Novelist Jordan Castro on lifting culture, masculinity, and why getting jacked is a spiritual practice

called The Novelist? Yes. What inspired that? That's it's kind of like uh it's recursive. Yeah. Oh, well, I I wanted to say first of all, thanks for having me. Of course. Of course. Um you know, I Yeah. I um uh and shouts out to Norman Plays in the chat. Someone just showed me they said I'm here for Jordan Castro.

Let's go. It's not norman. Um um um but yeah, I I I uh I write novels, but I also um you know, you guys had the pope up talking about the pope and I I I work with this guy Luke Burgess with this thing called the Clooney Institute. Oh, no way.

Um and one of the things I've noticed it's sort of we sort of do stuff at the intersection of like what we say Athens, Jerusalem, and Silicon Valley. And so sort of bringing religious wisdom into the tech conversation.

But so I've been like I'm not really related to tech, but I've been like at all these different like talks and so on about tech and whatever. And I noticed that when people normally talk about AI, they sound like AI. They immediately just sound like AI.

And when you guys were doing your AI quadrant thing, I was like, they sound like people. Interesting. You know, and I I was like I'm like, why do I give it up for people? Yeah. Yeah. Let's give it up for That's right. That's right. That's right. Yeah. And I was like, why do I like TVPN?

you know, I shouldn't like I mean, you know, I shouldn't like it or whatever. And I was like, well, because you guys like talk like people and you talk about people, you know what I'm saying? And so much of the conversation about Yeah.

There was it was very deliberate to put the faces of the people there, not the logos of the companies. Yeah. And I noticed that they weren't particularly flattering uh photos. Yeah. Yeah. Oh, interesting. That was not intentional. We a lot of times we'll give them muscle Well, we will literally make the muscle me.

We have fun with that. uh for that that decision was actually more just about like how do you actually fit them all in? Like if you make them the muscle man, then you have to make it smaller. You can't see their face facial features.

It No, I mean some of those photos are like their hero photo that like their comm's department clearly like put on their Wikipedia page or something. I don't know. Hey man, that's uh or like their corporate photo.

You don't always get to pick what photo is becomes you on the internet, but sometimes, trust me, I know when people get mad at me on Twitter. I've been publishing since I was like 16. Oh, do they go find a stupid photo?

find pictures of me like in high school wearing like a pink button up and they post it and they, you know, comment that makes sense. Yeah. Yeah. I I' I have some silly photos from from of of old that I'm sure will resurface when people want to dunk on me.

Uh what break this po post down for me actually like what what what was your read on this? So technological innovation can can do you think he did? Well that I think the worst actually uh the the worst thing about AI is that people are saying you can't use m dashes anymore. I love the mdash. Okay. Okay.

So, I don't love the M dash. Like, it's not that I hate it. I'm just indifferent to it. I didn't I don't even know where it is on the keyboard. And so, like you do minus sign, minus sign, and then space, I think, to generate I think you know, double tap, double tap, space, shift, option, dash.

So, like just double tap space. And I go here. Double tap it. But sometimes it doesn't like this is the story. And then I want to do an M dash and then space. Shift and you can hit it. I'm putting on an absolute human mash. Underscore. This is an underscore. That's an underscore, dude. Look. Underscore underscore.

Maybe it's just something that I know how to do. Test underscore test. How do you do? Maybe. Maybe. I just run it double double dash space. No. So, so, so I completely agree with you.

So, uh, I I wrote I write like a little, you know, 300word, 400word like summary of my current thinking on whatever's in the news every day. Uh, I just write it right in Google Docs here. I don't use any AI. I hand it off to Brandon on our team. He edits it. I don't think he uses any AI.

Uh sometimes he would put M dashes in and if we put in even one M dash, all the comments we M dash M A what was the problem? And it's just like okay, like now I just can't use the M dash because like like the the masses will go crazy. I refuse to let them take that from me. You're fighting the good fight.

Okay, you think you can win? I think that it's just I lost it.

