Mate – Tucker Max, Geoffrey Miller PhD
(Buy from Amazon; Buy from The Book Depository)
The #1 bestselling pioneer of “fratire” and a leading evolutionary psychologist team up to create the dating book for guys
Whether they conducted their research in life or in the lab, experts Tucker Max and Dr. Geoffrey Miller have spent the last 20+ years learning what women really want from their men, why they want it, and how men can deliver those qualities.
The short answer: become the best version of yourself possible, then show it off. It sounds simple, but it’s not. If it were, Tinder would just be the stuff you use to start a fire. Becoming your best self requires honesty, self-awareness, hard work and a little help.
Through their website and podcasts, Max and Miller have already helped over one million guys take their first steps toward Ms. Right. They have collected all of their findings in Mate, an evidence-driven, seriously funny playbook that will teach you to become a more sexually attractive and romantically successful man, the right way:
– No “seduction techniques”
– No moralizing
– No bullshit
Just honest, straightforward talk about the most ethical, effective way to pursue the win-win relationships you want with the women who are best for you.
Much of what they’ve discovered will surprise you, some of it will not, but all of it is important and often misunderstood. So listen up, and stop being stupid!
Disclaimer: This page contains affiliate links that may provide monetary compensation to help support the Whole Guidance Vision of Creating a Happy and Healthy Planet should you make a purchase. We very much appreciate and thank you for your support.
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In this podcast I’ll be exploring Connecting with Nature:
- I’ll explain the importance of relationships and connecting with others
- I’ll talk about the different types of natural connection that nourishes your bodymind
- Finally, I’ll share some simple and effective relationship and nature rituals you can put into action to grow your natural social network
CLICK HERE TO LEARN WHAT ARE THE BEST FOODS TO GET YOU LEAN
All life came from a single cell billions of years ago. Now this cell wasn’t alone for long as it soon multiplied into a community of cells. Over time this community of cells adapted and evolved and grew and developed into all the different life forms we see today.
Human beings are social creatures. We live and we love and we fight in communities. Wanting to be with other people and feeling a connection with another person is built into your DNA going way back to that very first cell.
Now if you think about it how do we punish someone who’s already in prison? Solitary confinement. This is where people are physically separated from the main population and put into a room by themselves isolated from the rest of the world.
There’s no worse prison than that of a mind of someone who has lost connection to their friends and family.
Whether you experience pleasure or pain as long you’re with other people there’s a hidden sense of safety and security that makes you feel like it’s okay to feel this way. You can call on another person for help or you can blame that other person for causing your problem. A shared experience also tends to feel more alive and vibrant in the moment then if you were to have it by yourself.
But when you are cut off from family and friends this is where feelings of loneliness and solitude begin to creep in. Every time I bite into a delicious piece of dark chocolate or drink a tasty smoothie the first thing that comes to mind is ‘I want to share this experience with someone else’. But if I’m alone at the time there’s a split second where I get a little bit sad at not being able to share what I’m having.
Sadness is an emotion that you can feel and deal with on your own quite easily. Grief on the other hand can hit you pretty hard and it usually comes from a major sad event happening in your life suddenly, out of the blue, and unexpectedly. Dealing with grief alone is never easy. You need support and people around you to help you to see a different perspective of things and to see that this time of grieving is only temporary, eventually things will get better. Without support that grief if left to linger may turn into depression.
To paraphrase a line from The Lord of the Rings:
“Grief must move on, grief cannot linger.”
The saying it takes a village to raise a child is very true if we want that child to grow into a happy and healthy adult. Today many families are having to raise children alone. I’m not talking about single mums or dads, but families that have no extended relations nearby to help them. No grandparents, no aunts or uncles, no-one to act as a babysitter or teacher or guardian. This raising of kids without proper support puts too much stress and strain on the family and eventually on society as a whole.
Obviously us human beings are happier and healthier together than we are apart — up to a point as we do get on each other’s nerves every now and then, but as a society we are all in relationship with each other whether we like it or not. It is this relationship, this togetherness that moves you as an individual and us as a society forward and helps every single one of us to learn and to grow.
“Relationships are the key to experiencing the fullness of life.”
A lack of relationships equal a lack of experience leading to a lack of learning and growth and a lack of living.
Now even if you were the last human on this beautiful planet you still wouldn’t be alone. Animals, trees, and plants you are also in relationship with these guys. You have a relationship with the planet itself and even the sun.
The three key relationships in your life include:
- The relationship you have with your self
- The relationship you have with other people and
- The relationship you have with Mother Nature
The primary relationship you have is with your self or should I say selves. You are not only a physical being, but also an emotional, mental, and spiritual being. Your inability to live an awesome life comes down to the fact that your many different beings are out of sync with each other. For example, if you say to yourself ‘I want to be happy and healthy’ which is an expression from your mental being relating to your emotional and physical being, but then you eat fast food full of rancid plastic vegetable oils, sick drugged animal meats, and processed sugars then your emotional and physical beings are going to express something a lot different to what you were intending.
