank slate. Consider removing a bunch of stuff, not for not permanently, but just so that when you start adding it back in one at a time, you can see what it's doing and how it's impacting your life, your body, your mind on a daily basis. There's only one way to find out Until next time.