I was and and Brandon was like really like and there were places I'll I'll show you sometimes I will literally just write like like a minus sign not an M dash I'll just be like you know close quote I will deliberately break the rules that I know I'm not supposed to like even when you when you when you put something in quotes you put like the period inside the quotes or whatever I will just break all those rules because it just makes it clearer that I'm not slopping it up.

I don't know. I think you're accepting accepting the frame of the hat or something. I think so. I think I I think it might be I think you're right. I think you're right. Also, shouts out Brandon. I don't I didn't hear any claps for Brandon. Yeah, let's get some claps going for Brandon.

Me call him in the He's in He's got a new haircut. He got a new haircut. We need a We need a trading card for Brandon's new haircut. He's a sleeper muscle man, too. He's a muscle man. I know why, but I've got I got Is it fair to say I got you into it? What?

You're Wait, you you're the reason he's the reason you got Jack? Is that fair to say or that He's the reason that you're absolutely shredded and diced. He's the reason you're walking around at 2% body fat. Yes. Okay. Wow. Wow. Brandon content. That's why That's why you can bench three plates.

You can [laughter] just rep it out because of him. Four. Okay. Four. Wow. Whoa. Whoa. Whoa. Whoa. Look. Crazy. It's good. Wait. Uh, so yeah. Actually, tell me the story of the the Muscle Man book. Like how like what inspired it? What was the thesis?

It's a novel about an English professor who hates being English professor and loves lifting weights. Sick. Um, and part of it was that And this is a real person or No, it's a it's a fictional character. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah.

Um, um, but like, you know, part of it was that I, when I was growing up, I basically grew up online and, you know, it's sort of a classic story, but it was like I was totally anxious, you know, like I would be at school, then I would get on the screen and, you know, I would just post and sort of lurk and be sort of weird and creepy in front of the computer, you know.

Um, and then when I started lifting, um, my anxiety and depression just like completely went away. Yeah. you know, and and and and I was like, damn, like, you know, was my dad right my whole life? You know, are all the sort of jacked guys who are like annoying and saying that, you know, you got to start lifting.

Were they just all totally right? Basically, the other thing that that tracks with my personal experience, I used to have trouble falling asleep at night. Yeah, that too. The second I started lifting daily or six days a week, it just went away entirely.

And the lesson is people that struggle to fall asleep, at least in some cases, are just not exerting themselves enough to be just physically tired enough to like fall asleep and started lifting. Soon enough, it's like, okay, you basically close your eyes, you're knocked out in like 5 minutes. Totally. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah.

And so I wanted to just kind of like I and then I tried to find novels or even books about lifting that I thought were like compelling at all. And I couldn't find any. So I started sort of trying to write um something like that. It's also like a satire about higher education.

There's like a lot of rants and stuff about the universities and stuff. That's cool. Um so, um so yeah, talk about the reception. Um the reception has been sort of idiotic. Okay. Um you know, the the the the media as we all Let's give it up for idiotic. Let's give it up for the idiotic media. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah.

Um you know, it's a it's it's um [laughter] the idiotic media. And we have a horn going on. We are Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. You know, you know, you have a horse wearing a hat in the back of your consider journalist, but I definitely consider us to be part of the idiotic media. Yeah.

Well, that's now you're using it in a good way. You're reclaiming it. You know what I mean? But um but but but most of them are idiotic in a bad way. Um and the the reception has been like here's a novel to like explain the manosphere, the manosphere and like here's like a novel about men.

And I feel like, you know, back in the day, um, like, uh, there's this great, uh, the literary, uh, the writer Norman Mor has this debate with these feminists like back in the 70s, and he keeps calling them lady critics. It's this very hilarious debate.

Um, and I feel like in a weird way they're doing the same thing to me, but they're calling me like a man novelist. Okay. You know what I mean? Where it's like, this is a novel about a man, so like it has to be about masculinity or something like that. Um, yeah. Everyone wants to know what's going on with young men.

