This Devoted Life
What started as a Saturday morning coffee date turned into a podcast where we discuss our faith, family, finances and so much more!
In a world that is encouraging you to “live your truth” and to “follow your heart,” we want to encourage you to live Devoted to THE Truth. The Bible has a lot to say about how to live a victorious Christian life, and we want to share practical insight in how to apply those truths to your life as we endeavor to apply them to our own lives as well.
We are passionate about building and growing the nuclear family, as well as sharing our expertise and experience with finances, homeschooling, and over 70 years of combined biblical knowledge.
Join us as we live… This Devoted Life!
James and Shanda
This Devoted Life
29: Is Paul Saladino on to something? The Truth Behind Food Industry Claims
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When it comes to navigating the complex world of health and nutrition, the journey often feels overwhelming. How do we sift through conflicting information and find a balanced approach that works for our families?
Join us for an honest conversation as we break down key insights from Paul Saladino's appearance on the PBD Podcast, discussing everything from the influence of pharmaceutical companies on our healthcare system to practical steps anyone can take toward better health. We're not claiming to be experts—we're simply sharing how we process and apply health information in our own lives.
Our health choices impact not just ourselves but everyone watching us, especially our children. We share how our family navigates these decisions, finding balance between healthy choices and realistic living in a busy world. Remember, the goal isn't perfection but progress—small, consistent improvements that add up significantly over time.
Leave us a review if you found this helpful, and share with friends who might benefit from a balanced approach to health and nutrition. We're all on this journey together!
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Website: This Devoted Life
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Email: podcast@thisdevotedlife.com
Introduction to "This Devoted Life"
Speaker 1How do you talk to a giant?
Speaker 2How.
Speaker 1By using big words. This whole entire thing is going to be a catastrophe. What started as a Saturday morning coffee date turned into a podcast where we chat about things like faith, family finances and so much more.
Speaker 2In a world that is encouraging you to live your truth and to follow your heart. We want to encourage you to live devoted to the truth.
Speaker 1The Bible has a lot to say about how to live a victorious Christian life, and we want to share practical insight in how to apply those truths to your life, as we endeavor to apply them to our own lives as well.
Discussing the PBD Podcast
Speaker 2If you enjoyed this podcast, please leave us a review and share these episodes with your friends so that you can help them live this devoted life too. Welcome to another episode of this Devoted Life Podcast. Today we are going to be talking about something a little bit different. So James sent me a podcast the other day between Patrick Bet-David. Did I say that correctly?
Speaker 2You correctly and Paul Saladino, and admittedly, it's a two hour podcast and I only got about an hour into it. I'm not really a podcast person, which is terrible to say, considering we make a podcast. I prefer to consume my information via books. But you listen to, I mean, hours of podcasting each week, and this was one that you, you know. It kind of gave you some food to chew on, I mean, because it's going to be all about health and nutrition, and so we just thought that we would kind of talk through some of the things that you found interesting in this.
Speaker 1Yeah, absolutely yeah, you're coming out the gate, hot. I literally was like kind of looking at my notes and everything and you're like welcome to.
Speaker 2Ready or not, here we come, that's right.
Speaker 1Yeah, so Patrick Bet David. It's the PBD podcast. So hopefully we don't have any pop filters on our mics, so it's popping a little bit, but lots of P's in there, lots of P's in there, oh my goodness. So the Patrick Bet David podcast and again like you said Paul Saladino.
Speaker 1And whenever I listen to podcasts like this, part of me is like all right, you know, I think we're doing okay and you know, is this dude legit or whatever? And then part of me is like all right, when I get home tonight, we're literally going to purge the pantry. We're going to go through everything, get rid of all of our forever chemicals, all of our plastics, everything. So I guess I'll start off by saying it's pretty obvious, I think, to anyone who listens to this podcast that we are not medical professionals.
Speaker 2Absolutely not.
Speaker 1We love learning, we love trying to better ourselves through scripture. We try to learn things like that and also any secular advice. We try to like filter it out, and so, just starting off with that, this is just food for thought.
Speaker 2You and I have not actually sat down and talked about this podcast at all, so this is kind of just the raw this is how we think yeah, just the food for thought. And how are we processing what we have learned through this? Absolutely.
