S7E2 Brad Carlson: Mindset for sustaining Weight Loss and Exercise for the Long Term…

Have you tried to lose weight many times but never seemed to be able to keep it off?
So has Brad.

Have you started an exercise program and gone all in only to quit 3-4 weeks later?
So has Brad.

Have you disliked how you looked and felt and struggled with low self-worth?
So has Brad.

But Brad discovered that he had actually been focusing on the wrong things all along.

After changing his mindset, he went from being 50lbs overweight to completing over 30 endurance events including marathons and the Spartan trifecta, and creating the life of his dreams.

In this episode, he will teach you the framework he used to do that.

Brad Carlson is a certified health coach, spiritual practitioner, author and speaker. He guides others on a journey of self-discovery to become fit, happy and healthy based on what works for them and their own interpretations of being fit, happy and healthy.

Website:
www.trainingwithcoachbrad.com

Transcript

Brad Carlson: 0:00

I was trying to exercise and I had no energy. I had no motivation. And I asked myself a very simple question that I had never asked before. Why? Why am I doing this? Why am I exercising? I discovered my why in that moment that if I take care of my mind, body and spirit, my mind, body and spirit will take care of me.

Michael Bauman: 1:00

So welcome back to Success Engineering. I'm your host, Michael Bauman I have the pleasure of having Brad Carlson on. He's a certified health coach, a spiritual practitioner, author, speaker. He helps other people on the of self-discovery, and we're gonna get into what that looks like for him as well, on how to become fit, happy, healthy, based on what works for them and how they actually interpret what that looks like. So very, very fascinating. He's the creator of Mind Strong Mindset Training Academy audio programs. So it helps you develop the mindset you actually need to become the better version of yourself. He's coached hundreds of people. He has a bunch of nutrition and fitness certifications. He's done 30 endurance events, including the Spartan trifecta, studied martial arts philosophy in five different countries, black belts. I mean, I'm just gonna keep going. Aikido, hapkido, Japanese sword, black belts. It's, it's amazing. So this is gonna be a fun conversation. He loves adventure, loves travel. It's gonna be, it's gonna be great. So welcome to show

Brad Carlson: 1:54

Oh wow. Thank you so much for having me here, Michael. Gosh, that was an incredible introduction. Thank you.

Michael Bauman: 1:59

Oh, there you go. You've had an incredible life, but it wasn't always Well, doesn't always like that. So let's start, we're gonna start in the, in the rough, uh, probably one of the hardest periods of your, your life. Just dive right into that. So, can you talk about, you know, around that 2011, you know, period of time and you really hit, hit a low spot, and can you share that period of your life and how it just started the journey of discovering yourself and what, what you became up to this point?

Brad Carlson: 2:28

Yeah, it actually started in 2009 when I was that Couch Potato that was really overweight. I was 38 years old at the time, and I had come back to America at 30 and then like everybody I got cut up in, in the work, you know, work life cycle. I, all I did was work, come home, I'd sit on the couch, watch tv, and was just completely exhausted. I was sitting on the bed one day in my bedroom and I was disgusted with the person I had become. I was just so disappointed in myself. I was very overweight, 50 pounds to be exact, and I had what I call the couch potato belly, the Santa Claus belly, the spare tire, I call it the 18 pack or something like that, and, and yeah, my life was spiraling downhill very quickly. Starting in 2012, the divorce hit. From 2009 to 2012. I was still in the midst of what they call that yo-yo cycle, trying to gain lose, gain, lose, and still trying to, to figure all this stuff out. 2012, I went through the divorce and lost my house to foreclosure when the economy in America collapsed the housing market in 2008. My house went to the bank in 2013. I signed the divorce papers I remember on a Friday, and had to turn the keys over to my house to the bank on a Saturday and then couch surf for a month. That was, oh my gosh,. The whole time was still trying to Figure out the whole health thing. I didn't even get my head wrapped around the whole health thing for probably at least two more years. If I knew what, obviously what I know now, then it'd be very different. My life would've been very different. But I didn't. It really began in 2009 with just being overweight and I just become purely disgusted and disappointed in myself with, you know, how did I let myself get this way is the common question. How did I let myself get so lethargic? How did I let myself get so outta shape? My self-esteem was in the toilet. If I think about it now my physiology is changing a bit. Like I can feel the pain coming back inside of me, that period of my life. It's like I wouldn't even recognize that person anymore if they were sitting here. But still definitely a painful part. But again, what they say doesn't kill you, makes you stronger. That is true. It took that pain to get me to change my mindset, change my health, change my nutrition to propel my life forward to where I am now. So I can look back at it now and say that was the best thing that ever happened to me. Mm-hmm. That's one thing I would tell listeners right away, is whatever you're going through, you'll look back five years from now and say that was one of the best things that ever happened to me. Mm-hmm. uh, doesn't seem like that in, in the meantime, but there's always a reason for whatever is happening is happening. And if you can just kinda like a surfer on the wave. If you could just ride the wave to the shore eventually it will end and your life will be better. But you gotta want to make it better. You gotta want to change, you gotta wanna step forward. And that was a big difference for me is like, enough is enough. I'm ready for change. I'm ready to get in shape, I'm ready to lose weight. But that was part of the problem. I thought it was about losing weight and getting in shape and I learned along the way it has nothing to do with losing weight and getting in shape.