Yeah. And it's this kind of fake discourse. Yeah. I saw Chris Williamson on Tucker the other day and it felt it felt very much I mean honestly like I feel like Chris has done a fantastic job of actually sort of explaining like what's going on with young men like it is an interesting question. Yeah.

Uh there's a whole bunch of and I feel like every media outlet has their own way of interrogating this whether it's Harper's or Vanity Fair Wired.

Like everyone's telling stories and writing profiles about interesting people and young men and I don't know it seems like it was somewhat worthwhile uh discussion to have if there if it can inform interventions even in even just in your own life or with your own kids.

It seems like there's some some value to the discourse. Did you have any intention of actually uh sparking that debate or like actually like like was was one of your thesis like I need to put this book out so that more people lift weights at young ages?

Uh no, but I did write an essay for Harper that was just basically a straightforward prolifting essay. So that had more of that kind of Sure. Sure. Sure. Yeah. That's awesome. Yeah.

The uh the thing that the my take away from going I was very anti- gym growing up because I was a skateboarder and a skater surfer like the idea of like going inside being indoors lifting stuff up and putting it down just for the whatever the whatever the reason was it wasn't appealing to me as a kid because I was like well I could just go to the beach and surf and like be out in nature and so I had a generally negative sentiment around the gym and I was also like super scrawny growing up.

I've got like long arms. I'm I I I was like in high school probably like 140 lbs. Like getting under like one plate on bench was like big I'm going to die at first. And I never really got into it. I wasn't I didn't play football or anything like that.

Uh and then I got really into it in college and it was the biggest unlock for like mental health. Like I prior prior to that I was like a you know teenager. where I was like teenagers I think are just naturally kind of like moody and figuring out who they are and how they fit into the world and all that stuff.

And then I found lifting and like a lot of that stuff just like went away entirely because I had a purpose. Uh I would even if that purpose was like so simple and just like going I woke up, I was going to eat well and I was going to go to the gym. I was going to lift as heavy as I could and go on with my day.

And it just it it ended up being like uh it it was like a drug almost immediately cuz I was like I want the feeling of how I feel after I lift. It was it was incredibly addictive in a very positive way.

So I did that and then and then about probably a year or so I went from likeund by that point of like 150 lbs to like 190 in like a very short period of time. like basically spending I was this was from freshman year to sophomore year and I was spending like so much of my energy just focused on lifting. Yeah.

Uh and I ultimately reached a point where I was like okay at some point this is actually not the most productive use of my time. And I was fortunate enough to at that point to kind of like discover like work and things that I was passionate about and and ways that I could use my energy that was more interesting to me.

And so I think like the debate to have around lifting is like I think like basically everyone should be like picking up heavy stuff and putting it down like at least a little bit, right? You don't need to go to the extreme.

Uh the the advice that I find myself maybe giving like you know people that were in my shoes is like figure out the point where you maybe actually want to dial it back a little bit because it's possible and probably healthy to go way too much to the extreme where you're spending like like I was like all my time and energy like just lifting because I didn't have anything better to do besides like you know work and and school.

And then at some point I actually needed to dial it back and actually apply that energy in other places. But I got the benefit of like that period of just like obsessiveness that I still carry with me. Yeah, 100%.

I mean I that was sort of actually what the novel was exploring, you know, cuz when I first found it, like you said, it's like, is this the answer? Is this the ultimate answer? You know what I mean? And it it it really isn't.

I mean, that's part of the issue that I take with like the optimizers, you know, like Hub, I mean, I know you guys had Huberman on or Brian Johnson where you sort of become like perversely obsessed with health or with lifting or something like that.

you sort of tinker, you know, you think of the person, the human person as some sort of like, you know, mix of neurons and chemicals and stuff. And yeah, it's interesting like even between uh Brian Johnson and Huerman, I see a huge wide gap, but let's put them in the same bucket. How do you contrast your philosophy?

I think you need to be injury maxing. I think you need to be horsing heavy weights. Interesting. And uh I think it's like a spiritual endeavor. I think you need to almost I think you need to get crushed under a a body breaking weight a few times. Okay.