Another example let’s say you’re a person of faith who follows a creed of ‘love thy neighbour’, but more often than not you gossip about other people behind their back in order to make yourself feel better than them due to a lack of self-esteem. Well here you have a disconnection between your mental, emotional, and spiritual beings.
In order to have a happy and healthy relationship with your self you need to have a clear intention on how you want to be in the world and then you need to live your life in harmony with that intention. If your intention and way of being are incongruent, are not in harmony with each other you will never truly be able to love your self and who you are.
Once you can live a harmonious life and love your self then the relationships you have with other people are a lot easier to be in. You won’t have the need or feel that you have to defend yourself when other people question the way you live because you know that your intention and your way of being are 100% in harmony. So no matter what vile crap other people might spew in your direction to try and rock your boat, you can stand tall and simply agree to disagree because you can only control how you feel. Their feelings are not your responsibility.
As my mentor Paul Chek says you are 50% responsible for every relationship you are in. You are 100% responsible for how you think and feel toward your self, but you can only take half that responsibility when in relation with another person.
You want to nurture the relationships with the closest people in your life. This doesn’t just mean family or friends, but anyone that you interact with on a regular basis. Even the relationship with the local shop owner you buy your lotto ticket from every week needs to be nurtured.
We are social creatures after all and were made to live in communities sharing experiences and ourselves with each other.
“Isolation leads to desolation, whereas integration leads to celebration.”
The final and most vital relationship is the one you have with Mother Nature. This means the Earth, the sun, and all other life forms.
Your body is of this planet, this planet is of a star, and stars are of the universe so you literally have the Universe inside you. You are made up of the Universe. You are made up of stardust. You my dear beautiful [reader] are made up of the Earth and soil.
Our human ancestors before the dawn of air-conditioning, television, malls, and high-rise buildings spent 100% of their time on soil, on grass, on sand, or in the sea. Even huts and shelters were made out of natural organic materials meaning our ancestors were connected to the Earth even while sleeping.
Why is this important?
Your body is a biobattery where your cells hold an electrical charge and positive electrons build up overtime and act as free radicals in your body. These free radicals cause damage to your body like rust damages a car. Now think of the world we live in today with WiFi signals, cell towers, and all these new consumer electronic gadgets our world is full of electromagnetic fields and these EMFs disrupt your battery, your energy signature, your aura. EMFs also cause a buildup of positive electrons in your body leading to more free radical damage, more rust.
Guess what electrical charge the Earth is? It’s not neutral, it’s not Sweden right it’s negative. So every time you ground yourself to the Earth and come into physical contact with it the Earth sucks up those positive electrons, those free radicals and gives you more health affirming negative electrons. This is called grounding or earthing and has many health benefits besides fighting off free radicals. Earthing can also:
- Reduce stress
- Improve sleep
- Speed up healing
- Decrease recovery time
- Increase energy
- Improve the flow of blood normalising blood pressure
- Reduce inflammation
- Boost immune function
You can find out more about earthing and grounding at earthinginstitute.net.
Okay so that’s your connection with the Earth now let’s have a look at why you need to connect more with the sun.
Vitamin D controls the expression of over 1000 genes in your body. Vitamin D actually isn’t a vitamin, but a steroid hormone like oestrogen and testosterone. Vitamin D is a powerful antioxidant combating those damaging free radicals. It also boosts and activates the actions of vitamins and minerals and controls how these micronutrients work with your body benefiting your bones, skin, and blood vessels. Vitamin D is also involved in fighting certain cancers.
Now your main source of Vitamin D comes from your skin when it’s exposed to UVB radiation from the sun. Note I said UVB rays not the cancer causing UVA rays. So slapping on a pile of toxic UVB blocking sunscreen and sunbathing behind glass which filters out the UVB and only allows in the UVA is the exact opposite thing you want to be doing for better health. You can also get some vitamin D from food and supplements, but your best and original source of vitamin D will always come from the sun.
Don’t worry if you don’t have a healthy relationship with the sun right now, I’ll give some tips later on how to rebuild it.
Last point about your relationship with Mother Nature involves being surrounded by her loving embrace and by this I mean being within and with her natural forms. So this means connecting with other life forms other than the human ape.
This could mean having a pet or how about NOT stepping on a snail or killing other small bugs. This could mean having a garden and tending to it regularly or going for a swim in a natural body of water like the ocean or a river.
In Japan they have a natural organic therapy that has been shown to heal many diseases and prevent illness called Shinrin-yoku translated as ‘Forest Bathing’. Another translation would be ‘getting outside and going for a hike in the woods’.