Speaker 1Yeah. So yeah, this is a little inside look. We're kind of peeling back the curtains on how we talk about things for our family and also kind of digest the information that we learn and receive and turn it into something usable for our family. So again, I know very little about Paul Saladino other than just what I listened to.
Speaker 2I had to do a Google search on who he was, because I actually did not know.
Speaker 1Yeah, so it sounds like he's very much a carnivore, diet-related person and diets can become almost—people who are really into health and things like that. It can almost become like a religion in a way, oh, totally. And it's like they love telling you about it and you have to do everything that they want you to do. Or you have to do this, don't do to do. Or you know you have to do this, don't do that, and they're very passionate about it.
Speaker 1So I'm more of a. I think we, I should say, are more of a. All right, let's, let's look at this. Does it make sense? Is it doable? Is it something that we can actually incorporate into our family and even remotely Like do we want to yeah? Can we carry through with it?
Speaker 1And is it going to make a difference. So a lot of the things that he said, though, I thought were very good. So just kind of take everything with a grain of salt and learn from it and do your own research and kind of just again use it for whatever level of change in your life that you can use it for. So I did take a bunch of notes and I'll just kind of go down through Obviously again.
Speaker 1this is just a Cliff Notes version of this podcast, but I thought it was a lot of this is the James Note version.
Speaker 2It is yeah, exactly.
Big Pharma and FDA Funding
Speaker 1So they kind of started out with talking about big pharma and specifically advertising on television, and this is something that's come up numerous times. I mean, we talk about it. You know, we've talked about it for years. Really, how bizarre it is that you know you watch the, you know any sporting event on live TV, things like that and it's shocking how much advertising for drugs there is.
Speaker 2The US is one of two countries that allows that.
Speaker 1Yes, so the US and New Zealand are the only two countries in the world that allow advertising for pharmaceuticals on TV.
Speaker 2Okay, isn't that crazy. Honestly, it boggles my mind that that's even allowed. Yeah.
Speaker 1So 47% of funding comes or I'm sorry, let me restart so there's that, and I think it's $4.2 trillion of healthcare, spend things like that, so that it's a big industry, right, and then I'll probably come back to that. But another thing about Big Pharma is that 47% of funding for the FDA so the Food and Drug Administration in the United States comes from Big Pharma.
Speaker 2So it's mind-boggling. I don't even know what to say to that yeah.
Speaker 1So I think RFK Jr talked. He said I think in some of the political things that he's been involved in recently, I think he said like half the funding for the FDA comes and literally they like fact-checked him. Yeah, it's like close enough Well they were criticizing him because they were like that's not true and like it's not half, it's only 47%. And it's just like that's just kind of the world that we're living in, but it is true, like it's mind-blowing. That's just kind of the world that we're living in, but it is true.
Speaker 1Like it's mind-blowing that the FDA gets that much, so why wouldn't it be influenced by drug?
Speaker 2companies yeah.
Speaker 1So that's a thing. And again, not all drugs are bad. Obviously a lot of people need medication. I'm very pro, you know, like if you go through the process and try all the you know kind of natural and just healthy things.
Speaker 2There's a time and a place for traditional medicine.
Simplifying Healthy Food Choices
Speaker 1Yes, absolutely. So you know, I just kind of I'll leave it at that. It's just kind of staggering statistics. So who do I listen to? You know, it's one of those things that, like I said, it becomes a religion. You know, like do this diet, don't do that diet. So one thing that I thought was good is PBD, patrick Bet-David, the PBD podcast. He thinks I'm not going to like elevate myself to him or whatever you know, but like I feel like he thinks very similarly to me.
Speaker 1I love listening to his podcast because, as I'm sitting there like wanting him to ask the question, all of a sudden he does and I'm like, oh, this is great, like let's make this simple. You know a recent podcast. It's like let's really simplify things because really life is pretty simple.
Speaker 1Not necessarily easy but simple. So he said you know, if I want to do just, you know like where do I start and I'll kind of get down a little bit later into those different levels. But I thought it was a good answer that Paul gave. He said just start by eating some single food, I'm sorry, single ingredient foods. So it's you know, it's like what's in broccoli, broccoli. You know, like what's in chicken.