Michael Bauman: 5:35

Well, let's talk about that because I'm curious to hear how. how did you start working through both on the, the physical side of things. So you go, Hey, I, you know, don't like myself, I don't like how I look, I don't like where my life is at. And you go, I wanna make a change with the, with the exercise. Um, so I'm curious as like what that started to look like, but then also how did you work through, and this is a process, right, like you said, but how did you start to work through on that emotional side of things, dealing with all of that?

Brad Carlson: 6:05

This is always a funny part of the story. When I had that meltdown in 2009, like sitting on a couch, I'm like, okay, I'm gonna do it. I'm gonna lose the weight. It's happening. And an entire year went by. This is November of 2009 to November, 2010. And I didn't do a single thing. Like I didn't lift one weight. I didn't spend a minute in an exercise class, I didn't do anything. And so a whole year went by. And so now I'm a year later, now it's November, 2010, I'm right back in the same spot, sitting on, on my bed in the bedroom, still 50 pounds overweight, still low self-esteem, lethargic, everything. And that's when I said, okay, now I call it my secret weapon. I'm determined to do this. So I had no training, no knowledge, no anything, but I had an exercise bike in the garage. So I did the only thing I knew how to do. I went and rode it every single day for three weeks, and then I quit. The physical part it came in in waves, up and down. Like I went for three weeks and then completely quit. And then I think it was about a month later, a friend introduced me to one of those home-based exercise programs. I'll just. Say what it is. Not that I'm promoting it or anything, but it was called P90X. This is why failure is such a good thing. Failure is what drives success. Each failure gave me determination to then be more successful the next time I did it. It was about a month between the bike and then I started p90x, but here was a little secret that made all the difference. When I did p90x, my goal was not to lose weight. I didn't care if I lost a single pound. What I cared about was finishing the program. I told myself, I use some ex expletives. Bleep, bleep, bleep Brad, I don't care what you're gonna start this and you're gonna finish it no matter what. So, by God, six, seven days a week, I was in my garage. It was like 30 degrees Fahrenheit, sometimes two in my garage. Cause there wasn't any space in my house to do it. I couldn't even do half of the workouts. They would do like 20 and I'd do like three. But I didn't care, no matter what, I was gonna finish it. And I just kept getting stronger and stronger and stronger. And I remember one day I was actually running around my neighborhood. One lap around my neighborhood was one mile. And a really good friend, he was driving along on the car and we hadn't seen each other a while, and he stopped and he's like, my god, Brad, you've lost a lot of weight. Mm-hmm. And that's when I went, oh, I have, I didn't even really think to check about it. But then here's the thing. After I finished p90x, the 12 weeks I quit again. Mm-hmm. Cause I didn't know what to do, and the weight started to come back on. I gained 12 pounds within two weeks after finishing p90x. Mm-hmm. The magic moment for the physical part, I'll get to the emotional part in a second that everybody has to know, and this is one of the very first things I teach now, before you even get into the exercise or diet, if you're starting with me, is I discovered my why. That summer I went on a weeklong wilderness survival trip. Kind of like, Bear Grills, you know, he takes people on the trip, you eat bugs and you know, build your own shelter and all that. So there were 15 of us from all over the United States. We got together, we met in the Yakima Valley up in Yakima, Washington. And we lived like hunter gatherers for a week. And it was during that time that something happened to me. Um, It's hard to put into words, but I had a moment where physically I could not move. You're hiking all day, 20, 30 miles a day on like one calorie, if you're lucky. I mean, it takes like a hundred calories to get a five calorie mud cuz you're, you know, you're trying to catch it or so you're, you're, you're harvesting like roots. It takes more energy to harvest the root than you get from eating it. I was like dead physically and something happened in me. The Japanese call it"kokoro" where your spirit just takes over. There is no more physical and your spirit takes over. Well, that happened to me on the last day. And then I took that back with me from the hike and was trying to, you know, try again. I had lost motivation. I had fallen off the horse. I got back from that weeklong excursion. I was trying to exercise and I had no energy. I had no motivation. And I asked myself a very simple question that I had never asked before. So if you're listening, you've got to ask yourself this question. Why? Why am I doing this? Why am I exercising? And in that moment, I call it my first miracle. The roof on my garage opened up, the heavens parted, I got struck by a bolt of lightning. I discovered my why in that moment that if I take care of my mind, body and spirit, my mind, body and spirit will take care of me. And that has been the driving force for the past 13 years of everything that I have done, health and wellness wise. That is the key to sustaining your health and wellness journey, is that you have got to have a very deep inner personal why that works for you. It's exactly what Simon Sinex says. Start with why, but it cannot be an external. Why? Oh, I wanna lose 50 pounds. That's not sustainable. Oh, I wanna have more energy to play with my grandkids. That's a great reason, but it doesn't work in the long run. I wanna fit in a certain size wedding dress. Well, that's great. I wanna be able to travel and, and more adventure. Those are good, but they're all external why's. I had one client I remember she kept training for the 5k. She would do a 5K and then another one, and then another one. And as long as there was a 5K or a 10 K, she worked her way up. She was good. But then all of a sudden, COVID hit. There were no more five Ks. She gained a lot of weight because everything she was doing was external motivating. And it wasn't until we talked that she realized that everything she was doing was externally motivated. And anything you wanna start a business, why, why are you doing it? You wanna start, you wanna be a husband, a father? Why? Why? You know, why, why this person? You know, we'll get into that here in, in, in a little bit. But that's what sustained the physical part of my journey and any health and wellness journey is that I discovered my why.