Animals, trees, and plants, all living beings release signalling molecules called pheromones to communicate subconscious intention to other members of their tribe. Now trees and plants also give off other organic compounds called phytoncides that can influence your bodymind and by being in a forest surrounded by nature breathing in these plant chemicals you can experience the following benefits:
- Reduced stress
- Improved sleep
- Faster healing
- Decreased recovery time
- Increased energy
- Improved blood flow normalising blood pressure
- Reduced inflammation and
- A stronger immune system
Have you noticed that these are also the exact same benefits you get from earthing and grounding. Coincidence? Yes! Life begets life and the Earth, the sun, animals and plants all boost your life force energy.
Remember we are all of this one song this Uni-verse. We are single notes of a symphony or individual pieces of a giant puzzle. As this quote from Alan Watts nicely puts it:
“You didn’t come into this world. You came out of it, like a wave from the ocean. You are not a stranger here.”
‘We are the world‘ as they sang for Africa 30 years ago and it’s true. We are all in this together my friend.
Okay so here are a few ways to improve your connection with self, with others, and with Mother Nature.
To have a better relationship with your self meditation is a great option. Meditation isn’t so much about reaching a point of enlightenment, but moreso about being in a focused state of mind where you can keep your mind on a single thought. By practising meditation on a regular basis you can train your mind to stay in the present moment giving your thoughts full attention
Meditation is also a time for quiet and in a world where we are drowning in noise from other people, from the media, from our own thoughts having a daily me time and quiet time ritual will help reduce your stress making you more resilient and better able to handle stress in your life.
Now there’s a 1001 ways to meditate. You don’t have to be sitting in a cave in silence for days on end chanting a mantra although you can if that floats your boat. There are movement meditations like Tai-chi and Qi-gong.
Personally I like walking and cooking meditations.
During walking meditation I time my breaths with my steps and count my steps as I walk counting 1 2 3 4 as I inhale and 1 2 3 4 as I exhale through the nose with my mouth closed.
Cooking meditation involves me being fully in the moment where I may have some music playing in the background and where I may or may not dance while in the kitchen and I time my chops of the knife or stirring of the pot to the beat of the music. I stay away from intense house or dance music as these can be a bit of a health hazard when wielding a knife in the kitchen.
There are some fantastic books out there on finding your self and being true to who you really are in all forms of being. I recommend reading:
- Way of the Peaceful Warrior by Dan Millman
- Motivation Manifesto by Brendon Burchard
- The Music Lesson by Victor L Wooten which is best listened to as an audiobook
- 10 Secrets For Success and Inner Peace by Wayne Dyer and
- The Seven Spiritual Laws of Success by Deepak Chopra
These five books are a great start on your journey to integrating your physical, mental, emotional, and spiritual beings into one harmonious force of awesomeness! You can find all these books in the Book Reading Club on the Whole Guidance website at wholeguidance.com/brc.
To enhance your relationship with others try finding ways to be of service to them. Giving is a fantastic way to serve. You can give your time and attention. You can give money. You can give knowledge or you can give others responsibility.
Receiving is another way to serve where you can receive what other people have created like a beautifully cooked meal and you can receive by letting others authentically express and share with you what’s really on their mind without judging them.
By giving and being open to receive others in their true and honest form you will see your relationships with the people in your life go from artificial and superficial to rich and more intimate.
Tips for getting outdoors in nature… get outside and get into nature!
Go hiking, walk trails, mountain bike riding, swimming, play on the beach, take your dog for a walk — don’t have a dog then get one from an abandoned animal shelter (definitely on my list to do). Get your thumbs green and get into gardening and horticulture or how about climbing a tree like you used to as a kid before getting told off.
Ideally you want to spend 30 to 90 minutes a day earthing your body to the ground, on grass, soil, or sand to reduce the stress of EMFs and boost your immune system.
At the same time why not get some sun exposure to produce some vitamin D.
You want UVB vitamin D producing rays not UVA cancer causing rays. While UVA rays penetrate the atmosphere and reach the Earth’s surface at all times of the day and throughout the year UVB rays only come through the atmosphere when the sun is high enough in the sky and this is usually around 10a to 2p during the summer and warmer months of the year (remember the sun doesn’t run by daylight savings time so keep that mind if you have that where you live). Also if you live in the upper and lower latitudes of the globe during the winter months UVB rays will not reach the surface of the planet even between the hours of 10a and 2p. So be sunsmart and protect yourself when the sun is low in the sky and expose yourself (go on I know you want to) when the sun is way up high.
Your skin colour will determine how much time you should be exposing your skin to the sun. Fare and white skinned people only need as little as five to 20 minutes a day in the sun. Dark skinned individuals may need to spend 30 to 60 minutes. Basically you want to be out long enough where you see the first signs of a tan happening on your skin, but not so long that you get burnt. You can gradually increase your time out in the sun as your skin will get used to being in the sun for longer periods. Keep in mind though that too much of a good thing is no longer a good thing.
Now Shakespeare wrote:
“To be, or not to be: that is the question.”
So you could choose not to be, but that’s no fun at all!
So I’ll leave you with this poem I was inspired to write describing who we are all to be in relation to everything else.
