Episode 75: Elon Buying Twitter, Lessons from Dale Carnegie, Dealing with Unwanted Weight Gain, Judaism with Jordan & Mike, and more

0:00:11.5 Mike Vacanti: Hello, Jordan.

[chuckle]

0:00:13.7 Jordan Syatt: What’s going on, Michael?

0:00:17.9 Mike Vacanti: Not much man. How are you?

0:00:19.6 Jordan Syatt: Feeling good, man. How are you… You feel great, you had a great sleep last night?

0:00:23.3 Mike Vacanti: I had a great sleep. We just had a nice hour and a half live stream with the mentorship, and now hitting the podcast. Dude, sleep is the game. [chuckle] Or let me phrase that differently. Being sleep-deprived is such a disadvantage…

0:00:41.2 Jordan Syatt: Oh yeah.

0:00:42.5 Mike Vacanti: In every possible way.

0:00:45.1 Jordan Syatt: Preach, keep going on that.

[chuckle]

0:00:48.2 Mike Vacanti: I don’t… You know, you might be expecting to study, maybe a meta-analysis to back this up, maybe a series of clients who have stories that will be beneficial to you, but I’m just gonna go straight N equals one. I had two nights of subpar quality, subpar duration sleep, and it basically took me four days to get back. And during the course of those four days, my cravings for like, call it food to boost my mood was higher than I ever remember them being. My ability to think clearly or have physical energy were both down. I was just in a massive sleep deficit and I slept 12 and a half hours last night, like I told you, went to bed at 8 o’clock, woke up feeling absolutely fresh, and now I’m back. But I just think about how many people in the world are in subpar situations for sleep that aren’t necessarily within their control, right? There are gonna be times, new baby, whatever, crazy times at work, where you’re sleep deprived for periods of time, but there are also people who have the ability to change their sleep quality and quantity, but choose not to for whatever reason, and they are just at such a huge disadvantage in every single way.

0:02:08.9 Jordan Syatt: Yeah. Dude, I’m… That’s one of the things I’m worried about with the baby, I’m just like, Oh fuck, this is gonna be tough. [chuckle] But I think in terms of more controllable situations, I was talking about the… I know you and I’ve spoken about this, I was talking about this with someone else the other day, just about how addicting the phone is, and how you get these such huge dopamine hits from it, and how like… You might wanna go to bed, but you’re not getting the dopamine hit that you want, so you might actually be tired, but then you stick that fucking phone in your face just to get more dopamine, and then it’s like, you’re there for hours until eventually you’re almost like resistant to the dopamine at that point, you just scroll for so many hours that where you’re like, you get tired, not… You’ve been exhausted for hours, but now you’re just like, the dopamine doesn’t do anything to you, it’s like, it’s not enough now. Like, now it’s… Oh yeah, I guess I’ll go to bed because this isn’t doing much anymore, and that… By that point, it’s 2:00 in the morning.

0:03:07.3 Mike Vacanti: You’re pressing the pedal to the metal on the pleasure side of the pleasure pain pendulum, which out of the book Dopamine Nation, that’s like classic. The only way to reset is to let yourself stop experiencing that pleasure, is to sink into the pain, sit in the pain, so to speak. And I know exactly what you’re talking about. And it’s even more relevant when… For creators too, because I think the dopamine spike that you get from positive feedback is bigger than the dopamine spike that you get from just consuming enjoyable content.

0:03:42.9 Jordan Syatt: Yeah, especially… Yeah, if you get positive feedback on a post, like a lot more than usual, man, there have been times where I’ll delay my workout by like two hours, ’cause I’m just like, fielding all this positive feedback and I’m… Time flies by, right? It’s like, Oh man, it goes by so fast, Jesus, it’s been two hours that I’ve just been stuck here looking at this positive feedback, stroking my ego, and I should have just got my fucking workout in. It’s interesting though, ’cause negative feedback has a similar response in terms of the actions, like, if I get negative feedback, sometimes I’ll delay my workout by the same amount of time, it’s not necessarily ’cause the dopamine though, it’s a different response. I don’t know what it actually… Anger usually, [chuckle] like, Fuck you. And then I have to feel these have these wars with people, but yeah, both of them can lend to a very sub-optimal lifestyle.

0:04:40.0 Jordan Syatt: So I was… Ever since I’ve started doing more reels again and more content, I’ve noticed that behavior can creep back in and I’m trying to keep it in check, but yesterday, for example, I was having some debates with people and it just ended up delaying my workout by almost two hours, ’cause I was just going to town.

0:04:58.5 Mike Vacanti: So let me give you a little advice as someone who doesn’t make content to someone who does make content about content.

[chuckle]

0:05:05.1 Jordan Syatt: Okay.

0:05:05.7 Mike Vacanti: Here’s… And by the way, when this podcast drops, I might have a YouTube video up.

0:05:09.1 Jordan Syatt: Wow.

0:05:09.6 Mike Vacanti: I know I’ve said this many, many times, but there’s a real chance that if you go to my YouTube channel right now, there is a video that has been uploaded within the last 24 hours, there’s also a real chance that…

0:05:21.9 Jordan Syatt: No.

0:05:22.4 Mike Vacanti: There isn’t.

0:05:23.1 Jordan Syatt: Well, when is this going live? When is this… This is going live on next Thursday?

0:05:26.0 Mike Vacanti: I don’t like to make any promises, probably Monday.

0:05:29.0 Jordan Syatt: No, this podcast.

0:05:30.5 Mike Vacanti: Oh, Tuesday.

0:05:32.4 Jordan Syatt: Wow. Yeah. Then your video’s up. You’re listening to this, Mike’s got a video up on YouTube right now. New one.

0:05:41.5 Mike Vacanti: What I was going to say was… [chuckle] Completely forgot.

0:05:47.7 Jordan Syatt: You forgot the advice.

0:05:49.6 Mike Vacanti: Got real distracted by the thought…

0:05:52.3 Jordan Syatt: You forgot the advice…

0:05:52.4 Mike Vacanti: Oh, nope, I got it. What… It’s almost like you need to separate yourself from you the content creator. Because you the content creator, and there’s… Jordan’s yawning so hard, just making me feel terrible about the start of this advice, like, [laughter] he’s like, This is so boring, hurry up. You the content creator has different reasons for wanting to make content, but I’m going to say the primary reason, especially since this is a business/coaching podcast where we occasionally talk about that stuff, the primary purpose of making content is for growing your business, is for helping people with fitness stuff for free, that feels good because you’re helping people for free but also attracts attention, so you have the opportunity to sell to them, and so if we say that the primary reason that you, the content creator is making stuff is for attention, then both positive and negative feedback are good.

0:06:52.9 Mike Vacanti: It’s kind of the phrase ‘there is no bad press’ or the cliche, ‘there’s no bad press’. All attention is good attention. And I don’t remember where I heard this, but there’s… Essentially, if one of those people leaving negative feedback tells their friend like, “Hey, can you believe this idiot? He thinks that burpees are stupid and he wears wigs.” And like, “This guy is just such a clown, I hate him,” and then the friend goes to your page and is like, “Oh yeah, I agree, burpees do seem like they don’t have a real purpose and they’re just for coaches who are trying to tire you out and I actually think he’s pretty funny. I like his sense of humor.” They follow you, that person joins the Inner Circle in nine months, the fact that you had negative attention “hater” is a good thing for business. So reframing all feedback as a good thing, all views as a good thing, all… Jordan’s like, “Shut up Mike, you don’t even make content.”