Uh and um and and yeah, it's more of a it's more of a spiritual process than an analytical process. Yeah, 100%. It's it's it's Eric Bugenhogen, who's like my favorite uh like lifter on YouTube, always talks about how it's a mindset.

And he has these things where like he'll just fail insane amounts of weight multiple times and then just like work himself into this kind of like crazy mental state and then lift it, you know? What do you think about the other YouTubers? What do you think about Sam Sulk? Oh, I love Sam Sulk.

What do you think about the Trend Twins? I love the Trend Twins. I love Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. For sure. For sure. Sam Sul also Sam Sul is weirdly emo. Yeah.

Like he will, you know, his vlogs actually there's this weird thing where so my my I don't know why I'm talking about this now, but my brother died like a year and a half ago. That's all right. And after the funeral, one of my buddies threw on a Sam Sulic video. And I don't inspirational.

Yeah, it was incredibly inspirational. But I noticed I was like Sam Sulick's videos are sort of emo where he's like driving by himself. He's like talking to the camera. He's like taking unnecessary loops around the parking lot just I I I I've maybe watched like 20 minutes of Sam Sulick.

appreciate like the content like that the the world that he's built but because specifically I remember being in that mindset of like I was kind of like again I remember I was like 19 I was in school I wasn't that happy I was like living in Santa Barbara which was like paradise but like mentally I was chasing that like I need to I'd be like that those scenes where you're like driving I'd be driving to the gym at like 5:00 a.

m. Dude, I can relate with everything you're saying. Like down to the specifics. Like I started lifting too like sort of like I was in school, just moved, didn't really have friends, would like go to the gym at 11:00, you know? Yeah.

These early early mornings or late and then getting like food afterwards and like honestly that era for me like Future uh the the rap artist was like absolutely peing. What year was this? Monster for me. For me monster was just Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. So So we might we might be the same.

He became a man after Wait, is your is your full name Jordan? Yeah. Wow. Brother, make it make sense. Make it make sense. Make it make sense. What's going on here?

But uh but yeah, so I would I would drive I I I just remember like at the time I was driving a a a Prius with like 200,000 miles on it and I'd just be like driving to the gym just blasting Future drinking protein shakes and that's like when I think I became a man. Yeah.

Like [laughter] incredible, incredible things about and so I want I when I I think it's super important and like when I hear when I hear that a young person is getting into going to the gym, I'm like great, totally like you're going to become you're going to find yourself through that.

And my only thing is like I think at some point you have to evolve beyond that and take the learnings and that like that mentality that you get from going to the gym and apply it to other other ways.

I think like the big takeaway that I learned early on was like early on I was obsessed with like how many how many sets am I doing? How many reps am I doing? How am I uh how am I you know just approaching different lifts? How many different exercises should I be doing in a lift?

And I very quickly realized that there was like two fac there was maybe three factors. It was like was I sleeping a lot? Was I eating a lot? And was I like hyperconsistent and doing a lot of volume. And those are the same lessons that I've brought into my real life outside of the gym. It's like, am I sleeping a lot?

Am I like nourishing myself? Am I getting the right amount of calories? Am I getting, you know, getting the right amount of um uh just like the right kinds of food? And then am I being consistent in the work? And so we apply that every day. We come in and do the show. Well, and you also go to the gym.

I mean, I behind the scenes look, the whole squad was at the gym this morning, which I think is a great thing that you guys do. Yeah. Uh, a lot of people that were on that chart, a lot of the tech elite are deeply unpopular people. Um, I think Elon was polling as less popular than Donald Trump.

So, not just controversial, but actually just unpopular across the board. A lot of tech CEOs, a lot of tech people are just unpopular in America. Obviously, we love them here. Um, but we're weirdos about that. But my question is like when I think about who's really popular, I think Tom Cruz. I think George Clooney.

think people that are in shape, is there something, you know, we we we do this jokey like giga chatification of these people um is there something where you like like it would actually be in their best interest for the tech elite to get a lot. Look at Zuck.