You were designed
To be
Under the sky and
On soil
On sand and
In the sea
You were created
To be
In the bush and
In forests
With plants and
The trees
You were embodied
To be
The same as animals and
Bugs
As well as the birds and
The bees
You were born
To be
Giving
Loving
Happy and
Healthy
You are
To be
A unique
Expression of
The Universe living
Your own reality
Links and Resources
- Earthing and Grounding — EarthingInstitute.net
- ‘We Are The World’ music video
- Way of the Peaceful Warrior — Dan Millman
- Motivation Manifesto — Brendon Burchard
- The Music Lesson — Victor L Wooten
- 10 Secrets For Success and Inner Peace — Wayne Dyer
- The Seven Spiritual Laws of Success — Deepak Chopra
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In this podcast I’ll be exploring Stress:
- I’ll explain what stress is and the different types of stress
- I’ll talk about how stress affects the body
- Finally, I’ll give practical tips on how to reduce stress in your life
CLICK HERE TO LEARN WHAT ARE THE BEST FOODS TO GET LEAN
Stress is defined as placing pressure or tension on an object. What most people don’t realise is that there is such a thing as good stress. This is called eustress, e-u-stress, eustress. The difference between eustress and stress (or distress) is determined by our own perception of the stress. For example imagine two people riding a rollercoaster. One person experiences stress and the other experiences eustress. While one person experiences pain, anxiety, and worry the other person experiences, pleasure, joy, and excitement. Same pressure. Same tension, but different experiences different perceptions of that stress. One has distress (or stress). The other has eustress.
My point here is that everything that happens to us is not good or bad until we make the choice to make it mean good or bad. So whatever type of stress you are experiencing, keep in the back of your mind that you do have the choice to see this stress as something positive something for you, eustress, or as something negative, distress.
There are three main types of stress and many subtypes of these stressors. The three types of stress are:
- Physical
- Mental and Emotional
- Biochemical and Physiological
Examples of the subtypes of these stressors include electromagnetic stress, nutritional stress, and thermal stress.
Now these three main types of stress can be broken down into two groups. External stressors such as being out in the sun, getting injured, or being exposed to toxic chemicals. Then there’s internal stressors such as having a disease and having an imbalance in your hormones. So an example of a physical stress would be working out at the gym. Having difficult relationships would be an example of a mental and emotional stress. An example of biochemical and physiological stress would be when you come down with the cold or flu and your immune system has to battle the bugs in order to bring the inside of your body back into balance.
So those are the three main types of stress. There’s physical stress, which is normally associated with external stress. There is mental and emotional stress, which can be either external or internal. Then there’s biochemical and physiological stress, which is an internal stressor.
Your body is made up of a system of nerves and the nervous system is broken down into different types. The Autonomic Nervous System (ANS) is the system that looks after your body automatically. It digests, it eliminates, it regulates blood flow, hormone production, temperature, etc. You don’t have to think about doing any of this stuff yourself. These are run by your ANS. Now as you live life and experience different events the ANS can go down either one of two pathways. One pathway is the Sympathetic Nervous System (SNS). The other pathway is the Parasympathetic Nervous System (PNS).
The SNS puts your body into a fight, flight, flee, or freeze state. When activated the SNS releases stress hormones which raise heart rate, blood pressure, and moves the blood from your internal organs to your muscles and limbs. These stress hormones also prevent fat mobilisation and fat metabolism. What does that mean? It means your body stops moving fat out of the fat cells, out of their homes, which means you will not be burning any fat for energy. So much for reducing your waistline hmm.
The PNS on the other hand puts you in a rest, digest, calm, and connect state. The PNS deals with growth, fat-burning, and sex hormones that help keep your heart rate and blood pressure in a healthy range and your blood remains close to your internal organs allowing for your digestion, elimination, growth, repair, and reproductive processes to function normally. Also your body becomes a fat-burning machine.
When you perceive or sense a stress your body goes into short-term breakdown mode (the SNS) in order to help you survive that stressor in that moment. When you perceive that you are safe and secure your body remains in long-term growth and repair mode (the PNS) helping you to live a happy and healthy quality of life.
Now back in the day our ancestors would have dealt with acute (short and sudden) stressors like running from a tiger, but most of their lives were pretty relaxed. Today, however, traffic jams, deadlines, exams, and difficult relationships, these are the tigers of our time. Unfortunately these are not acute experiences. These are chronic, these are ongoing so your body is in constant breakdown mode. Remember the SNS releases stress hormones to help you survive, but these stress hormones are breaking you down and causing you to store fat and when stress hormones are up your growth and sex hormones are down. If you can reduce the amount of stress that you perceive in your life the PNS can be activated more often so you can have your growth and sex hormones higher than your stress hormones. Giving you proper digestion, elimination, and repair, as well as more fat-burning.