0:07:50.0 Jordan Syatt: I can’t wait till you get negative feedback on one of your posts and you lose it. [laughter]

0:07:54.5 Mike Vacanti: You’re gonna be like, “Mike, all attention is positive. Go listen to episode 76.” Yeah, I’m going to, but I’m also… Where there’s smoke there’s fire, I’m hyping myself up for this mind test strategy, because the negative feedback isn’t even on me, it’s on the me that is making stuff for my business, it is on the marketing department of On The Regimen LLC. It’s not me the human being, it’s me the… This is why Gary always said… GaryVee is my side hustle, like Gary Vaynerchuk and GaryVee are different. They’re actually… It’s like… In Fight Club when…

0:08:36.3 Jordan Syatt: Great movie.

0:08:37.9 Mike Vacanti: Yeah, but Tyler Durden was like… That was him. It was the same…

0:08:42.8 Jordan Syatt: Schizophrenia. [laughter]

0:08:46.5 Mike Vacanti: Spoiler… But with a practical usage and application, which is you create an alter ego that is useful. It’s back to the Gary example, like GaryVee is my side hustle. GaryVee, the content creator, is not the same as Gary Vaynerchuk the person, and what happens to him is beneficial for the business, but isn’t… Obviously has a lot of his ideas and principles and values, but isn’t actually him, is a way to think about it. So just chew on that Jordan.

0:09:16.8 Jordan Syatt: Chew on that one.

[laughter]

0:09:20.5 Jordan Syatt: Maybe you’ll get it one day.

[laughter]

0:09:26.8 Jordan Syatt: But dude reels have really been crushing, reels are definitely the game…

0:09:29.8 Mike Vacanti: They’re popping.

0:09:31.5 Jordan Syatt: Yeah, yeah, they’re popping and they’re so easy to make, that’s the crazy part, is like… Reels have been so easy to make… I think it’s so funny because I see all these reels where people are doing voice-overs and learning all these dances and pointing, and I’m like, Man, that takes way more time than literally just taking 60 seconds to look into the camera and just give a quick lesson on something, it’s just the reels are… And it’s actually much easier ’cause… The longest part of Instagram used to be writing the captions, but now with reels, I don’t think as many people are reading the captions at all ’cause it’s not very user-friendly to read the captions on reels, ’cause the captions…

0:10:12.9 Mike Vacanti: It seems intentional.

0:10:13.9 Jordan Syatt: Yeah, yeah, it’s difficult to read because the video is directly behind it, and so it’s more important just to get the words out on video, which if you’re a video person, man, reels are just… They’re incredible.

0:10:26.8 Mike Vacanti: I’m excited.

0:10:29.3 Jordan Syatt: I can’t wait to see you back on the reel train.

0:10:31.3 Mike Vacanti: Back? Explain… Not on the reel train, but back on the reel train?

0:10:35.3 Jordan Syatt: Just back… Can’t wait to see you back, comma, on the reel train. [laughter]

0:10:41.4 Mike Vacanti: On the reel… On any train. I’d like to see just commuting.

0:10:46.3 Jordan Syatt: Or just commuting. [laughter]

0:10:48.8 Mike Vacanti: What else is happening?

0:10:51.5 Jordan Syatt: Let’s see, had a Jiu-Jitsu competition, won my first match, lost my second match, got choked out real bad, but…

0:11:00.8 Mike Vacanti: Choked him out in your first match.

0:11:01.3 Jordan Syatt: Yeah, choked my first guy out then I got choked out, but good learning experience. Always good to go against people better than you, so you can test your skill, and he was just straight up better than I was. It wasn’t like I made a mistake, he was just… He was really good. So that was fun.

0:11:18.4 Mike Vacanti: You sound to me like a professional athlete in a post-game interview.

0:11:25.3 Jordan Syatt: Oh yeah?

0:11:25.8 Mike Vacanti: You know how they’re always so polished and say the right thing and take the high road?

0:11:29.8 Jordan Syatt: Not always. [laughter] I’ve heard some bad ones. [laughter]

0:11:34.4 Mike Vacanti: But usually, like good PR training. Have you ever had PR training?

0:11:38.3 Jordan Syatt: No. I’m just thinking of… Was it Allen Iverson who was like, “We’re talking about practice? Practice? We aren’t even talking about the game, we’re talking about practice?” [laughter]

0:11:49.0 Mike Vacanti: Yeah that was AI. That was… That was an epic moment.

0:11:52.9 Jordan Syatt: That was one of the best clips of all time.

0:11:55.0 Mike Vacanti: But you know what I mean? For the most part, they have really good PR training, but that just comes with having Dale Carnegie being the reincarnation essentially. But way more jacked.

0:12:08.3 Jordan Syatt: I don’t know, you’ve been coming more Dale-like every day.

0:12:11.8 Mike Vacanti: It’s ’cause I learned from you.

0:12:12.4 Jordan Syatt: Alright… Dale.

0:12:13.5 Mike Vacanti: And by the way, I haven’t, but I am re-listening to…

0:12:18.0 Jordan Syatt: Are you listening? I know you said you listened to chapter one and you liked it. What was chapter one about? Their names?

0:12:21.9 Mike Vacanti: No Chapter One was Never criticize, complain, or… One other thing, but the emphasis was on not criticizing.

0:12:30.0 Jordan Syatt: Never criticize, complain and something else. [laughter]

0:12:30.8 Mike Vacanti: Basically that you’re not…

[laughter]

0:12:32.5 Mike Vacanti: Something else I forget. It wasn’t that good.

[laughter]

0:12:35.9 Mike Vacanti: You’re never going to change someone or elicit change or even help someone or win an argument by criticizing them. And even if they’re wrong, you don’t give them the opportunity to come to your side, call it or discover the correct answer because you put them on the defensive, and then they’re just gonna dig their heels in the sand and argue their point even harder by being criticized. You’re looking at me like, This is the most obvious thing that anyone’s ever said.

0:13:04.4 Jordan Syatt: No. I’m just… I’m shaking my head, ’cause I’m like, Man, what a real lesson. That should be what we should… We should dig into this more, ’cause people fucking love to criticize. They love to criticize. And we see it in coaches with their clients, we see it with coaches against other coaches, we see it with content creators against other content creators. We see it with people and their family members criticizing it. People fucking love it. And I think one of the most important things to realize is that good business… Being a good business owner does not necessitate everyone knowing that you were right. It is not a requisite of a successful business for you to be right all the time. In fact, I would say if you being right or making it known that you’re right makes other people feel criticized, it is bad for business. It’s a bad business strategy to make other people know you are right at the expense of someone else’s… I’m not gonna say feelings, but at the… At someone else… No, I’m not gonna say their feelings. It’s feelings… It’s not necessarily their feelings. It’s more about just you needing to make people know that you are right. That’s a bad look, and that leads to criticism.

0:14:32.6 Jordan Syatt: If you need to have that last like, Hey, I’m right about this, or like, No, you’re wrong, and here’s why, if you need to have that last say, that last word, you’re probably gonna suck in business. And I’ve… You and I have interacted with people like this. And I have one person top of mind right now who always needs people to know that they are right, and they always pick an argument, and they will not back down and, not surprised, their business is not doing anywhere near as well as they want it to do, because they’re always fucking picking arguments and fighting… If people say something to me that’s wrong, most of the time, I’ll be like, Oh cool, that sounds really nice. And that’s it. I’m not gonna be like, Well, actually, we’re gonna… I don’t do that, unless they specifically ask me for my opinion or thought on something. But if someone says like, Hey, this is working really well for me, you’re not gonna be like, Well, actually, that’s a really stupid idea, because… Shut the fuck up. You know what I mean?