I was going to say like that um you know I I used to think Zuck was a full creep. He was like a beadyeyed sort of bug. He would like you could when when when Zuck would look in the camera, you could almost like hear him blinking. You know what I'm saying? It was it was it was And then he got jacked on a chain.

I was like, "This guy's not so bad after all. " You know what I mean? So maybe um so maybe they would all benefit from PR PR teams hate this one simple trick. [laughter] Well, PR team should love it, but they maybe aren't awake to it for some reason.

And yeah, look, if you're on if you're on a billionaire's PR team, um step one, hire a trainer. Bring the trend twins in. Yeah. Yeah. Bring the trend twins in. Get jacked. Um and uh you know, then then the public opinion. Why do you think health is so political?

Oh man, I I I did an event uh two nights ago here and um someone asked the same question and this guy in the audience stood up and he he because I I I actually don't know.

I mean, one one reason is that um I think that um when you're jacked and you're strong and you're, you know, or you're competent, it it acts as a judge actually because if you're like, you know, fat and you're lazy, then you feel just sort of implicitly judged.

The other thing is that going to the gym and getting jacked implies a certain value system. You know, there's there's like, you know, if you lift 145, um you know, that's less than 225. And if you're in the gym, you're trying to get stronger, the implication is that it's better to lift 225, you know?

And so like a lot of people who are like dogmatically committed to a certain kind of like egalitarianism, don't like that. But the guy at the event stood up, this guy, he looked just like Joe Rogan. His name's Anthony, actually. Shouts out Anthony.

But he he was like he said that he said that um the generally speaking, the left tries to impose their ideas onto nature and the right starts with nature and discerns their ideas from there. And so there's something just sort of fundamentally different about that. I think lifting sort of falls into the latter camp.

I have a question. Makes sense. Yeah. I'm always I'm always surprised at how much like there seems to be more controversies within in between like various people even that consider themselves all to be pursuing their ideals of health.

It's like everybody like kind of picks a lane in a category and then it's like they're fighting over like green powders. What green powder should you take? Oh, my green powder is better than your green powder. Let's get It's universal.

Like it I I feel like it's it's hard to make a political issue out of something that doesn't affect everyone because you just keep bumping into people and if your whole thing is like you know corporate cards or something or like you know the the manufacturing supply chain for large gongs.

It's like there's a lot you guys have a lot of those around even have the you got I noticed in the bathroom the the picture of the jacked guy the shirtless guy hitting the gong. I like these guys love Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. It's it's like it's hard to get everyone animated about that. It's a niche interest.

Whereas like healthare, how much money you have, your job, your health, your food, like these things are universal.

So anyone can uh anyone can relate to them and I can give you a take and you can bounce off it immediately instead of being like I don't really know anything about that or that doesn't really affect me ever. Yeah.

But there's also there is so much co more people die in this this is actually I don't actually don't know if this is true but you see this talking point all the time. More people die in this country from like obesity and from starvation.

You know, there is this total cope around around being unhealthy and people people don't like the idea that there's actually something you can do about it. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. It's just like everyone everyone can be obese or not.

Like not everyone can have a like a large corporation that goes bankrupt under their stewardship. Like so it's just less relevant to them because like they might not be the CEO of a company that's going bankrupt or something. Um pickle ball.

There's uh I couldn't find it in here, but there's a in the mansion section online. There is a house that is up for sale right now that has a pickle ball court outside and a pickle ball court inside. What's your take on pickle ball? Dude, it's fun. I hate to say it, but it's fun. Guilty pleasure.

I mean, I played it one time with a friend and I was like, man, this is I probably said some Yeah. Yeah. words and uh uh and then uh we played it and I was like, this is awesome. Yeah. So I don't I don't inside or outside.