Again be aware that any stress you encounter, whether it’s literally being chased by a tiger or being chased by your boss, your body is going to begin breaking down. Your body isn’t going to be able to digest your last meal. Your liver isn’t going to be able to detoxify your blood. Your bowels aren’t going to be able to eliminate the waste. Your mood isn’t happy. Your body isn’t growing or repairing. Your immune system isn’t able to fight off bad bugs. Your body will be storing fat instead of burning it. Your sex drive and your ability to have children is going to be pretty much zero, so no sexy time for you! But if you can reduce the stress in your life, reduce the stress hormones, increase the growth and sex hormones… sexy times are here again my friend.
So that’s how stress affects the body. It’s either going to break you down in order to help you survive or it’s going to help you grow and repair. So how much distress compared to eustress do you have in your life? Something to meditate on.
If you’ve got issues with managing your weight, digestion, elimination, getting over an illness, a nagging chronic pain, migraines, fatigue (if you’re always tired), fertility or sex issues, all of these symptoms plus much more come under too much stress, chronic stress in your life.
There are many ways to reduce stress in your life. There are whole books written on the topic. Two books I recommend are Why Zebras Don’t Get Ulcers and The Tapping Solution.
Personally I reduce stress in many different ways and one of them includes writing down every single perceived stress that I have in my life at the time and out of that list I pick one, just one to focus on and work on reducing its impact on my life. The one stress I pick is the one I think is the most stressing to me in that moment.
So prioritise, figure out what is your primary stressor. Write out a list of all your stresses right now and then pick the one that you think is stressing you out the most. Not the one you think you can deal to the easiest, but the one you perceive to be affecting you the most in your life right now. Highlight it, circle it, underline it, just get it in your mind’s eye. That is what you’re going to focus on.
Next thing I do is I write down all the things about that primary stress that’s actually causing me to stress. So, for example, right now I feel a lot of stress when it comes to time. I feel like there isn’t enough time. I’m unable to finish projects or to finish books that I’m reading. I don’t have enough time to prepare the food that I want to make. I’m feeling pressure and like I’m failing. So that’s what I write down. What is this stress causing me? What is it stopping me from doing that I’d like to be doing? What is it causing me to feel? The reason I do this is so I can understand exactly where I am and how I am doing in that moment. Remember this saying paraphrased from Alice in Wonderland:
“If you don’t know where you are going, any road will get you there.”
You cannot get from A to B if you don’t even know where A is. Your turn. Write down how your primary stressor is affecting you and your life. This is your A, this is where you are now.
Next thing I write down is if I didn’t have this stressor what would my life be like then. For example, if I had all the time in the world I’d finish the projects that I wanted to finish on time when I said I would finish them. I would finish the books that I wanted to read and I would have the time to prepare the food that I wanted to eat. Then I would feel awesome and accomplished. After this step I know now where I want to be and I know how I want to feel so I have a better idea of why I’m doing what I’m doing. This is giving me a why, a reason to manage myself better when it comes to time.
So write down for yourself what would your life be like and how would you feel if your primary stressor was no longer a perceived stress.
What I do next is to plan. How am I going to manage this stress practically and effectively? In terms of time it means making bookings in my Google calendar. I’m going to create separate bookings for project work, reading books, and for preparing meals. Then I have to stick to the calendar and take the necessary action when the booking comes up.
Create a plan for your particular situation. For example, if it’s trying to stick to a diet to reduce your waistline what is it that you’re not doing now that you can do in the future and what might your plan look like? Maybe it’s creating a meal plan and preparing and cooking meals in advance like cooking a whole week’s worth of meals in one day.
So in a nutshell:
- Write down all your stressors
- Identify your primary stressor
- Write down how it’s stressing you out, how it’s affecting your life, how it’s making you feel right now
- Then write down how your life would be and how you’d feel if you didn’t have this stress
- Make a plan
- Finally, be consistent and take action on that plan
[click here to download the WG-Stress Reduction.pdf worksheet]
This is one way I deal with stress and it’s just that one thing, that one stress that I focus on. When I feel like it’s no longer stressing me then it’s back to the list and creating priority number one again.
Now along with this practise you have to be living a healthy holistic lifestyle. Without the right lifestyle factors in place the technique I just mentioned is like a house of cards and it’s only a matter of time before it all comes crashing down. A healthy holistic lifestyle brings stability and strength to every aspect of your life. I’ll go into more detail about what a healthy holistic lifestyle really means in later episodes, but I’ll sum it up here:
- Get good consistent quality sleep
- Move often throughout the day
- Eat whole real foods
- Drink plenty of quality filtered water
- Breathe deep belly breaths and take time out to be with yourself and your breath, and just breathe
- Leg go of resentment in relation to yourself and others
- Get more exposure to Mother Nature especially the sun and the soil
- Dramatically reduce your exposure to toxins
That about sums up living a healthy holistic lifestyle. If you can strive to do all of these things you will successfully reduce the stress in your life long-term.