0:15:29.4 Mike Vacanti: It’s such a good point. It’s so accurate. And it requires what I believe is emotional control and emotional discipline, because it feels good, or at least for me, and I think this is pretty universal, it feels good to be right, and it feels good to let a person know that you’re right, but you lose in business by doing it. I think Dale even says in the book something along the lines of, When you criticize, you get the positive emotion of… Something about like, You get the positive emotional release you’re looking for, but at the expense of their reaction, the damage to the relationship, the… If it’s online, the damage to the look, if you’re doing it in the comments section, how it looks to others on you, which is kinda reputation. But it requires something to swallow that emotion. I don’t know exactly what it is, but in the moment, it’s like a bitter pill. It doesn’t feel good to not get the last word and to just swallow it, but it is very beneficial in the mid to long-term.

0:16:38.3 Jordan Syatt: Yeah, yeah. Man, it’s such an… I’m glad he made that Chapter One. He must have been like, when he was planning out the book, he must’ve been like, What’s the most… Realistically, he must’ve be like, What’s the most important thing? What do most people suck at? And most people criticize and they just always need to be right. It’s like… It’s, Why do you need to be right? It’s literally… It’s your own ego. It’s an ego thing, and your ego will destroy your business and your relationships.

0:17:02.8 Mike Vacanti: Yeah. Is it hard for you though? If you get frustrated with someone…

0:17:08.7 Jordan Syatt: It depends on the person and it depends on the topic. I’ll give you an example. With my mom, it’s very difficult for me. With my mom, and that’s one of the reasons why my mom and I, we have some real debates. Now it’s also, I think, part of our culture. I wouldn’t necessarily say Jewish culture, but definitely the culture that I was brought up in with her. She’s a lawyer, she likes debating. Ever since we were a kid, she’s always encouraged debating but it… With my mom, I’m… It’s… I’m much more likely to say, No, that’s incorrect. And I think that comes with family and people who are much closer to you. It’s interesting, sometimes on social media, there’s such a distance between you that you can still say like, No, you’re fucking wrong. It’s easier to say that, because in the same way, it’s easier to criticize someone on social media, ’cause you’re not gonna get punched in the face. It’s easier to criticize someone on social media than it is in person. I think it’s easier to criticize either that someone that has a massive distance from you or someone that’s super close to you, that’s very, very, very close to you.

0:18:16.1 Jordan Syatt: That middle range tends to be where we maybe a little bit more politically correct and aware and maybe like, Okay, well, I don’t wanna push that button ’cause I don’t know their response, or, I just wanna be polite, whatever it is. But when politeness isn’t necessarily needed because there’s so much distance and/or because you’re so close to them, it’s easier to just say like, Whatever, I’m gonna be right. So with my mom is really the only one that I do that with.

0:18:40.8 Mike Vacanti: Yeah. You can “brawl” with your mom on a topic, and the next morning, you guys are just…

0:18:45.3 Jordan Syatt: Oh. Literally, we could brawl…

0:18:46.7 Mike Vacanti: It doesn’t impair the relationship.

0:18:48.9 Jordan Syatt: It doesn’t even go to the next morning. It’s like we could have a huge, huge debate, and then literally like, Okay, cool. I love you so much. Have a good night. And that’s it. And then it’s all forgotten and we could even go on and have a great conversation, but that’s a unique relationship that I think is not just for my mom and myself, but in general, having… You don’t have many of those relationships in your life, in your life as a whole… You know when you’re a kid and you’re just like… If you have a great childhood, you have a lot of friends, you’re like, I have friends, friends here, friends here, as you get older, you have fewer and fewer and fewer and fewer friends or just a couple of really close ones that you have, the number of people in my life that I could just full on debate with and know that once the debate is over, we’re still loving 100% is… I could count that on a couple of fingers.

0:19:37.3 Mike Vacanti: It’s a good topic. It’s a great book. It’s a must read.

0:19:40.9 Jordan Syatt: Yeah, I just think… I wanna think about how we can go more in on this ’cause… And I know… You know what I’m talking about. Some people just… They need to get the last word in, whether it’s with clients or on social media, it’s just… It’s not a good look and I’m really… And for some reason people really struggle with this. For me, I think I’m lucky ’cause it naturally comes to me and I just know… I know if there’s something to get out of… What… We need to get this video podcast up…

0:20:11.3 Mike Vacanti: It comes easy to you with Fitness Now, but if someone was debating certain topics, I think we talked about this…

0:20:20.2 Jordan Syatt: Politics, we’ll say.

0:20:22.7 Mike Vacanti: Or even just like Middle East specifically politics…

0:20:26.0 Jordan Syatt: You could say Israel.

[laughter]

0:20:34.3 Mike Vacanti: “I know you’re checked out Mike, you’re allowed to say Israel.”

0:20:35.0 Jordan Syatt: “I know… If we, uh… discuss, I don’t know the Middle East region of the world…”

[laughter]

0:20:47.0 Mike Vacanti: You would be less likely to give up that last word.

0:20:50.8 Jordan Syatt: Oh yeah. No, that’s one that I would definitely… Yeah, you’re right. It depends on the topic for sure, and I think I’m more desensitized to fitness stuff now, where I’m like, I’ve heard it all, whatever. I don’t give a shit. Believe whatever you want.

0:21:04.8 Mike Vacanti: “Carbs are the devil, okay. Never eat a carb again,” see ya.

0:21:08.8 Jordan Syatt: Somewhere in the Middle East discussion.

[laughter]

0:21:14.5 Jordan Syatt: That was so good. I can’t wait till you get the video for this, it’s gonna be so much better.

0:21:20.9 Mike Vacanti: Yeah, it’s hard to do for a lot of things, but it’s beneficial for… Especially… For any personal relationships, but especially when it comes to… I actually like the idea less in personal relationships, because there’s part of me that if an aggressive debate ends the friendship, was it really a friendship, if you can’t debate ideas strongly and then be on the same page. I think if you’re skirting the issue, it actually fractures the personal relationship, but when it comes to being a public-facing content creator and having a goal of growing a business that… It’s just good. It’s a good tactic we’ll call it.

0:22:03.6 Jordan Syatt: Yeah, yeah, yeah, that’s exactly right. This is sort of sliding off to a different topic, but that just made me think of big clip of Elon going viral after his offer to buy Twitter for $40 billion, which is insane, the discussion around free speech, and he was like, “Free speech is… Is someone that you don’t like allowed to say something that you don’t like, if they are then you have free speech, if not, then you don’t.” And I was just like, “Man, savage.” I love that. It’s like is someone that you don’t like allowed to say something that you don’t like, if not, then you don’t have free speech.

0:22:38.0 Mike Vacanti: That seems like a good definition.

0:22:40.7 Jordan Syatt: Yeah, I like that a lot.

0:22:42.6 Mike Vacanti: You think he’s gonna buy Twitter?

0:22:44.4 Jordan Syatt: Dude… Oh man, I don’t think they’re going to allow him to… I don’t think… I think there’s… This is going more into politics and stuff, but did you hear that Vanguard apparently bought the new highest share… Vanguard, apparently bought 10% of Twitter?

0:23:04.8 Mike Vacanti: I assume they already had a decent percentage and that they increased their stake because Elon bought 9.2% before and they increased their stake, so that they now own more than 10% of the company. I did see that.

0:23:18.7 Jordan Syatt: Yeah. So that makes me think… I think there’s so much going on behind the scenes right now with…

0:23:27.8 Mike Vacanti: That we don’t know.