I mean two courts is a little bit um you know I don't know if you love something zoom out for me build the the the ultimate mansion for ath for athletics. Are you going all in on one particular athletic endeavor? Are you making sure that there's a pool and a basketball court, a tennis court?

What's important to have around the mansion? For me definitely a basketball court. A basketball court. Uh, and then like a gym in a garage with no AC. No AC. And And what's in that gym? Are we doing rogue racks? Are we doing Rogue racks are good? Okay. Yeah. Yeah. Free weights.

What is it about uh what's the archetype that can make a home gym really work? Do you have to be like like spiritual? Like every time I've just been in a dedic like only like during co I bought a bunch of weights and I was working out of my garage and I just got so small. Hard to be motivated. Yeah. I got J.

That's a skill issue, bro. I think No, no, I think I'm I'm implying it's a skill issue because I would be going in there and I was at home so I could get an email and I'd be like, "Okay, I'm going to run in and respond to this email on my computer because it's easier.

" And if I was taking a more monklike approach, I'd probably have been getting even more jacked because there's no distractions, right? It's just like more focused.

Well, during co I mean we ordered a bunch of weights, me and my lifting buddy like right when like right at the tail end because everything sold out like super fast. So we had But you still had a buddy that helps. Had a buddy. Yeah.

And um um and we we ended up getting these like dinky probably like 25 lb barbells with these like shitty weights or whatever. Um but I would just go I had a shed at the at the house and I would like go in the shed and throw on music.

And it was actually the first time that I was lifting where I understood the power of like shrieking and screaming while you lift. There's a lot of power. You can Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Okay. Well, moder man does not shriek and scream. Uh what what's in the supplement stack? What's Lindy? What's interesting?

What What are you staying away from? Are you beta alanine? Are you creatine protein supplementation mass gainers? What do you like? I don't I'm feeling uh reactionary against the optimizers and I want to just say nothing. I mean I creatine for sure.

Protein's fine, but I think you could basically just eat eat uh raw milk. I do I do like raw milk. I drink a lot of raw recently. I gained I went from like 165 to 200 lb over the course of like 3 months. And so I was drinking like a gallon of raw milk a day, a tub of Greek yogurt a day. Yeah. Uh um the raw eggs.

I do think like drinking, you know, 12 raw eggs makes you feel amazing. Okay. Um but that's kind of the I went through a raw egg. I went through a phase where it' be like five eggs mixed into raw milk. Just raw. Were you Bodybuilding. com guy back in the day?

[laughter] That was a long That was a long That was like That wasn't even like a phase. I would just That was just me for a long time. Um I I realized like wait, I don't have to scramble the eggs. I can just put them in a jar and just drink it. I would I I didn't like the taste.

I would kind of almost throw up sometimes, but it was just so effective. I mean, uh Derek from our place more dates talks about just drinking the full carton of liquid egg whites. He does stuck in the carton. Yeah, that was a good era.

There was a period where I was watching his videos like when I was first getting lifting, watching like I remember being like I can't believe I'm watching an hour and a half videos about something. Crazy. But it's so meditative. Well, it's like what we were saying at at at breakfast.

It's just amazing to watch anyone who loves what they do. Yeah, exactly.

You would have appreciated we we gave a a talk last year when we had done like a few episodes of the podcast and then we we uh gave a talk at Heredicon uh of like the case for like founders getting on like peeds because you have like you think about like pro athletes are like spending all their time trying to be healthy, sleeping well, working out and being as strong and as physically fit as possible and they legally or cannot take peeds.

Although if you asked them like if you could take peeds if it was legal, would you do them? They'd be like, "Yeah, absolutely. I want to go to the next level.

" Meanwhile, in the business world, you have people that are not sleeping that well, they can't train that much, they're not that healthy, they have like kind of not that great hormone profiles. In a perfect world, they just start sleeping well and training and eating well and getting on track.

But for a lot of people, if you're a CEO, busy CEO, you're scaling your company, you don't have like you you some of these people like can't prioritize it or they don't for whatever reason.