Speaker 2Chicken, which he is carnivore diet, and he would actually probably not like broccoli?
Speaker 1Yeah, he probably wouldn't like broccoli, so I'll use that example.
Speaker 2He didn't say broccoli, but he did say chicken Right, yeah, exactly.
Speaker 1Yeah. So it's like you know, kind of that's the first pass is you know, like, eat single ingredient foods and then kind of the next pass is you know if it is more processed, or you know, you know produced or whatever from a company. He used the phrase like, basically, if your great grandma wouldn't recognize the ingredients don't eat this food.
Speaker 1Don't eat it, yeah and they pulled up a bunch of different products and it was kind of funny because I think they literally went to value attainetainment Studios or whatever that's also a PBD thing and grabbed a bunch of snacks.
Speaker 2Well, I laughed. So I did watch this part and I was laughing because I was like, did they go and get all of the worst stuff possible to like set before this guy? Because I was like could they have brought something that maybe you and I would have eaten? But could they have brought something that maybe you and I would have eaten?
Speaker 1But I mean they were bringing like monster energy drinks and stuff and I'm like of course he's not gonna endorse those Oreos. I don't think so. I mean, I've been in and out of a lot of offices, and I mean like the snack stand is usually filled with that stuff, right? I mean like things that last a long time, non-perishable foods, highly processed that's typically what you find Things that are addicting and that people want to go and grab.
Speaker 1Yeah, Absolutely yeah. So you know again, that's kind of like the first pass of filters, you know. And so if you diverge from that, just eat foods that have ingredients that your great-grandma would recognize. And then they went into seed oils and I feel like seed oils is a kind of a hot topic.
Speaker 2You know.
Speaker 1I don't know if it's just recently or maybe I've just kind of been hearing about it recently, but it was fascinating. So I guess the first mass produced seed oil was started in 1911 and it produced by Procter and Gamble. It was Crisco right. Yes, exactly, yep. So you know the tub of Crisco right would recognize that, but maybe it's more like my grandma would and not my great grandma?
Speaker 2I don't know.
Speaker 1But I just I thought that was kind of funny. So and then literally Procter Gamble started with a marketing campaign about it being better than butter, like basically it's a substitute of butter. So again we see this. You know, literally back to 1911, a lot of the food was marketed, you know, and it's just like people trying to make a buck you know, and you know I love capitalism. I love, you know, making a buck.
Speaker 2And they try to make everything sound like it's good for you. Like that better than butter? What would be like natural flavorings? You know, like you see that and you're like, oh, they're natural, so it must be okay you okay, so they always put, like this, positive spin on whatever it is they're trying to market to you Right?
Speaker 1yeah, I think they actually talked, not even necessarily at this part of the podcast, but they mentioned the marketing of using words and they talked about. Really it started out as death insurance, but like nobody wanted death insurance, so let's call it life insurance.
Speaker 2And now everyone wants it. Yeah, now everyone wants it, right.
Speaker 1So you know, it's literally kind of how you spin things.
Speaker 2Yeah, totally. I mean, we do that with our kids Like we want it to be a positive thing when we tell them something sometimes. Yeah, yeah absolutely so.
Speaker 1Again, highly processed foods. They talked a lot about that. So seed oils, highly processed foods, and literally there's and I have my own little story so I'll add that but I'll kind of say this one thing so, and literally, food is engineered nowadays to be hyper palatable and addicting. So you know the smells, the different senses, even like the crunch.
Speaker 2That white cheddar popcorn I've got upstairs in a bag is calling my name yeah.
Seed Oils and Food Marketing
Speaker 1And um, and it's very addicting. So you know, it's just like one of those things where, um, you know, they literally engineering things. So my little story with that is, uh, I graduated from Michigan technological university in engineering and um, at at our uh job fairs, career fairs that we would literally have 300 companies and it's a remote location and I mean people you know, companies would travel from all over the nation, all over the world to be there and like it's a hike right.
Speaker 2You know it's a long way.
Speaker 1You can't just like turn, you know, take an extra right, you know, and end up at Michigan Tech.