0:23:28.2 Jordan Syatt: That we don’t know about. I think with politicians… I think it’s… Twitter is mainly a political platform, if we look at the majority of users, I think it’s mostly politicians and politics, news media, and I think that there’s a lot of scrambling behind the scenes right now to not allow him to do it, people are making chess moves to make it so that he can’t do that, ’cause if he did, there could be real… There would be, without question, real political changes as a result of it, the entire landscape would change and it would change the entire precedent of… This would just be the first move of many. I think it would be really cool if he did. I think it would be one of the most bad ass fucking moves of modern history, I think it would be written about in books, I think it could literally change… It could change the entire social media world, so I think it would be really cool to see that. I don’t know if they’re gonna let it happen.

0:24:32.3 Mike Vacanti: I think… I don’t know that Twitter would change as much as you think it would change. I think the main way that it would change is there would be far less censorship, far less deplatforming, far less banning for…

0:24:45.8 Jordan Syatt: Yeah, that’s what I think would happened.

0:24:48.0 Mike Vacanti: Oh, okay, okay. And that by keeping more people on that would change the dynamic of the platform.

0:24:54.6 Jordan Syatt: I think if Elon were to go in based on from what I’ve seen with him and just with… Politically, I think that he’s tired of censorship, which I think a huge portion of people are tired of censorship. For example, it doesn’t make sense… And I’ll preface this, just because of what I’m about to say, it doesn’t mean I support this individual, doesn’t mean… Keep that in mind. It doesn’t make sense that…

0:25:21.0 Mike Vacanti: Let ’em know Jordan. Let ’em know.

0:25:22.4 Jordan Syatt: It doesn’t make sense that Donald Trump…

0:25:23.2 Mike Vacanti: Don’t let them clip this.

0:25:24.5 Jordan Syatt: Doesn’t have a Twitter, but Al-Qaeda and the Taliban and Vladimir Putin and dictators around the world have Twitters. Why in the hell is Donald Trump not allowed to say something but these other dictators and terrorist organizations are allowed, it doesn’t make sense.

0:25:43.0 Mike Vacanti: 100%.

0:25:44.8 Jordan Syatt: And that’s why people don’t trust Twitter, they don’t trust social media platforms, and I think that Elon, in terms of free speech, he’s like, Hey, this isn’t right. I think if we’re gonna give people a platform, give them a platform, and we have to own that, so I think it would be far less censorship, and I think it would be a great opportunity for other social media platforms to stop the censorship that they’ve been having ’cause the censorship has been huge and has been quite frankly petrifying to see on such a large scale, and I think, again, the censorship that’s happened over the last couple of years will be written about in history books long after we’re gone so we won’t necessarily see it, but the things that we’ve been duped into, the things that we’ve been blinded by, the things that we weren’t allowed to see due to censorship, our grandkids and great grandkids and so on, will be like, Holy shit, I can’t believe that’s what happened at our ancestors?

0:26:44.9 Mike Vacanti: Yeah, I agree. You need open communication with people you disagree with to reach resolution and to reach compromise and by banning people because you disagree with them… And sure you can say like, Well, they did something that violated the terms and conditions and this is a publicly traded company, and they’re allowed to do this, and that’s actually correct.

0:27:08.0 Jordan Syatt: That is correct.

0:27:10.6 Mike Vacanti: It doesn’t mean that having tight TOC to make it easier to deplatform people is good for society at large and is good for all of us, because it’s important to… Like I just said, it’s important to have open dialogue with people you disagree with, whether it’s on a giant national and global scale, or whether it’s within your neighborhood or within your family.

0:27:36.2 Jordan Syatt: And I agree, if it’s someone else who owns the company, they can do whatever they want with it, they can deplatform however they want, fine, I agree with that, but then if Elon buys it and makes it a private company, then you can’t get mad at him if he allows them to come back, and that’s where I see people getting upset about like… First, do people get mad because we’re like, Well, you can’t just deplatform and censor these people, it’s like, Well, no you can because it’s their company, fine cool, but then if Elon owns it, buys it back and now it’s his company, well cool, now you can’t be upset about it because it’s his company now. And the other thing is, a lot of people… This is what a lot of people don’t… They really struggle with this. This is really a difficult topic for people to hear about in the same way that I think making stand-up comedy can be difficult for people, like some people don’t understand how comics can make jokes about certain situations. I am of the opinion, and I have said this a million times, you can joke about literally anything, there could be… I don’t… There’s nothing that’s off limits.

0:28:32.1 Jordan Syatt: And trying to censor someone’s speech, it’s very dangerous, and so I know a lot of people say, Well, we’re censoring them because they have dangerous ideas, that is one of the single most dangerous things that could ever come out of someone’s mouth, we’re censoring them because they have dangerous ideas. That is the sign of a dictator, that is how major wars has broken out, that’s how genocides happen, when a group of people decide to not allow someone to speak because of their ideas. That is why the First Amendment is the most important of all the amendments because it allows everyone to speak their mind, and even if you don’t agree with them, and especially if you don’t agree with them, they should still be able to speak their mind. I don’t care if it’s a “dangerous idea,” you can’t censor that because where does that end? Then someone always…

0:29:23.6 Mike Vacanti: Who decides what a dangerous idea is too?

0:29:28.7 Jordan Syatt: Yeah.

0:29:29.2 Mike Vacanti: And not to mention the way that you beat a dangerous idea is with open dialogue and good ideas.

0:29:34.9 Jordan Syatt: Correct.

0:29:35.7 Mike Vacanti: And healthy debate and open communication, and then maybe it was a dangerous idea or maybe it wasn’t.

0:29:43.1 Jordan Syatt: There are always… Then some people say, Well, you know, not all speech is free, for example, you can’t go into a movie theater and yell “fire,” I’m like, Well, of course, that’s because that’s an incitement, that’s like if you’re… In the same way, I can’t say I’ll give someone… I can’t tweet out or I can’t put out publicly, I’m gonna give someone X amount of dollars to murder this person, of course, that’s illegal because that’s… I’m inciting someone to violence. If you’re in a crowded movie theater and you yell “fire,” well, now you’re inciting people to get up, you could be trampled, you could get really hurt, that makes sense. But in terms of expressing ideas that is different, that is… Express… It’s different to express a thought or idea than it is to incite someone to action, that is two very different things, and that has to be understood and people get really upset when you have that discussion, but there should be nothing off-limits in terms of what you can say about what you think.

0:30:35.4 Mike Vacanti: When did we start hating Elon collectively? Because I remember in ’13, ’14, ’15, ’16, he was like this tech god, this innovator, this cool Tony Stark character, liked from all ends of the political spectrum. Is it… Is he hated because of in the last several years, this general disdain for the wealthiest in our society or…

0:31:01.4 Jordan Syatt: Yes. That was what I was about to say.

0:31:02.7 Mike Vacanti: That’s why.

0:31:03.7 Jordan Syatt: I think it’s because…

0:31:06.8 Mike Vacanti: Income inequality and it’s just like, Okay, anyone who has billions, they shouldn’t be allowed to have that much no matter how they got it, and that’s wrong and they’re a bad person.

0:31:15.5 Jordan Syatt: Yeah, I mean, people could see that Jeff Bezos built Amazon from literally nothing, they can see that and know that he wasn’t just gifted billions of dollars, but they’re not gonna like him because he has so much money, ’cause he has billions and billions and billions of dollars, same thing with Elon, where it’s like… It’s a… I think there’s a certain… There will always be a group of people that no matter what, they say tag lines like, “Billionaires shouldn’t exist.” It’s like, that to me, doesn’t make any sense. Not to mention how many jobs they create, how much of the economy they fuel, how much they contribute. How fucking awesome was it when Ukraine was like, “Hey Elon, we need help.” And they tweeted to Elon like, “Hey, we need help with this server.” And Elon was like, “Cool, done.” In an hour, he got it for them, an individual, not a government, not anything, they tweeted to Elon and Elon got it done because of what he’s been able to create. Get the fuck outta here, people who just hate someone because they have… “Billionaires shouldn’t exist,” Shut up, c’mon, what a stupid tagline to stand behind, it’s stupid.