Michael Bauman: 12:05

Sorry, before, before we get into the emotional, I, I would like to talk about how, how you kind of coach, um, people to discover that, why, what does that look like? How do people go about discovering their why or their purpose, vision.

Brad Carlson: 12:17

There's something called the seven levels of why exercise. And you start with that. Okay, well, why do I wanna lose weight? Oh, because I wanna fit into a certain size wedding dress. Well, why do I wanna fit into a certain size wedding dress? Well so I look good. Well, why is looking good important to you? Well, because then I'll feel better. Why is feeling better important to you? Because then I'll be able to do the things I wanna do. Well, why is doing the things that you want to do important to you? Because then I'll be living a life of meaning and purpose. You see how we're starting to get more deeper into that? So it's basically, it's called the seven levels of why exercise. It's in my couch to healthy curriculum. It's week, two, actually. Week one is mindset. Week one is about who are you? Mm-hmm. that, we'll get into that in a second. That's part of the emotion. And then week two is the why exercise? One area I disagree with Simon. He says You only have one why for anything. And I don't agree with that. I have very deep personal whys, sort of depending on what I have going on in my life. They're similar, but in some instances they're really different. But you do that seven levels of why exercise and then I work with them on the phone and we keep going and we keep going until the light bulb goes off. And in some cases we've gone down to level 20. It's called the seven levels of why. But in some cases, like for me, I've gone to level 17, I level 24. Because until that aha moment, that epiphany, that white bulb, it's not going to be sustainable. You know, it may be a great why, but it's not sustainable enough. It has to be something that, that resonates with you and it's so personal.

Michael Bauman: 13:48

Yeah. I use a very similar thing, um, with my clients. It's very simple. But if you just asked that question about any area of your life, just going like, why am I actually doing this you know? Yeah. Or like, what do I really want? And then why do I really want it? Right? Like,

Brad Carlson: 14:01

You start to questions what and why. We don't have to ask how, how will, how will I show up on our life? But the what and the why, the two most simple questions you could ask that most people on this planet don't have an answer to. Yeah. When you can answer both of those questions, that's when you're successful. Yeah.

Michael Bauman: 14:17

There you go. There you go. We hit on the hit on the definition of success for you So we have this why, right? So you kind of discovered this why, but obviously in life, things come that affect that why. There's times where it's difficult and you have to push through, and there's obstacles and there's setbacks. How do you go about maintaining that why or keeping your focus on that when things are really challenging?

Brad Carlson: 14:43

It always falls on your why, but that gets into the next, the next question, who are you? Who are you as a father? Who are you as a husband? Who are you as a health coach? And then show up as that person. Mm-hmm. And when you fully understand who you are and embrace your true, authentic self, then it becomes easier and easier and easier to just authentically show up. And then what you just described, it rarely, rarely happens for me now. That I get down in the dumps and that I'm off alignment and that I'm off balance. And when that does happen, I just sit in my chair, maybe get my journal out, do some journaling about the situation that's going on in my life and just let the verbal diarrhea on the paper and like, what is going on in my life? You know, and what I, what I've discovered, gosh, we could go off so many areas here that's things like that. Everything is an inner solution. Every problem going you have going on in your life, the answer is inside you. And I've found that it always boils down to a self-worth, self-esteem type of an issue. Feeling of a lack of worthiness or a lack of deserving something or, and when you can work through that, and the more you work through those with regards to being a spouse or with being a coworker, or with being a husband or a dad or whatever area in your life, then the less and less that you get pulled back down off that horse into that depression hole, uh, so to speak.