Links and Resources
- Why Zebras Don’t Get Ulcers — Robert M. Sapolsky
- The Tapping Solution — Nick Ortner
- Stress Reduction Worksheet
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In this podcast I’ll be exploring what it means to be in an Attitude of Gratitude:
- I’ll explain what gratitude really is
- I’ll also explain why everyone should be practising gratitude in their lives everyday
- Finally I’ll talk about a few different ways to practice being in an attitude of gratitude
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What is gratitude? Let me read what Professor Google says. The definition of gratitude: “The quality of being thankful; readiness to show appreciation for and to return kindness.” Alright so thanks and appreciation, sounds pretty standard.
Now I like to give these two quotes of what I think gratitude really means.
This is from Melody Beattie:
“Gratitude unlocks the fullness of life. It turns what we have into enough, and more. It turns denial into acceptance, chaos to order, confusion to clarity. It can turn a meal into a feast, a house into a home, a stranger into a friend.”
And this from Wayne Dyer:
“Change the way you look at things and the things you look at will change.”
To me gratitude is about seeing things in a new light, in a different perspective and there’s different ways people express gratitude: blessing and prayer; showing appreciation to people; saying thank you and actually meaning it. Gratitude isn’t so much what you say, it’s how you’re being in that moment that you’re giving thanks and appreciation and being grateful and praying and blessing. I love to say “say what you mean and mean what you say.” You can say thank you and not mean it, but you can BE thankful and there’s no denying what you mean.
That’s what gratitude is. Gratitude is a life skill, a tool to reframe parts of our lives from not that much, from scarcity to more than enough and abundance.
Today we love in a world where everything is pretty much 24/7, plugged in all the time, non-stop. We live in the world of FOMO. FOMO means Fear Of Missing Out. Now I believe that everyone should be practising and dedicating a few minutes a day to being in an attitude of gratitude because that will get rid of your FOMO disease, your FOMO syndrome, your FOMO illness, okay. Remember gratitude is a reframing tool. It helps us s change our perception of things, so where there wasn’t enough now there’s plenty. What we have is plenty. By practising gratitude no longer do you have this fear of missing out because what you have is already enough and it takes time to see things this way, but that’s why you got to practise this. It’s a tool that you use to build a skill that then becomes a habit.
So being in an attitude of gratitude will help you disconnect from this 24/7 online world that we live in currently. Disconnect just enough to bring you into the present moment, to being more mindful and aware of how your thinking, how your feeling, how’s your body going, how’s your mind going, how’s your life going. Right now we are surrounded by so much stimulation that sometimes we don’t know whether we’re coming or going. Just taking time out to say thank you or to give a blessing or to have a prayer, just being grateful for five seconds will bring you to that moment in the present very mindful and aware of how you’re feeling. What sensations are you feeling in your body? What thoughts are running through your mind before you get into that attitude of gratitude and then what thoughts come after?
Gratitude, it’s not just being polite and saying thank you. It’s disconnecting yourself from the confusion that can appear around you. It’s removing the fear of missing out. It’s bringing you to the present moment, increasing your awareness and making you very mindful of how you’re feeling and how you’re doing in the moment. It’s nothing small, it’s quite huge. Grat-ti-tude. One word. Three syllables. Infinite amount of possibilities of how it can change your life.
Now there is no one way to practise being in an attitude of gratitude, okay. Now I like to leave every episode of the Whole Guidance Podcast in an attitude of gratitude. I explained in episode one how I do this personally. So, before bed I give thanks for one person I interacted with that day, one goal that I accomplished, and also another random experience. That’s how I personally do it. Right before bed and I give thanks for those three things.
Now you may want to set a timer, a gratitude reminder. You might want to book something in your calendar. You can set it for every hour. Maybe you can remind yourself to do this at every meal. You might want to do it first thing in the morning after you wake up. You might want to do it before exercise, after exercise, before meditation, after meditation, before bed. You have to find the time and the duration that works for you. My attitude of gratitude practise takes less than 5 minutes for example.
The way you practise gratitude whether it’s a blessing, whether it’s prayer, whether it’s saying ‘thank you, thank you, thank you, thank you, thank you, thank you’ a thousand times in front of a mirror, is up to you. As long as it brings you into the moment and puts a smile on your face you’ll know you’re doing what’s right for you. There’s no one way to do this.
Try this easy 10 second practise. In any moment you have the need to be grateful and this could be anytime it comes to mind (it doesn’t matter whether you’re waiting to cross the road, stuck in traffic, bored at work, stressed at home, waking up, brushing your teeth, taking out the trash) close your eyes if possible and think of someone you’d like to say thank you to and mean it and be sure to have an image of them clearly in your head. This could be a supernatural being or even yourself. Take a deep breath counting four seconds as you breath in and on the out breath say out loud or in your mind ‘thank you’. Also, let out that breath as a huge sigh of relief. Sorted. You just practised being in an attitude of gratitude.