0:32:19.7 Mike Vacanti: I’m with you, this could be a two-hour podcast about this alone, but we don’t need to dive in.

0:32:25.1 Jordan Syatt: Or we could. We could go more.

[laughter]

0:32:30.3 Mike Vacanti: I love it, I love this discussion. If you’re feeling this discussion, drop a five star, we always like positive reviews, positive feedback, and negative feedback is good too, ’cause it’s attention as we’ve discussed, but positive is even better for the podcasting world, and let’s dive into some Q&A, drop some fitness knowledge, coaching knowledge, business knowledge, let’s see what you got.

0:32:51.3 Jordan Syatt: Alright, “Med student here. What’s something you wish doctors did better when you see them?”

0:32:58.9 Mike Vacanti: It’s a good question. I don’t like criticizing. I like… It doesn’t feel like it’s my place to… “Don’t criticize the speck in your brother’s eye when you have a plank in your own eye.” I don’t feel like I’m in any position to talk about reformation of the health and medical industry.

0:33:30.5 Jordan Syatt: Medical community. I’ll give some thoughts, I’ll give some thoughts based on not necessarily on what all doctors are doing poorly, but on what I’ve seen when I have an experience with a good experience versus when I have a poor experience. So the doctors that I have known, I have a great experience with are the ones that essentially have the most empathy. So when I walk in there, and I was speaking to Susan about this, ’cause Susan’s… She’s had issues with some AFib recently, and Susan was saying how sometimes she’ll go into the doctor and they’ll just be so nonchalant in terms of like, she’s worried, she has a real issue and they’re just sort of brushing it off like, “Yeah, it’s fine. Yeah, it’s fine.” And she’s like, “Well, hold on, I don’t feel that way and I need a little bit of reassurance.”

0:34:24.6 Jordan Syatt: And I think sometimes doctors like in any field, the more you do something, the more resistant to it you get, the more used to it you get, and it’s easy just to forget that the person you’re dealing with is a real person with feelings and emotions, and I think some doctors would do really well to remember that your patient might be nervous, might be anxious, and not necessarily to give them false hope, ’cause I know doctors can’t do that, doctors can’t just say, “Oh, it’s gonna be fine.” I know they can’t say that because that could be incorrect and there are a lot of potential legal issues, ethical issues with that, but just… And I know they’re rushed and they have a huge backlog of patients coming in dadada, but just like being a little bit more empathetic on the whole and understanding like, “Hey, I know you’re feeling nervous right now, we’re gonna get to you as soon as we can, and I promise, we’re gonna give you a full update once we have all the information.” Just something like that could be enough to calm the nerves, to make them feel a little bit heard, that’s what I would think.

0:35:25.2 Mike Vacanti: I think that’s a great idea. I’ll throw the stone that I wasn’t gonna throw. I don’t know how this practically gets implemented, but… And I don’t even know that it can, or I wouldn’t know how, but the focus on essentially being mostly reactive compared to preventative is a shift that would benefit all of us.

0:35:54.7 Jordan Syatt: Oh yeah.

0:35:55.0 Mike Vacanti: Rather than wait until it’s too late and then throw medication at it, which isn’t what a lot of doctors do, but in general, moving along the continuum of being a little bit less reactive and a little bit more preventative, would serve everyone well, which I think is actually something we as coaches are a part of the solution of, I think that getting people focused on their health, their weight lifting, their cardio, their nutrition, their sleep, their stress management, all of these things we do for our clients is preventative and is making them healthier, and it’s actually one of maybe reason number three or four, but in the YouTube video that I made that may be up right now, I talk about that being an actual motivator in addition to other things, but the fact that we in the West are really struggling with our health, and I think that many of the ideas that we share on this podcast regularly, many of the things we talk about, all the things that Jordan crushes in his content, are ideas that when implemented are really helping people become healthier, have higher quality of life, live longer, feel better. And so I guess I would like to see more of that from doctors, I’m not sure how that gets done though.

0:37:16.0 Jordan Syatt: Yeah. I’m actually gonna tag onto that, that just made me think of something that has nothing to do with doctors, but… And we might have spoken about this before, but I really think a lot of coaches… This is a direct message to all the coaches listening to this, I think a lot of coaches really underestimate the value of what they say on social media about health and fitness. If you really think about it, the people who have the most direct impact on our society as a whole’s health and fitness, not even just like domestically, I’m talking international impact, worldwide across the health and fitness of the entire world.

0:38:01.2 Jordan Syatt: It’s you. It is the individual with your voice on your platform, it’s, the amount of impact that you can make in people’s health, in society at large is fucking insane. You don’t need a huge audience to do it, you don’t… Helping one person changes society as a whole. It is a massive, massive, massive wave-like impact that impacts an individual, which can impact their family, which can impact more families, which can impact generations, which can impact so much with just what you have to say. And I know we have the CDC, and we have the World Health Organization, we have all these different programs and companies and da da da, no one looks at those companies for health advice. Not to mention they’re not really giving away good health… They’re not being like, “Hey, let’s make sure you’re doing this type of exercise, let’s make sure you’re doing this technique.” So much of what they talk about is actually more reactionary rather than preventative, and that’s actually been a major issue over the last couple of years. There’s been very little discussion around movement and exercise and sleep and getting outside. In fact, sometimes even the opposite, it’s the voice that you have, don’t underestimate that.

0:39:26.3 Jordan Syatt: The voice that you have… Forget your business, let’s just talk about leaving a legacy behind that people can look back on in terms of how you helped people, the type of person that you were. It’s like the voice that you have to change the health of society as a whole is unbelievably powerful, and I think far more powerful than many of these massive organizations. So if you’re not making content, you’re thinking about it, you’re not sure if it’s worth it, shut the fuck up and start making content. It can change people’s lives forever.

0:40:00.9 Mike Vacanti: Preach.

0:40:04.8 Jordan Syatt: Okay, let’s see. “Is it appropriate to say mazel tov to my Jewish friend, who just had a baby boy? Thank you in advance.” Yes, mazel tov is a… Or mazel tov is…

0:40:16.7 Mike Vacanti: Hang on, hang on, hang on.

0:40:17.7 Jordan Syatt: What?

0:40:18.2 Mike Vacanti: I’d like to field this one.

0:40:20.1 Jordan Syatt: Okay, you answer this one.

0:40:21.0 Mike Vacanti: Feel like I’d… I’m just kidding. [laughter]

0:40:22.8 Jordan Syatt: You answer this one, you know more about Judaism than I do.

[laughter]

0:40:30.5 Jordan Syatt: What is it Mike, what’s the answer?

0:40:32.6 Mike Vacanti: Well, I pronounce it mazel tov. And yeah, I say it to my Jewish friends for celebratory moments.

0:40:38.3 Jordan Syatt: Yeah, yeah, it’s Congratulations. So it is a good question because you don’t say it when someone gets pregnant, so you don’t say congratulations to someone to… For example, when we found out when my wife was pregnant, in Judaism you don’t say, “Congratulations,” because there’s a lot of superstition in Judaism… And so you don’t wanna say congratulations before the baby is born. There’s actually no baby showers in Judaism for that reason, because you’re essentially celebrating the baby before it’s born and superstition, you don’t wanna jinx it essentially. So in Hebrew, what you would say is, you’d say B’sha’ah tovah, like in, which is essentially saying, “in the coming hours,” is what it translates to, but “all in good time,” is sort of what it means. And then you say mazel tov or mazel tov or congratulations once they’re actually born.