Michael Bauman: 16:07

How, how do you go about doing that? Because that's, you know, right up, right up my alley. Um, how, how people could feel enough so that worthiness that, you know lack of worthiness when people have that, what are your tips or your advice for how to go about filling, you know, filling the This is

Brad Carlson: 16:24

Week 1 of my Couch to healthy program. You have to answer the question, who do you want to be? So that's the second miracle. So, getting into how I dealt with this emotionally. I understood my why. I was starting to get into the exercise groove. I still didn't know anything about nutrition. I was three years into this journey, I was still eating hot pockets and chocolate milk and sugary donuts like every single day. I didn't realize you had to eat healthy too. I thought all you had to do was exercise. Mm-hmm. But during the divorce, my dog he would not come over to me and like, come on, boy, come over here. And I still to this day have in my mind the look he gave me. You know, he was a 20 pound cock spaniel, like a foot and a half off the ground. He just gave me this look like, you're such a loser, dad. Oh. And he turned around and he went back to his bed. Dogs sense energy, especially in humans. He knew something was wrong with me, and I looked at him and that's when I had my second miracle. And that's when I go, oh my God. I have been focusing up to this point in my life on everything I didn't want. I didn't want to be an uptight, grumpy, irritable husband and father. Well, guess what? I was a very uptight, grumpy, irritable husband and father. I didn't want to be a lethargic, low self-esteem, couch potato. Well, guess what? I was still a low self-esteem, lethargic couch potato. Mm-hmm. And in that moment I realized, I asked myself a question, what type of person do I want to be? And that's how you stay motivated. That's how you propel your life forward is what type of person do you want to be? So Michael, what type of husband do you want to be? What type of dad do you want to be? What type of health coach? What type of trainer do you want to be? Okay. I wanna be someone that is full of love and life and health and passion and enthusiasm and, and dynamic intensity and fun, and can bring that in into every situation. And it's just a matter of showing up authentically as who you are every single time and focusing on who do you want to be. Mm-hmm. Who do you want to be a year from now? Mm-hmm. five years from now. 10 years from now. Okay. Imagine what your life would be like. Like best case scenario, shoot, reach for the stars, even past the stars. This is the type of life I want to have. This is the person I want to be. I wanna be that awesome rockstar business entrepreneur that is kicking butt in the world and, helping people and is full of love. I call it love, life, health and happiness. And so who do you want to be moving forward? And when you step into that, that person of who you want to be, that's when your life really shifts and that's when motivation really doesn't become an issue. If you don't have your why, and what I'm talking about is your what? What type of person do you want to be? If you don't know your why and you don't know your what, then you have to have a lot of discipline. You gotta have a ton of discipline to be able to move forward, otherwise you will fall off the horse and most people do. Perfect example, an Olympic athlete, Michael Phelps, best athlete in the world. Some will argue at swimming 18 Olympic gold medals, something like that more than anybody in history. And after the Olympics, he didn't. Know what to do. He was depressed. He didn't know what to do because he didn't understand some of this. So yeah, we talked a little bit off camera about success, you know, the gold medals, the house, the car, and, and I asked that question, well, is their life any better than mine? At the time, 13 years ago I thought it was, but,but now, no, because The key to happiness, the key to success is knowing who you are and being that type of person you want to be. So whoever's listening, take a look in the mirror. Who am I right now? Okay. I was a tired, overweight, lethargic, couch potato. I didn't figure this out until my dog would not come over to me. And then I asked myself that question, who do I want to be? What type of husband do I wanna be? What type of person do I wanna be? What type of father do I wanna be? I had been focusing on everything that I did not want in life. Mm-hmm. I had been focusing on the type of person I did not want to be. And unknowingly that's what most people are doing. They're focused on the fear, what they don't want, who they don't want to be. And when you shift that and start focusing on what you want and who you want to be in life, everything changes. And that's where discipline is no longer needed because then it's fueled by passion and desire. There's a much, much, much stronger factor force than than discipline. Discipline only lasts for so long. So after I, I had that epiphany on my dog, it still took me about another year. But finally I realized who do I want to be? I want to be this healthy person. And everything started to fall in line under that. I was in the public health department one day and about to reach for the donut and I was in the middle of triathlon training and something, I swear to God it was a higher power that like literally grabbed my wrist and pulled it back and would not let me grab the donut. Every day I grab a donut, chocolate, candy. Cause it's there every day. It's like, how crazy, the health department, we should have like fruits and nuts. But we didn't. And it's like, if I eat that, will it help me to be a faster swimmer? And I went, oh my God, no! And then I asked, well, what can I eat to help me be a faster swimmer? And the first thing that came to me was spinach. I literally went to the store and grabbed a bag of spinach and ate the whole thing. And that what started my journey into healthy eating.

Michael Bauman: 22:05

While you are talking about the nutrition and you know, the exercises as well, can you talk about what are some of your tips in terms of how can people eat well sustainably and how can people exercise well sustainably?