And like I genuinely think if they just got on peeds, they might build they might build the build the uh you know, of course under under doctor's supervision, but they might actually like get motivated in order to build some of those healthier habits, but at the very least have a lot more energy and bring that uh intensity.

What do what do you what's your take on on peeds? I don't do them because I haven't had kids yet, but they do seem probably good. I don't know. Have you done them?

one actually although I I actually one of my buddies um from from from Cleveland uh was having a hard time on I won't I won't say his name he was having a hard time on the dating apps and he was like um no one's responding you know whatever like and he started blasting gear cuz he thought it would help him get girls and I was con yes immediately and I was like but he didn't even get jacked in the it was like it was literally immediate and I was like was it a mindset I think it might have been a mindset sure sure he's like I got I I have I've solved the problem solved my problems So I can bring the confidence.

It worked for him like the next day. I I find [laughter] uh I find dating very performance blasting. I find creatine genuinely very creatine. I also find caffeine extremely performance-enhancing in the gym. Like if you can like the Celsius phenomenon I think is very real.

Like 200 milligrams of caffeine getting actually very fired up before a workout genuinely helps you stay focused during this with lift. Push your push you. We want to make the the beta alanine for for the workplace. You know, imagine you got to do some emails. Is that the tingling? You start tingling.

You're like, I got to get through these emails. I mean, I will say that the Yeah, for sure. I guess the supplement sack is like drinking enough caffeine to like kill a small child. It It's really And not that I'm going to kill a small child, but that would if they drink it kill them.

Um, these mates are really good, though. Are you guys sponsored by these guys? We're not, but we That's Andrew Huberman's brand. God damn. Sorry, man. Hey, look, look, look.

I love your product if you you know I'm talking trash but no [laughter] you're reminding I don't even consider I don't consider Andrew's philosophy like about nothing you said wildly disagreeing with yeah but yeah I I I think it's more about like understanding understanding yourself and the various inputs so that you can then make calculated decisions like yeah I I still I know how important sleep is there's plenty of nights we we were traveling on Tuesday didn't get a lot of sleep made made a call to try to get some more sleep.

But ultimately I think it's just about my my view is like as much as possible try to understand how the body works but at the same time you need to remember that the the real edge is like having like uh like a a fiery like spirit like and just being like that that is like that's the thing that you want to cultivate, right?

Yeah. There's that there. Yeah.

I mean, I I um Yeah, maybe part of the the the my feeling about it is that the one time I tweeted something negative about Andrew Hummerin, I got like ratioed into oblivion, you know, people people calling me gay and it gets like 5,000 likes, you know, and I'm just so so so yeah, they came after me hard.

But you're probably you're probably you're probably right, you know. I don't know there. But then but the the counterargument to that is like that. Um delicious yerba mate. Well, yeah, he makes a delicious uh matina yerba mate. He makes a great great product.

Um and actually in my first novel there's a long passage about how your mate is great. Oh really? Yeah. Yeah. In in the novelist. But um I guess the counterpoint to the to the sleep thing that you're saying is that um there's that for a while when like the tape brothers were just all over the feed.

There was that one of Tristan being like um you know I I'll go to sleep at 6:00 a. m. and wake up at 5:59 a. m. and you know 1 minute before 6:00 a. m. and I don't need any sleep. And like that that's the kind the sort of counterargument. That's what you want to do. I mean, negative one minute.

It's a It's a It's a It's an admirable vibe. The attitude. Yeah. Yeah. Exactly. Right. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. No, I always get it.

I always I always do beef with Brian Johnson about this because I'm just like, don't you think that if you just have uh like great will and a life's purpose, you can live forever even if you're super unhealthy.

And I always cite like Charlie Mer and Warren Buffett who like eat McDonald's and drink Coca-Cola all day long and like live to 99 and 100 and just like, you know, they don't look jacked.

They don't really do any biohacking, but they see I think one thing that we probably one thing we probably agree on is like I don't think you should let health trackers like decide your mood. Totally or decide like how you're going to approach totally. It's like I wake up some days I sleep on an eight sleep.