0:41:37.6 Mike Vacanti: What’s the difference between the two that you’re saying?

0:41:39.2 Jordan Syatt: It’s the exact same thing, and one is just saying it really White, and the other one is just saying it a little bit more properly. So you see…

0:41:46.5 Mike Vacanti: I got a lot of Northern Euro in my genetics, I say mazel tov.

0:41:51.8 Jordan Syatt: You’re like “maaaaazel tov” [laughter]

0:41:54.3 Mike Vacanti: Yeah.

0:41:55.3 Jordan Syatt: But if you’re saying it a little bit more correct in terms of dialect, you say mazel tov.

0:42:01.7 Mike Vacanti: That’s good to know. I don’t think… I don’t think I have the tongue mobility for that. Also, you can just copy what other people are saying.

0:42:09.0 Jordan Syatt: Yeah.

0:42:10.6 Mike Vacanti: On some group threads, that’s what I’ll do, if I see a few mazels in a row, I’ll throw one out there too.

0:42:16.0 Jordan Syatt: It’s interesting, in English, we emphasize… We generally emphasize the syllable earlier in the word, whereas in Hebrew, you emphasize the syllable later in the word. So in English, you say mazel tov. In Hebrew you say mazel tov, so it’s like, you can hear the first syllable in A, ‘Ma’ versus ‘Mazel.’ Does that makes sense. So it’s like…

0:42:37.0 Mike Vacanti: Yeah, definitely.

0:42:38.0 Jordan Syatt: The English, you emphasize the syllable earlier in the word, which is just one way to make the accent a little bit better.

0:42:41.6 Mike Vacanti: That makes sense.

0:42:42.8 Jordan Syatt: So it’s sort of like everyone knows Shalom, but it’s like, Shalom, it sounds super White when you say it, where it’s like… It’s not like Shalom, it’s like Shalom.

0:42:52.3 Mike Vacanti: Super English would actually be technically correct, right? Not super White.

[laughter]

0:42:56.7 Mike Vacanti: No, no, no, seriously, I’m… Right?

0:43:02.0 Jordan Syatt: I’m making it a racial issue.

[laughter]

0:43:05.2 Jordan Syatt: So White.

0:43:05.6 Mike Vacanti: We got Elon Musk, we got…

[laughter]

0:43:10.6 Mike Vacanti: Here’s why I ask ’cause I have many… You’re not my only Jewish friend, Jordan, I have many Jewish friends, but I think they’re probably…

0:43:16.7 Jordan Syatt: Many?

0:43:18.3 Mike Vacanti: Yeah.

[laughter]

0:43:20.4 Mike Vacanti: You want me to… I’ll dig… I’ll name some names right now. I could rattle off more names… And what’s your over-under of how many names I’m about to drop?

0:43:29.3 Jordan Syatt: Four.

0:43:30.5 Mike Vacanti: Higher.

[laughter]

0:43:38.5 Mike Vacanti: It’s, I’ve only heard mazel tov, but I also don’t think that they have spent time in Israel, and so I think maybe that has something to do with it. They probably speak less Hebrew than you, they…

0:43:50.0 Jordan Syatt: Yeah, last time in the Middle East.

[laughter]

0:43:58.5 Mike Vacanti: Yeah. But what you’re saying is that the way that I’m pronouncing it is more with an English accent compared to how it would be said in Israel.

0:44:10.3 Jordan Syatt: Yeah, yeah, more White.

[laughter]

0:44:16.0 Mike Vacanti: I’d like to be technically correct about this thing.

0:44:20.1 Jordan Syatt: Listen, don’t criticize, Mike, we already spoke about that.

[laughter]

0:44:25.0 Mike Vacanti: I’m really trying to get to the bottom of this, and I feel like Jordan’s making it a big joke.

[laughter]

0:44:29.5 Jordan Syatt: Alright, next question.

0:44:32.8 Mike Vacanti: No, no, no, why have all of my Jewish friends… Why does no one say it that way? Are they just not as…

0:44:39.4 Jordan Syatt: Yeah, well, there’s different dialects as well…

0:44:42.3 Mike Vacanti: They’re jusr saying it more English?

0:44:44.8 Jordan Syatt: It’s funny… If anyone’s Jewish listening, they’re gonna laugh when they hear this. But everyone knows… Not everyone, but a lot of people know the Jewish prayer often starts with Baruch atah Adonai, right? Baruch atah Adonai, Eloheinu melech ha’olam, if you’ve ever been to a Bar Mitzvah, you’ve heard that phrase. For whatever reason, a lot of the very old Jews from Eastern Europe, they say, Baruch atah Adonai, and it’s wild like, for me, I’ve always wanted to do a stand-up skit about this because there’s… At a certain age, for whatever reason, they stop saying Adonai, and they say Adon-oy, and it’s like Baruch atah Adon-oy, and they always do it. And so there’s different dialects, you have Ashkenazi, you have Sephardic, you have different areas in the Middle East where they might come from, so it’s different regions will say something a little bit differently, but generally speaking, it’s sort of like, you have anyone with an accent and they start speaking English, they’re gonna say things a little bit differently just because they have that accent. So you have a lot of people who maybe they’re born in America, and they learn Hebrew at Hebrew school, but they don’t learn the accent, so they say things a little bit incorrectly, or not, as they would say in Israel.

0:46:03.9 Mike Vacanti: Understood.

0:46:05.0 Jordan Syatt: Does that make sense?

0:46:06.3 Mike Vacanti: Mm-hmm.

0:46:07.1 Jordan Syatt: Just very White.

[laughter]

0:46:19.3 Jordan Syatt: Alright, someone said, “Track macros, if I hit proteins and fat intake is higher than carbohydrates, how will that affect…”

0:46:27.3 Mike Vacanti: Jordan comes off of this discussion, he’s like, Oh macros, this will put him in a good mood.

[laughter]

0:46:33.0 Jordan Syatt: It’s exactly right… That’s right.

[laughter]

0:46:37.9 Mike Vacanti: Keep going, I’m already excited.

0:46:41.4 Jordan Syatt: “Tracking macros, if I hit my protein numbers and my fat intake is higher than carbohydrates, how is that going to affect my body composition?”

0:46:50.4 Mike Vacanti: So proteins on point, they’re a little over on fat, a little under on carbs and calories are on point, I assume?

0:46:55.1 Jordan Syatt: Yeah, we’ll assume that.

0:46:56.3 Mike Vacanti: It’s not going to affect your body composition.

0:47:00.5 Jordan Syatt: Okay.

0:47:00.5 Mike Vacanti: That’s basically all that needs to be said. At the extremes of very high fat, very low carb, it can be detrimental primarily to training performance and especially for more like bodybuilding sal training or training in upper ranges that require glycogen as the primary fuel source and very low fat, very high carb, but you gotta be very low fat and you have to be very intentional about it, can be detrimental from a hormonal perspective, but realistically, if you’re within a reasonable range on carbs and fats, it doesn’t matter if you’re going over or under, but just make sure you’re not over by 60 grams of fat and under by 10 grams of carbs, which would drive calories to be way over, like protein close, calories close, and then if carbs and fat are a little off, you’re fine. If carbs and fat are way off and one is extraordinarily low, there could be some downside to that.