So it doesn’t matter when you do it. It doesn’t matter how you do it. As long as you do it. As long as you can take time out to bring love in. Love? What’s that got to do with gratitude? Well, there’s this book called A Course In Miracles (it’s a pretty beast of a book). It’s about life. This is what ACIM says about gratitude:
“Gratitude goes hand in hand with love, and where one is, the other must be found.”
This has proven to be true time and again in my experience. So I could have called this podcast attitude of love, but it just didn’t sound as good off the tongue. When you’re being in an attitude of gratitude you’re bringing yourself back into love. What I’m saying is that if you can take time out to bring some love in you’ll find yourself feeling less stressful and a lot happier.
Now I would like to hear from you, the beautiful listener. How do you practise being in an attitude of gratitude? Is it weekly, daily, multiple times a day? Do you use prayer or give blessings or do you just say thank you to yourself, to others, to God, to the Universe? How do you do it? Leave your comments [in the comments section below] or leave your comments in an iTunes review. Either way I would love to hear from you.
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The Wise Heart – Jack Kornfield
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Experience the Transformational Power of Buddhism’s Psychology of the Heart with Bestselling Author Jack Kornfield.
You have within you unlimited capacities for extraordinary love, for joy, for communion with life, and for unshakable freedom—and here is how to awaken them. In The Wise Heart, celebrated author and psychologist Jack Kornfield offers the most accessible, comprehensive, and illuminating guide to Buddhist psychology ever published in the West. For meditators and mental health professionals, Buddhists and non-Buddhists alike, here is a vision of radiant human dignity, a journey to the highest expression of human possibility—and a practical path for realizing it in our own lives.
Disclaimer: This page contains affiliate links that may provide monetary compensation to help support the Whole Guidance Vision of Creating a Happy and Healthy Planet should you make a purchase. We very much appreciate and thank you for your support.
Better Than Before – Gretchen Rubin
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The author of the blockbuster New York Times bestsellers, The Happiness Project and Happier at Home, tackles the critical question: How do we change?
Gretchen Rubin’s answer: through habits. Habits are the invisible architecture of everyday life. It takes work to make a habit, but once that habit is set, we can harness the energy of habits to build happier, stronger, more productive lives.
So if habits are a key to change, then what we really need to know is: How do we change our habits?
Better than Before answers that question. It presents a practical, concrete framework to allow readers to understand their habits—and to change them for good. Infused with Rubin’s compelling voice, rigorous research, and easy humor, and packed with vivid stories of lives transformed, Better than Before explains the (sometimes counter-intuitive) core principles of habit formation.
Along the way, Rubin uses herself as guinea pig, tests her theories on family and friends, and answers readers’ most pressing questions—oddly, questions that other writers and researchers tend to ignore:
• Why do I find it tough to create a habit for something I love to do?
• Sometimes I can change a habit overnight, and sometimes I can’t change a habit, no matter how hard I try. Why?
• How quickly can I change a habit?
• What can I do to make sure I stick to a new habit?
• How can I help someone else change a habit?
• Why can I keep habits that benefit others, but can’t make habits that are just for me?
Whether readers want to get more sleep, stop checking their devices, maintain a healthy weight, or finish an important project, habits make change possible. Reading just a few chapters of Better Than Before will make readers eager to start work on their own habits—even before they’ve finished the book.
Disclaimer: This page contains affiliate links that may provide monetary compensation to help support the Whole Guidance Vision of Creating a Happy and Healthy Planet should you make a purchase. We very much appreciate and thank you for your support.
Podcasts are digital audio programmes similar to a radio show.
You can download a majority of podcasts for free to your computer or smart mobile device using applications such as iTunes, Stitcher, and Pocket Casts.
Below you will find a premium selection of wellness podcasts that will assist you in improving many different areas of your life including health, wealth, love, and happiness.
- Wise Traditions – Weston A. Price Foundation, Hilda Labrada Gore (download from iTunes)
- The Model Health Show – Shawn Stevenson (download from iTunes)
- Love-Life – Jane Donovan (download from iTunes)
- Soul Doctor – Rebecca Dettman (download from iTunes)
- The One You Feed – Eric Zimmer (download from iTunes)
- Happier with Gretchen Rubin – Gretchen Rubin and Elizabeth Craft (download from iTunes)
- The Quote of the Day Show – Sean Croxton (download from iTunes)
- Bruce Lee Podcast – Shannon Lee (download from iTunes)
- The Cognitive Rampage – Adam Lowery (download from iTunes)
- Tangentially Speaking – Dr Christopher Ryan (download from iTunes)
- The Tim Ferriss Show – Tim Ferriss (download from iTunes)
- Up For A Chat – Carren Smith, Cyndi O’Meara, Kim Morrison (download from iTunes)
- Balanced Bites – Diane Sanfilippo and Liz Wolfe (download from iTunes)
- Rewild Yourself! Podcast – Daniel Vitalis (download from iTunes)
- Katy Says with Katy Bowman – Katy Bowman (download from iTunes)
- Ben Greenfield Fitness – Ben Greenfield (download from iTunes)
- Fitness Confidential with Vinnie Tortorich – Vinnie Tortorich (download from iTunes)
- The Fat-Burning Man Show – Abel James (download from iTunes)
- Jocko Podcast – Jocko Willink and Echo Charles (download from iTunes)
- The Joe Rogan Experience – Joe Rogan (download from iTunes)
- Bulletproof Radio – Dave Asprey (download from iTunes)
- Revolution Health Radio – Chris Kresser (download from iTunes)
- The Sean Croxton Sessions – Sean Croxton (download from iTunes)
- Body IO FM – John Kiefer and Dr Rocky Patel (download from iTunes)
- Underground Wellness Radio – Sean Croxton (download from iTunes)
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There are over four billion websites online dedicated to health, dieting, and weight loss.