Brad Carlson: 22:18

Again, it goes back to who do you wanna be? If you want to be a healthy person, it has to start with that. Focus on foods that will get you to that person you want to be. So I realized if I eat that donut, will it help me to be healthy? The answer was no. It's the questions that you ask yourself. Mm-hmm. So ask yourself questions that will get you to where you want to go, but you have to know where you want to go. Ask yourself questions that will lead you to that person that you wanna be. But you have to know that person that you want to be. Same with exercise, same with exercise. Now, the problem I had back then, it was all from a place of fear and place of ego. Mm-hmm. Another principle is are you doing this from a place of fear or a place of love? When I thought about switching to RV tiny living, those millionaires is their life any better than mine? And I realized, no, it wasn't. And that's when I started to ask the question, well, what is it that you want outta life? What is it that I want outta life? And I wanted adventure. I wanted to live, dream, travel, adventure, explore. And the first step of that was tiny living. Because for me, that, that sums up adventure in a nutshell. You're like camping every night. I mean, how cool is that We talked a little bit about what success is earlier. That slowly got me really thinking that what is it that I want outta life? Okay. First and foremost, I want to be healthy. And once I started to get that dialed in, then I realized, oh, I need to apply this to other parts of my life. Oh, I want to be an entrepreneur. I wanna have my own health coaching business. Never in a million, trillion gazillion years, even 10 years ago, five years ago, did I think I'd be a health coach. Um, Do doing this or podcasting or anything. Those are the first three things I teach. Your vision, your why, and your who do you want to be?

Michael Bauman: 24:08

Yeah, it's super, super important because especially like you're, you're talking about so many people, you know, in the health and fitness kind of arena, you know, new Year's resolutions, right? They set these resolutions, they go, I wanna lose weight. Similar to your journey. They have those three weeks. They, you know, they, they crush it for three weeks and then it's difficult after that. But what you're talking about is so important. It sounds, it sounds simple, but it is so important for every single area of your life to actually go, who do I wanna be? And you're always aligning those behaviors with, is this aligning with that or not? And the other aspect, of it is looking at, there's an incredible framework, from Robert Keegan, out of Harvard called Immunity to Change. So why do we actually resist change? We have this desire and we go, I want to do this well because we have these hidden assumptions and this is what we're talking about as well. We have these hidden assumptions that about these different behaviors that we have that keep us where we're at. So a lot of times we look at the reasons, you know, to change, but there's also, we have reasons to stay the same You know, there's reasons why we're sitting on the couch and exploring those and balancing that out and going, oh, this is why I'm actually wanting to stay the same and this is why I want to change. And then you would go, when I make this choice, when I make this behavior, do I wanna align it with the new identity that I have? Um, or do I wanna align it with the old identity that I have in the past? And it's cannot be overstated about how important this is in terms of making any change in your life. Very important.

Brad Carlson: 25:42

And it's like Tony Robbins said, change will not happen until your pain threshold is at a certain level. People will change either out of desperation or inspiration. Either one works. So in the beginning I was changing out of desperation. Mm-hmm. uh, this, this wasn't working. But now I change out of inspiration cuz I know everything is growing and leading me to my next highest version of me.

Michael Bauman: 26:05

So I'm curious as what, yeah. I mean, you have a very unique kinda lifestyle. So you have your little tiny RV you're loving life in terms of that. Do you have any specific routines that you do, whether it's morning routines, evening routines, just routines that are very helpful for you in terms of aligning yourself with the person you wanna be?

Brad Carlson: 26:23

So, yes. And it's constantly changing So to answer your question, the one thing I always do is check in with me. Mm-hmm. And what I mean by that is I check in with my inner voice, my intuition, and I just allow it to guide me. Okay? Tomorrow morning I'm gonna get up and I'm gonna read for an hour. That's my morning routine. Tomorrow morning I'm gonna get up and do my five mile run. Very first thing. That'll be my morning routine. Tomorrow morning I'm gonna get up and just meditate for an hour. Tomorrow morning I'm gonna get up and journal for an hour. It's not set in stone specific to any, it used to be very rigid. You know, 20 minutes of reading, 20 minutes of journaling, 20 minutes of exercise, 20 minutes of meditation, shower, get ready to go. Uh, it's not like that at all. It's very fluid now. So a principle I live by now is I ask myself the question, what's next? And we talked about earlier, all these millionaires who are not successful, not fulfilled. It's because they're living from a place of fear. I'll just use Buddha as an example. Completely broke. Outta shape. Never read a single book, but probably one of the most fulfilled people that the planet has ever seen, because he lived a life from the inside out. So my evening routine used to be Journal and read the last hour before lights out. This is all changed. It used to be the last hour, no electronics, no anything. Journal meditation, reading, which sounds pretty good. But the difference is I'm doing it from a place of love now, not a place of fear that, oh, if I don't get my reading in today, I won't be worthy. I won't be good enough. And so it's the same activity, but the reason, the why is very different now. Mm-hmm. trust. Learning to trust the path, trust the journey.