0:48:03.5 Jordan Syatt: “Does going for a walk count as NEAT or EAT?” And for anyone who doesn’t know, NEAT is non-exercise activity thermogenesis and EAT is exercise activity thermogenesis. It’s sort of like a… It’s sort of minutia detail, but it’s important as a coach to understand the difference between the two, so Mike, does going for a walk count as NEAT or EAT? Is it exercise or is it non-exercise, is essentially what it’s asking.

0:48:32.6 Mike Vacanti: I think going for a walk I would throw under exercise activity thermogenesis. It’s intentional activity, even if you’re not doing it specifically to burn calories, like you’re out, you’re going for a walk, it’s different from washing dishes or raking leaves or some activity that has a different end. Going for a walk, kinda the… It’s not a means to an end, where… Movement is a means to getting the dishes clean, going for a walk is an end in itself, and that end is movement, so I would… We’re splitting hairs a little, but I would put it under EAT.

0:49:11.4 Jordan Syatt: Yeah, I agree, I really think it depends on why you’re doing what you’re doing, and that’s where I think where some people get confused. If you’re taking your dog on a walk because your dog needs to go out to use the bathroom and needs to get steps in, I would consider that NEAT, but if you’re deliberately going on a walk just for yourself to get movement in, that is EAT. That’s exercise activity. If you are doing something specifically for exercise purposes, that is inherently not NEAT, because NEAT is anything you’re doing that has nothing to do with planned exercise, it’s just you do it as part of living. So some people… Like someone who has a dog will probably have a higher NEAT than someone who doesn’t have a dog, because if you’re out there walking your dog every day, that’s not planned exercise, that’s because you gotta get your dog out, that’s your responsibility. So oftentimes, I do wonder in the research where we see some people have 700… And they burn 700 calories a day more from NEAT than other people. Sometimes I wonder like, did they have a dog? You know what I mean? What was going on in their life that caused that… Such a higher calorie burn from non-exercise activity thermogenesis, so it’s completely splitting hairs, it’s super minutia.

0:50:31.8 Jordan Syatt: Your clients do not need to know this, it’s not a conversation you need to have with them, but I do see a lot of people using NEAT incorrectly, like they say, “Go on a walk to increase your NEAT,” and I’m like, well, technically, that’s incorrect. It’s planned exercise, so it’s EAT, but it doesn’t fucking matter, just move.

0:50:51.1 Mike Vacanti: Yeah.

0:50:51.8 Jordan Syatt: “How do I motivate my son to lose some weight he gained at university?”

0:50:56.1 Mike Vacanti: That’s a good question. I don’t know that you do, and I think it really depends on what are we talking about here? Did he put on the Freshman 15 and he’s… Went there lean and just got a little chunk to him now, or are we talking about someone who gained a lot of weight in the 18 to 22-year-old range and put themselves in a position where they’re… I don’t know why Jordan thinks this is funny, but puts them in a position where they’re unhealthy or potentially unhealthy because the answer…

0:51:29.2 Jordan Syatt: I’m thinking of the story that you told me, when you were in college, when you decided [laughter] that… I’m literally holding my breath, [laughter] trying not to laugh.

0:51:40.5 Mike Vacanti: This is basically when my life changed, I don’t know if this story has ever been told, but there was… For some reason at my freshman dorm, we had a bunch of… ‘Cause our hockey buddies, the guys a grade below us, we were good friends with, a nd they were seniors in high school, and they came to visit Wisconsin for, might have been Halloween, it was a big party there, and there was a picture taken of someone in their boxers in the bathroom, bent over, and I don’t know what was going on, and back then people would upload their entire camera roll to Facebook, it wasn’t even…

0:52:22.7 Jordan Syatt: There was no… It was like “Oh, let’s upload all these to Facebook.” [laughter]

0:52:25.6 Mike Vacanti: No tagging, yeah, so some random blurry picture with one guy is brushing his teeth and one guy is standing there and you can’t see faces, and I was like, “Oh man Schooper,” one of our buddies, gained a few love handles, lower back…

0:52:43.1 Jordan Syatt: Schooper is looking pretty chunky. [laughter]

0:52:45.5 Mike Vacanti: He’s looking all thick in this one, and they’re like, “That ain’t Schoop.” I’m like, “Huh.” They’re like, “That’s you.” I was like, “What?” I was like, “Oh, those are my Tommy Hilfiger boxer shorts.” I was like, “Oh man, I need to dial things in.” Because in that first semester, we had access to the cafeteria, our chefs, Otis and Rico, who were absolute beasts would… The tomato bisque soup, the chicken patty with Velveeta cheese on it, just all of the extra calories and you had a swipe card, so you weren’t paying out of card, and loading up, filling up on food, drinking on the weekends. Living like a degenerate, and I saw that picture and I was like, [laughter] “Okay, time to dial things in.” So it was grilled chicken for me after that and started getting after the weights a little bit more and…

0:53:42.5 Jordan Syatt: You got on the regimen.

0:53:43.4 Mike Vacanti: Eat more fruit and I got on the regimen, that’s correct.

0:53:47.1 Jordan Syatt: So what you’re saying is, show them a picture, show this person… [laughter]

0:53:53.8 Mike Vacanti: Yeah, it’s so tricky ’cause with parent to child, it really depends on your relationship, depends on history, depends on… Has your son or daughter struggled with their weight before, is this kind of a first time thing, is nutrition and exercise something that you guys talk about as a family, that you participate in as a family, is it kind of foreign to you? I think it’s a delicate situation. I think the worst mistake you make is, without context, is being that overbearing critical parent because… Tying the episode in full circle, going straight at him, your son, and criticizing him and telling him he needs to do X, can only make him dig his heels in and go the opposite direction.

0:54:40.3 Jordan Syatt: Yeah, yeah, that’s exactly right. There’s… Nothing good is gonna come from criticizing them, and this goes for anybody, whether you’re a coach, whatever it is, criticizing people, shaming them is not going to help them make the change that they need to change. That they know they need to change. I think one of the most important parts was, you brought up early on, you were talking about how… Alright, does it matter if… Not does it matter, you were talking about if… Did they just gain the Freshman 15 or was it a ton of weight, did they gain 50 to 100 pounds over their time, if it’s becoming a real health issue, then you can start to have conversations and discuss, “Listen, nothing… ” I wouldn’t say anything negative. I would say like, “Hey, are you alright? Let’s talk and if you need help, I’m happy to find you help with a nutritionist or with a psychologist.” I would honestly try to let them know you’re there to support them without you being the one to necessarily try and institute change. I think if you could outsource that… Working with family is super difficult, giving advice to family is super difficult, that just as long as you know you support them and you’re there to help them get the help they need, it should be as little with you as possible and the majority with a professional, even if you are a professional, I think the majority should be with someone else because working with family is very difficult.

0:56:09.7 Jordan Syatt: If it’s just like the Freshman 15 or 20, I’m not worried about it. They’re in college. I think that’s a very normal part of college, and it’s not a real health risk in a lot… It happens a lot, so I wouldn’t worry about that at all and if that was the case, I wouldn’t even bring it up. And I definitely wouldn’t do the thing that a lot of family members and friends do, where they make fun of them for it, they tease him for like, “Oh, clearly gained the Freshman 15.” I would not do that, like, “Looking a little thick.” I wouldn’t do that, I would just ignore it and just… It’s just part of college, I think, and part of… There are different seasons in life, sometimes you’ll gain weight, sometimes you’ll lose weight, but if it gets like either they lose a lot of weight or they gain a lot of weight, that’s when a conversation needs to be had, and just started with letting them know how much you love them and that you’re there for them no matter what.

0:57:00.3 Mike Vacanti: I love it. Great answer. Full circle, first full circle. There’s no such thing as a White accent.