With mainstream advice not working for a lot of people and the fact that most of it often contradicts itself where does one go for consistent practical wellness information that works for 99% of individuals when applied in the real world?
Below you will find 20 websites that are the pick of the wellness bunch that are backed by human history and factual non-political, non-financed science. These websites also have real world evidence as reported by real people who have healed and cured themselves following the lifestyle recommendations and whole food recipes that are detailed within.
Click through to a better, stronger, healthier, and happier you.
- WestonAPrice.org
- PaulCheksBlog.com
- UndergroundWellness.com
- ChrisKresser.com
- MarksDailyApple.com
- PerfectHealthDiet.com
- Body.io
- FatBurningMan.com
- BenGreenfieldFitness.com
- RobbWolf.com
- BalancedBites.com
- BulletproofExec.com
- GlutenFreeAnna.com
- WellnessMama.com
- NomNomPaleo.com
- CivilizedCavemanCooking.com
- EatDrinkPaleo.com.au
- NourishedKitchen.com
- AgainstAllGrain.com
- ZenbellyCatering.com
Have you ever attended a conference, seminar, or workshop and wished to yourself that you had a video or audio recording? What about having a full transcription of the entire event that you can read at your own leisure?
The online seminar or summit scene is very popular at the moment. You get options for video, audio, and transcripts that you can purchase for lifetime access.
The following health summits are the most cost-effective way to educate and upskill yourself in your own time and improve you and your family’s health and well-being along the way.
- The Gluten Summit – from theDr.com
(visit product page) - Real Food Con – from UndergroundWellness.com
(visit product page) - Detox Summit – from FoodandSpirit.com
(visit product page) - Digestion Sessions – from UndergroundWellness.com
(visit product page) - Thyroid Sessions – from UndergroundWellness.com
(visit product page) - Evolution of Medicine Summit – from FunctionalForum.com
(visit product page) - Paleo Summit – from UndergroundWellness.com
(visit product page)
Picture: Stuart Miles | freedigitalphotos.net
Disclaimer: This page contains affiliate links that may provide monetary compensation to help support the Whole Guidance Vision of Creating a Happy and Healthy Planet should you make a purchase. We very much appreciate and thank you for your support.
Killing Sacred Cows – Garrett B. Gunderson, Stephen Palmer
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NEW YORK TIMES AND WALL STREET JOURNAL BESTSELLER
Our culture is riddled with destructive myths about money and prosperity that are severely limiting the power, creativity, and financial potential of individuals. In Killing Sacred Cows, Garrett B. Gunderson boldly exposes ingrained fallacies and misguided traditions in the world of personal finance. He presents a revolutionary perspective that can create unprecedented opportunity and wealth for thoughtful, mission-driven individuals.
Our financial lives are intimately connected to our societal contributions, and we must be financially free in order to achieve our fullest potential. Sadly, however, most people are held captive in their financial lives by misinformation, propaganda, and limited knowledge. Through well-reasoned arguments, unflinching logic, and revelatory insight, Gunderson defeats common clichés and faulty retirement planning advice to plainly demonstrate the following and much more:
- 401(k)s and the stock market are the most risky investments for most people and the gambling mindset they induce creates disastrous consequences.
- Conventional retirement planning advice, products, strategies, and techniques expose you to significant danger of being unable to retire, or of running out of money prematurely if you do.
- Building net worth is a recipe for creating a life of fear and poverty and how to escape that common trap.
- Debt may not be what you think it is and why that matters to your prosperity.
- ‘High risk equals high returns’ is destructive dogma and how reducing risk can increase your returns.
Killing Sacred Cows is a must-read for brave individuals willing to question common assumptions and teachings, overcome the herd mentality, break through financial myths, and live a purposeful, passionate, and prosperous life.
Disclaimer: This page contains affiliate links that may provide monetary compensation to help support the Whole Guidance Vision of Creating a Happy and Healthy Planet should you make a purchase. We very much appreciate and thank you for your support.