Michael Bauman: 28:05

Yeah. I had Lord Richard Layard on, he's the co-editor of the World Happiness Report, and he actually said a very similar thing. He said in the morning, just checking in with yourself and the highest version of yourself. And using that to set the intention for the day. I'm similar. My morning routine is more rigid than yours because I do have, you know rigid things like getting kids to school and things like this. But I would describe myself as an exercise nomad like you, you do what works for that situation in time. How I describe it is having agile habits. I have habits that are basically little building blocks in terms of my morning routine, my exercise, things like that. And if they get affected, I can move those building blocks to different spots. I can shuffle them around. We listen to all of these experts and all of these people Hal Elrod, the Miracle Morning. You have, you know, very rigid kind of things. Mm-hmm. And I love talking to so many different people on this podcast cuz very successful people and some of'em have very rigid morning routines. Yeah. Or just routines in general. And some of'em don't at all. Some of'em get up at nine o'clock, you know, and are still incredibly successful. And so really understanding and experimenting with what, what actually works for you and what actually works for you right now in whatever season you're in is really important. And having the grace and the ability to be able to adjust it and not beat yourself up is really important. Really important.

Brad Carlson: 29:35

And I would say, just make sure you're doing it for the right reason. The first several years of my journey, all those 30 plus races I did, most of that was based in fear and ego. Mm. Because I thought, and again, it goes back to that question, what is it you really want outta life? And I realized that for me in my journey, I didn't want to be one of these hardcore, diehard, you know, ultra ultra type athletes. What I really wanted to be was just fit, happy, and healthy. And I realized, well, I could be fit, happy, and healthy whether I run a 20 minute mile or I run a 10 minute mile and my body appreciated the 20 minute mile a lot more than the 10 mile and I could walk the next day. And I started to go down this, what I call now, the slow, easy path of exercise. And especially for men over 40, this really makes a difference. You've really gotta back off the intensity and do the slow easy cuz it's much more sustainable. I want to be fit, happy, healthy, walking, no wheelchair, none of that stuff. You know, walking tall, strong and proud, well into my, you know, sixties, seventies, eighties and nineties. I can't tell you how many distance runners I've talked to in their fifties that can barely walk. I know one, she did marathons from 20 years old till almost 40. She's probably late fifties, early sixties now. She can't even barely walk a mile on a treadmill now cause her knees are gone because she overtrained for almost 20 years of her life. I don't train for anything specific now, so my exercise routines are very fluid and rigid. What do I feel like doing this morning? Oh, I feel like walking this morning. Oh, I feel like doing weights today. Oh, I feel like going to play racquetball today. Oh. I feel like playing pickleball today. You know, something, something that you're always moving. Oh, I feel like doing a natural movement session today and, and I have enough experience I can just whip something up like on the spot now and, oh, I only got five minutes. I'm just gonna do five minutes. Then I got 10 minutes later today, and then five minutes in the evening. That's at least 20 minutes. I still get in during the day versus one 20 minute session, so, mm-hmm. And I, I haven't mentioned this so, to make your health journey sustainable, to make your healthy eating sustainable, any of that. It must be a priority. You manage your priorities, not your time. I cannot emphasize that enough. I'm sorry, one more thing. I wanna get this in. This is a really powerful exercise that I just recently learned. All coaches have coaches, so I have my own coach right now. And she taught me this a couple months ago. To help with the motivation to help with staying on the path is a very simple exercise called daydreaming. You know, sit back in your chair for a minute or two and just daydream about the life that you desire about that person you desire becoming. Do that two, three times a day for just a minute, and your energies will just fly off the chart. And that helps begin to reprogram your mindset to bring you back into, you know, having that high energy and that high motivation where you don't lose motivation, you don't fall off the horse.

Michael Bauman: 32:22

It. It's like having consistent, like you're, you're talking about it all, you know, it just continues to come back to that one principle. It's like having consistent things in your day, whatever it is that, that allow you to align back with who you are, who you are, or who, who you want to be. You know, because all of our behaviors are a reflection of our identities, the values that we have, then the priorities that we have, and then the goals, you know, that we, that we set. And so often we focus on the behavior or the goals and like we're talking about, it's like no, focusing on the identity, who you wanna be. You know, then you know the values that you have that you wanna show up with in every single situation. Then looking at, you know, your priorities and making sure that those are, those are aligned and then your goals reflect that and your behaviors reflect that.

Brad Carlson: 33:08

And kind of the modern culture, modern society, the hustle culture. We have a backwards, it's always what do you do? We always emphasize the doing first. Well, you want to get over depression, well, what will you do? We'll go to the doctor or take this pill or whatever. But in the native indigenous cultures around the world, they always focus on the person and the being. Who do you want to be? That started to click in my brain a couple years ago. And then as I got deeper into my spiritual studies and went to some other seminars and read other books or something called the Be, Do, Have formula. Be the person you wanna be the doing will automatically show up.