0:57:09.9 Jordan Syatt: [chuckle] This has really been in your head. [laughter] Bro, I’m joking.

0:57:16.6 Mike Vacanti: No, no, but I’m curious. Are you talking about a Western English accent?

0:57:20.0 Jordan Syatt: No, I’m saying, it’s… Michael Scott says it all the time, Michael Scott will joke around and be like, “God, you’re so White.” And he’s like the whitest of the White, it’s just a joke man, come on.

0:57:30.3 Mike Vacanti: Yeah, but most of your jokes make sense and this one didn’t.

0:57:33.2 Jordan Syatt: It does make sense, you’re just… You’re so upset by how society has vilified White men that when I said that it really pressed a button.

0:57:41.4 Mike Vacanti: That’s probably true. [laughter]

0:57:46.4 Jordan Syatt: White men have become the most hated group of all groups, and as soon as I make a joke about it, you’re like, “But it’s, it’s not White… ” [laughter]

0:58:00.7 Mike Vacanti: [laughter] It was also incorrect. Blood in the veins. ISTJ. I’m just… We can set the joke aside, but what you actually mean is an English accent.

0:58:08.0 Jordan Syatt: I don’t know if it’s English, because I’m pretty sure English is British. I don’t… Is there, A, an English accent? I would imagine is like a… Found in England.

0:58:16.4 Mike Vacanti: Oh, okay, in… Found in America. An American accent.

0:58:18.0 Jordan Syatt: An American accent. Yeah. But even then, if we really wanna dig deeper, which is, now, we’re no longer making the joke funny. When you break a joke down like this is now it is no longer going to be funny. The American accent…

0:58:26.6 Mike Vacanti: It’s okay. I wanna understand. But I wanna understand what you meant.

0:58:27.5 Jordan Syatt: What’s American? Because Texas is American, Northeast, the Pacific Northwest… They have so many different accents in America. That’s why the joke is just “You’re so White… ” It’s almost… It’s funny ’cause it doesn’t even really make sense, especially coming from a White guy, so it’s… You know what I mean?

0:58:45.7 Mike Vacanti: Yeah, but I also… But you’re kind of White-passing. Because of the Jewish White thing, ever since the Whoopi Goldberg incident, I don’t know.

[laughter]

0:58:56.9 Jordan Syatt: Oh, I got a lot of people ask me about my thoughts on the Whoopi Goldberg incident. So, it’s funny. Some Jews say that… This is actually a huge discussion among Jews. Some Jews are like, “No, we’re not a race.” And other Jews are like, “Yes, we are a race.” I am very… I think that Judaism is a race. I do think that. But I’m White, right? Clearly, I’m fucking White, but I’m Jewish, which like it’s… This is honestly one of the reasons why I hate all these identity politics, because it’s like, “Why are we… ” I don’t know. “Why the fuck does it matter?” I just don’t like identity politics, I don’t know why it matters. But this is a whole big debate, right? It’s like, “I’m Jewish and my skin color is white, but when I go to the Middle East, I get really tan and people think that I’m not.” It’s like… You know what I mean? It’s like, “I don’t fucking know,” but that’s like a whole philosophical debate that we could really get into in terms of whether or not Judaism is a race, and I believe it is. But yeah.

0:59:56.8 Mike Vacanti: Well, it… Yeah, and it’s culture. It’s the only thing that’s also religion, also culture, and also… And it’s not… You gotta break out race as skin color versus a country demographic, right?

1:00:12.1 Jordan Syatt: Mm-hmm.

1:00:14.4 Mike Vacanti: It’s like, “Oh, that person’s White.” It’s like, “Well, is he Irish, or is he Italian, or is he Norwegian?”

1:00:19.8 Jordan Syatt: Right.

1:00:20.1 Mike Vacanti: “Are you Jewish? Are you Russian?” Because it… Wouldn’t that be what your… Your 23andMe would say that you’re… Ashkenazi Jew is Russian, right?

1:00:32.9 Jordan Syatt: Not necessarily so. It’s…

1:00:34.9 Mike Vacanti: Or the majority of…

1:00:35.5 Jordan Syatt: Ashkenazi is just Eastern European. So it could be Russian, it could be Hungarian, it could be Latvian, it could be Polish… Anywhere Eastern Europe, it could be in any of those areas.

1:00:46.3 Mike Vacanti: Okay.

1:00:47.1 Jordan Syatt: But, I mean… For example, for example… And this is one of the arguments or discussion points around why Judaism is a race, is because, for example, in Russia, and also in Germany, and all over the world, Jews haven’t been allowed to be citizens. So for example, in Russia, Jews weren’t allowed to be citizens. In Germany, Jews weren’t allowed to be citizens. Well, literally, on their passport, it did not say “Russian citizen”, did not say “German”, it said “Jew.” So, they were not allowed to be a citizen because… Not because of the color of their skin, but because of their race, which they said they are a Jew, that’s their race. And the Nuremberg Race Laws of Germany explicitly denied people the ability to marry a Jewish individual, to have kids with a Jewish individual, based on that race of them being Jewish. So that… I think race goes further than skin color in many situations. So yeah, that’s barely breaking the discussion… Breaking open in discussion of why Judaism is also a race. But yeah… It’s… It would be…

1:01:50.0 Jordan Syatt: My family probably came from Russia and Hungary, but they weren’t actually Russian. They were not allowed to say they were Russian. They didn’t have the rights of Russian citizens. For example, that’s why my great-grandfather came from Russia when he was 12 years old, because Jews at… Jewish boys, at 12 years old, under Czar Nicholas, were required to join the Russian Army. And if you Google this, it will come right up. It’ll… And I know this verbatim, 12-year-old Jewish boys were put at the front lines of Czar Nicholas’s army to specifically be used as what they called “cannon fodder,” because they wanted to try and get rid of the Jews. So they would take 12-year-old boys, and put them in their front lines, and they were the first ones to die. So my great-grandfather, when he was 12, he escaped Russia and came in to the United States, and that’s how we got here. But yeah, so that’s why… That’s one aspect of why it’s a whole debate around, “Is Judaism a race or not?”

1:02:46.6 Mike Vacanti: Have you had to go into this… Have any body positivity influencers been like “This fat-phobic, fat-loss, straight White male, calorie-believing guru, Instagram, whatever,” and you had to be like, “Actually, I’m Jewish.” [chuckle] Has that happened yet?

1:03:05.9 Jordan Syatt: I’ve never done that, just because… I think, it could be a bad look for… I think, it would be a bad look, because essentially, I’m not a fan of playing identity politics. Period. And if I deny that… If I was like, “No, well, actually, I’m Jewish,” I’m still playing identity politics. And I’m essentially saying, “Well, no, it’s okay for me to say that because I’m not White, I’m Jewish.” And it’s like, “No, no, no. Let’s get out of this skin color game, and let’s just discuss what I said, rather than you pointing to the color of my skin or my religion.” So I don’t even bring that up because my skin color, my religion is irrelevant to what’s actually being said. So that’s why I would never actually say that. Or I never have said that. You know what I mean?

1:03:55.5 Mike Vacanti: Debate the idea. Yes, it makes complete sense.

1:03:58.2 Jordan Syatt: Yeah.

1:04:00.1 Mike Vacanti: Great episode. I feel like this is a real ‘moth becoming a butterfly’ episode of life, episode 75-76, wherever we are. Thank you very much for listening. We enjoyed having you, we enjoyed this conversation. Please leave a five-star review, if you have not already. And have a tremendous week.

1:04:16.6 Jordan Syatt: Have a great one. We’ll talk to you soon.