I have like a tracker is a competition going to the gym. It's not telling you what to do. Well, and it's and it's just Yeah, it's just a it's a it's a little friendly. It's not tracking me. I'm tracking it. You're tracking it. I'm tracking it. Yeah.

[laughter] But then there are also studies that are like, you know, the people that live the longest have like, you know, they have like uh good relationships, they have some sort of spiritual life. Stuff is Yeah. That stuff is very unquantified right now in the quantified self movement and it needs to be more included.

I think for sure. That's why I don't think you can really like quantify that stuff. People are really uncomfortable things you can't quantify. Totally. Totally.

Um um but I think probably yeah good relationship some sort of spiritual life general health you know eating the things that like you're because also different people different you know diets work better for different peoples and stuff like that. Totally. Yeah. Anyway, what's your actual uh routine? You're split.

Are you in bro split? Push pulling manosphere. The manosphere split. Just crushing fo. Um um um not beating the manosphere alligator. Yeah. Yeah. Exactly. Um uh lately I was doing uh Mad Cow I think it was called. It was just three days a week and it was literally just go crazy. It was um it was uh uh just powerlifting.

So it was like squat, bench, deadlift, barbell rows three days a week, 5x5s three days a week. So you do all of those every day? All of those three days or you rotate through them? You you rotate through them, but you're you're squatting three days a week. You're benching twice a week. You're doing overhead press, too.

And you're adding um you're adding five pounds a week. So it was like and that was when I was doing the the spirit bives. Yeah, exactly. I like the 5x5. That's a good that's a good Um so I was doing that recently. I I do like I I mean the thing that got I'll It's funny.

I I the the thing that maybe we're just holding back a little bit of our progress is like we want to work out every day and there's actually like studies that show if you just take more rest days you can put on you can you can just like start but the problem with that program is like I also like lifting every day so it was like a problem like I I was like it was actually not the most enjoyable thing.

I do like, as much as I'm like uh uh opposed to it in theory, I do like Jeff Nipper's programs. They're the power building programs. I like him a lot. Yeah, they're they're very good. Yeah. Um um so the powerbuilding one and powerbuilding three are I think my favorite programs I've done. Yeah.

I just like the way he like structures his like lessons and stuff. Well, he's also natural, which is like a big deal. You know what I mean? A lot of people who make these programs aren't natural, so it won't work for guys that aren't Sure. Sure. Sure. Sure. Yeah. Makes sense. Yeah. They're like, "Do 10,000 reps of this.

[laughter] The rich Piana 8 hour arm workout. I'm on I'm on enough trend to kill a horse. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. That's fantastic. Well, thanks for chatting. What's your You have your next book in the works. Uh yeah, kind of. But I don't I don't I want to talk about it. Yeah. Yeah. It's going to be a thriller.

Can you share the prompt? What's the prompt? No, no, I can't because the thing the the the the don't make mistakes. No, I'm not I'm not I'm not gonna do it, but thanks for having me on. Muscle man is the current one. You guys can buy Uh, what about the biggest fish you've ever caught? Dude, I just did.

I never You've never been fishing? No. No. Not once. Family has? No. Dude, I was punk. I was too much lucky. You've never shot a fish in a barrel? Nothing? Nope. Nothing. Okay. Well, we'll have to change that soon. Uh, the outfit looks like it could maybe transport onto fishing boat. And it's funny.

That's funny cuz I I wore this the other day for an event and my buddy was I told him my friend that I was coming on the show and he was like, "You're actually kind of dressed like he thought the vest was somehow TBPn. " Also, Brandon Content over there has the same has the same vest he told me about. Very good.

He told me that he has it. So, he's looking he's looking sharp. Uh well, thank you so much for coming on the show. Leave us five stars on Apple Podcast and Spotify. And if you're listening to this and you haven't lifted today, hit the gym. Get a lift. re Jo uh visit the Church of Iron. That's right.

Uh have a great weekend everyone.