Michael Bauman: 33:41

There's a, really, you know, powerful kind of framework. It's along those lines that I, that I referenced by a leadership coach called Alan Seal. And he talks about, there's four levels of engagement with a situation. So when any situation arises, that first level is, you know, just jumping into the drama, right? So we all do it at, at times, like, just jump into the drama this did that, you know, I felt this, you know, whatever that is, right? But then above that, if, if you go above it, you're able to look at it from a situational awareness level and you go, oh, you know, instead of being, you know, it's this person's fault, this person's fault, I can actually look at it from a, a higher level and go, oh, this is the situation. This is what's going on. This is how we can fix it. This is how we can approach it. But what you're talking about is what he references is kind of the level above that is that has to do with choice. So it's actually choosing. Who do I want to be in this situation? So it doesn't matter what happened, what situation it is, whatever at all. We can always choose who we want to be in this situation that and that references, you know, like Victor Frankl's Man Search for Meaning. Like he is in like we've heard a lot of the things. Yeah. Yeah. But it probably, I mean, it's just like, it's kind of the quintessential book on meaning where he is in. As dire situations as you can pretty much possibly think, you know, every right to say, why does this happen to me? But he goes, man's ultimate freedom is the ability to be able to choose, you know, how they respond to this situation, choose their emotions. And that's extraordinary. Like that's some, like, that's not just like a namby-pamby thing. He was in the worst situation and you, you're able to, you're able to say that. So that level of third level of kind of being able to choose and then that fourth level is the opportunity and when do you focus on who you want to be? A lot of times that opportunity just naturally arises to provide the solution for that situation. But you have to train yourself to recognize. Am I operating? You know, like you talked about, am I operating out of fear or am I operating out of love? Or who do I wanna be in this situation? Yeah. Um, and it's, it's totally different way to approach, approach living. And it takes practice, it takes training, it takes, oh, it

Brad Carlson: 35:52

did. Absolutely takes practice. Yeah. No, I've been doing this for almost, I'm on my 14th year now, and it's taken a lot of, I guess they call it intentional practice or awareness practice and understanding that stuff. Yeah. You, you're hitting the nail on the head. Choose who you wanna be and then start to have everything revolve, evolve, I should say, evolve around that.

Michael Bauman: 36:11

As far as your meditation routines or just kind of developing awareness, do you have any tips for how people can go about doing that?

Brad Carlson: 36:19

You know, the two tips I would have, one is that daydreaming, take a minute as many times as you can a day and just daydream, imagine the best life and the best version of you. There's a meditation that I started doing about six months ago. I don't even know how to describe it. But if I use the metaphor of a cell phone, when your cell phone is low on battery, you have a cord and you plug it into a charger. Mm-hmm. Okay. And it charges. And so what I do, and I actually do this when I'm laying in bed, like the last 10 minutes before I actually get up in the morning. So that's, going back to your question, my morning routine. This is something I do almost every morning now. I lay there and allow your mind, your body, and your spirit just to fill with joy and love and happiness. That's the only way I know how to describe it. And for someone who's beginning at this, I would just say focus on all the exciting, wonderful things that you have going on in your life and focus on all the exciting and wonderful things that you know, not, that you hope for, not that you wish for, but you know, will be a part of your life in six weeks, a year or whatever. You just allow those feelings of love and health and passion and joy just to flow through you and just allow it to charge yourself. And that is the most powerful meditation that I do now. I do that and then a lot of journaling. Mm-hmm. okay, this is my life right now. This is all messed up with regards to, I don't know, coworker relationship or something like that. So I'll just start journaling, just let the pen flow and I'll get about three, four, I mean three, four pages in, and I'm like, oh my God. I was being inauthentic towards that person because I had an insecurity, I had a fear about something. And then through the journaling, that fear of insecurity will come out. Then once I can identify that, I can immediately replace it with what I do want to, I want love and peace and help and happiness. Mm-hmm. And so next time I'm interacting, I know how to better handle that situation. But I would say the two things. Yeah. Do practice the daydreaming and practice the morning meditation where you just allow your heart to open up and fill with love and joy and peace, and health and happiness. Those are the values that I want my life to be about. That's who I'm stepping into more and more every day. and my vision is, is to become this bigger source and this bigger version of love, health, and happiness for the world, one person at a time. Mm-hmm. I'm so blessed to have the life I do. My lifestyle has not made any sense at all to a lot of people because they're so wrapped up in society's definition of lifestyle, the big house, the car, and, okay, well, you're stuck with, you know, X amount of mortgage every month and I'm traveling to three different countries, which, you know, again, what do you want your life to be about? Such a simple question that so many people really have a hard time questioning for me at this stage in my journey. And it, it evolves, it changes. But for right now, I want my life to be a big adventure. Mm-hmm. And that's tiny living, that's traveling, that's hiking in the wilderness, you know, all kinds of stuff. So yeah. What do you want to be about? Uh, if I could leave your listeners with anything, it's that question.