Speaker 2You're like eight hours off the beaten path, yeah, exactly, you know. And end up at Michigan Tech. You're like eight hours off the beaten path, yeah, exactly.
Speaker 1And so long and short of it is. I remember companies like BASF and Kraft Foods and whatnot being there and I'm like what is Kraft Foods doing here? And they're like well, they recruit chemical engineers. And I'm like why does a food company need chemical?
Speaker 2engineers. And this is you know. Kraft Singles are not cheese. Yeah, they're just a manufactured, you know yeah, cheese substitute.
Speaker 1Yeah, at any rate, I thought that was kind of funny, um you know, because I literally remember that I don't know if it's funny or if it's just really sad.
Speaker 2Yeah, yeah, I guess. Yeah, it's ironic. Well, doesn't? One of your friends, um, they worked for, uh, a food industry where they were creating, um tastes using chemicals, right, yeah?
Speaker 1Yeah, and it's like very strategic, so like they will want you to like, for example, and maybe this is a good thing that they were trying, I don't know, but they were trying to remove salt or sodium from some food, trying to remove salt or sodium from some food, but they would put a hint of bacon like smell, like aroma in there, and so I guess we as human beings have learned to associate bacon with salt, and so then you don't realize or notice that it's a low sodium thing Okay, okay, yes, so that was an example of it's mind bending.
Speaker 2Yeah, yeah.
Speaker 1So, like one of our customers is international foods and fragrances, you know, and they're actually getting bought out, which might have to sign an NDA to learn about that? No, I think it's public knowledge, but at any rate, yeah, that's literally what they do Methicel and ethacel, so yeah, so around 1900, most doctors had never even seen a heart attack, so I thought that was an interesting observation. And then obesity was rare.
Speaker 2Do you think that they hadn't actually seen a heart attack, or is it possible that they just didn't know how to diagnose a?
Speaker 1heart attack, so I thought the same thing. Heart attack, so I thought the same thing. But I mean you would have to assume that whether they called it a heart attack or a cardiac arrest or whatever, like I think they would have known, you know, by listening to the heart you know what the cause of death was, or what, the main issue.
Speaker 1So yeah, and obesity was rare. You know all those different. You know like chronic illnesses weren't around and again other. You know people died of other causes and you know our longevity nowadays is way higher than you know the 16, 17, 1800s, right, you know, but at the same time you know we have an epidemic of different proportions. So again, just kind of is what it is and interesting. So they talked a lot about I think PBD asked him about. You know energy drinks and kind of avoiding that mid-afternoon crash. And you know this is the quote I think that really spoke to you is Paul said caffeine is borrowing tomorrow's happiness for today.
Speaker 2So good, yeah, isn't it yeah.
Speaker 1And I love coffee, right, yeah, this is fun to me. But you know I try to limit my caffeine intake to you know I don't I stop drinking anything caffeine, or that includes caffeine around 10 am, 11 am, so that because I am very affected by caffeine I always have been and I kind of view it as a good thing, so that I can't, you know, kind of overdo it. But literally, if I have, you know, caffeine at six o'clock at night, or even, you know, sometimes in the afternoon, like it's harder for me to fall, asleep, or if I do, I don't get in that good REM sleep.
Speaker 2I drink one coffee a day as well, and I usually don't drink it until about 11 am because I usually wait until I've had breakfast and the kids and I are done with like our morning routine and then I'll have my coffee, like kind of between when we're switching up between our morning routine and our like formal school lessons. And the other day, because it was exam week, we didn't have school on Friday. I went and I met a friend for lunch and my routine had been upset and I got to lunch at 11 am and I went. I totally forgot to have coffee today and she looked at me and she was like how do you forget to have coffee?
Speaker 2I was like well, honestly, like I'm really thankful, because it was kind of a moment where I went oh, I guess I don't rely on that. You know, like I enjoy the cup of coffee in the morning, but it's not something that my body's like. Oh, I have to have that first thing in the morning.
Speaker 2And I mean, that's not saying, if you like want to have it first thing in the morning, that it's not the thing. But I um it just kind of like maybe go, oh okay, like phew, I'm not totally reliant on this.