Michael Bauman: 39:30

that's a super, super, great spot. To kind of wrap up, I did want to talk just a little bit about what you talked about you know, just receiving, the love and the joy and stuff into that. A really powerful thing to be able to learn is to how to be able to shift our state in the situations like we're talking about. And, I've had some elite, special forces people on the podcast and they talk about how basically it's, it's the principle for training everything. You learn to train something in an environment that has low distractions. And this is what essentially meditation a lot of times is, you know, it's like, can I change my state to what I wanna be? Whether it's peace, whether it's love, whether it's joy. Um, can I change that in a situation? Maybe there's no kids around, you know, it's quiet, you know, I have headphones on, I'm listening to lovely music. But then you start to add in some of the different things that of life, right? You start to add in these different situations. So for instance, these elite special forces, if you're learning how to shoot, you learn shooting downrange with earmuffs on with very little distractions. Then you start to add in different situations. Maybe you add in movement. Can I still hit the target? Maybe you add in, explosions noise, other people shooting at me, right? All of a sudden you ratchet that up. Can I still perform this skill in complex, chaotic situations? So the question is, can you still access those places of peace and joy and love in the complex, you know, situations? That's what you talk about, having these things throughout your day where you're reset around accessing those things in, in the context of your, of your daily life. So I wanted to, you know, highlight.

Brad Carlson: 41:06

Can I, can I say something on that real quick? Yeah. I used to have, well, I still have a philosophy. Can you do it when you're tired? You had a good night's sleep and you got a full breakfast and you can show up and, and you're hot shower and all that, and you can, you know, perform at a high level. But what if you didn't have any of that? What if you got a terrible night's sleep? What if you haven't had a meal in two days, you haven't showered for a week. Can you still perform at a high level? And the answer to that is yes. And the way you do that is, again, who are you? If you know in the bottom of your heart that you are an elite warrior, you will, before the situation, you will show up as an elite warrior. If you know that you are a father, a husband of love and compassion and kindness before you're in the the chaos of the situation, you will show up as that, and then in the middle of it, you just take a deep breath, quiet, center yourself and remind yourself who you are. I am a, I am a husband and father of joy and compassion and love and repetition. Like Tony s says, the more you do that practice, that skill, the stronger you'll get and the easier it becomes. So to switch your state in the middle of the situation, it's still possible to do that. But to do that you've got to deep breath and focus and center yourself. Show up as the person you want to be, know who you are and show up as that person. And the more you practice, and the more you do that, the easier it gets. Another reverend minister friend of mine, she called it your peace bubble, so that when you're in that situation, your peace bubble doesn't get burst Because if your peace bubble burst, you're allowing it to be burst. You're allowing those people to rob you of your personal power.

Michael Bauman: 42:39

Mm-hmm. And I would say, and this goes, in general, obviously we started talking about like nutrition and, and things like that too. Um, even in these situations, like this is, a challenge for me. I have times where I do that really well, and then I have times where my kids, where I haven't gotten to sleep, it was crazy and I just go off on it. But using that in a, in a very non-judgmental way and just going it's like the fitness thing. It's like, maybe this is a weight that at this current point I can't lift, or I haven't trained well enough to lift this weight. But it's feedback. And I go, I need to learn how to be more peaceful when I'm tired and when, when things are crazy. And same with the exercise and nutrition. Like when you fall off, quote unquote the wagon, you know, whatever that means, it's not going, I'm a terrible person, it's going. oh, I need to learn how, when things are maybe stressful or chaotic or I'm busy at work or I'm really tired. How can I still maintain these behaviors that support who I am? So I, I think that's a great spot to kind of wrap it up on going. Like, you don't have to use that as, as judgmental against yourself, but you can use it as feedback and go, this is something I need to work on. And it's not like you failed in, in terms of what you're doing.

Brad Carlson: 43:48

Self, self-care, self-compassion. Yeah, you're right. Yeah. Even for me, I won't be perfect, I guess, or whatever. I won't show up as the person I wanna, I wanna show up as, and I used to really beat myself up, but self-care, self-compassion, self-love, self-forgiveness, goes a long way. So I've learned to be more kinder, gentler on myself, starting with myself. Yeah. I've made myself a priority. Mm-hmm. um, I kind of mentioned this already, but make your health and wellbeing for yourself first and foremost. So, for me, my three priorities are God, health and family. So that's my number two priority in life. My health and wellbeing. And that's another way I'm able to sustain this journey. Some people, their health and wellbeing is their number 10 priority. Everything else revolves around your health and wellbeing. So better relationship with your wife, your kids, all that. It starts with you and your own personal health and wellbeing. Yeah.

Michael Bauman: 44:40

Yeah, absolutely. It's very, very important, very important conversation. So where can people go to connect up with you if they want to coach with you or just follow what you're doing?

Brad Carlson: 44:49

Yeah, absolutely. Thanks. Thanks, Michael. www.trainingwithcoachbrad.com is my website. All my social media handles are on there. The link to my own podcast is on there and yeah, trainingwithcoachbrad.com

Michael Bauman: 44:58

awesome. I really, I really appreciate the conversation and like I said, you're somebody who's living it. You know, living that tiny RV lifestyle and, you know, being happy and joyful every day and it's, it's really important and sharing with other people as well. So yeah. Thank you. Thank you for the time.

Brad Carlson: 45:13

Thank you. Thank you for having me, Michael. I appreciate it.

Michael Bauman: 45:16

Absolutely.