Speaker 1Exactly, yeah. And again, I think all of these things are, you know, just fascinating and things that we should think about and have a little bit of intentionality. So again, if you want to, you know, partake in whatever you know. It's just like kind of, you know, every once in a while, assess it and say like am I becoming dependent on this?
Speaker 2or not.
Speaker 1And you know, is it a terrible drug? No, you know whatever. But like, maybe I should you know, lay off of it for a couple of weeks or whatever, just to kind of prove to yourself that you can.
Speaker 2Yeah, that's kind of like when you want to like you brush your teeth with your right hand all the time and it's like every now and then you're like. I'm going to try it with my left just to see if I can do without this. Or maybe we're the only people that do that, but I totally do stuff like that.
Speaker 1Yeah, um, then they kind of went into, don't take away my sugar, I know. That's terrible, so he used the term pure sucrose is the most dangerous because it creates the wrong type of bacteria in your gut.
Speaker 2Yeah.
Speaker 1So you know, I mean, most people think of it spiking your blood sugar and things like that. And again, everyone's a little different. We're all you know if you have diabetes or what all of those things. But in his mind the most dangerous part of sugar is or, you know, pure sucrose is that it creates, the wrong time, wrong kind of bacteria in your gut.
Sleep, Hydration and Lifestyle Balance
Speaker 2I found this one totally fascinating because he said that if you were to eat a banana, obviously you're going to have sugar in the banana, but because of all the other ingredients or the chemicals that you find, he called them chemicals natural chemicals that are within the banana. They actually help break down that sugar in your gut and it's the same way if you were to eat honey or maple syrup. Those are already naturally occurring and they come with all of the chemical compounds needed to break it down naturally in your gut. Absolutely yeah.
Speaker 1Yeah, your body knows how to digest them and you know pull the good and basically kind of I mean, for lack of a better term like excrete the waste right. You know, and, and it doesn't have all those harmful effects and it helps your gut biome. It doesn't degrade it.
Speaker 2Yeah, yeah, I guess he didn't take away all my sugar. No, no, not at all. Yeah.
Speaker 1I mean he, even, he, even like, use the phrase like strawberries and blueberries and honey and such, don't cause diabetes, you know. So like they, you, you can and people will argue everything. And again, I'm not saying he's right wrong.
Speaker 2We're just presenting what he said. Yeah, and again, everyone's not saying he's right, wrong or different.
Speaker 1We're just presenting what he said. Yeah, this is what he said and again, everyone's a little different, but I think he's right.
Speaker 1I mean to me it makes sense, and so you know to rather put it this way. I think the simplest way I can put how I think about things is if I'm going to make a big mistake in my health, making the mistake of being too natural is okay to me. You know what I mean. Like, if I want to eat a little bit too too much honey or maple syrup or fruit or whatever, and it still happens to be a little bad for me, I'd rather do that than do it on 20 Oreos high fructose corn syrup and you know know, like just beet sugar.
Speaker 1I don't want to talk about my sugar beet growers friends. No, but you know those, those things you know, and like we're basically extracting the pure sucrose out of things and our body's not knowing what to do with them. So again, I love like, literally, for I mean I think my entire life, I, if someone eats a dessert and they're like stop halfway through and they're like I'm sick to my stomach. That was so sweet, Like.
Speaker 2You're not usually one who will stop. I literally will eat the whole thing the Adam's peanut butter fudge ripple cheesecake at Cheesecake. Factory. You will sit and you will eat that and I look at that and I take a couple bites and it's like whoa and I love my sugar, I really love my sugar, but that one just puts me over the top Right, so what?
Speaker 1I'm saying is this is speaking to me, because I love sweet things.
Speaker 2Yeah.
Speaker 1Love, love, love. Yeah, it can't be too sweet for me. So next thing 90% of our health care dollars are spent on chronic illness, and then I'll kind of reiterate the $4.3 trillion on health care. So it's a $4.3 trillion industry and 90% of our health care dollars are spent on chronic illness.
Speaker 1So basically what that's saying is these are just band-aids to the underlying causes and it's like it basically not targeting any of the truly important pieces no underlying issues Exactly, and that's kind of what led into like the next kind of section of the podcast was, you know he just really he kept reiterating that the cumulative effects are what matter. So, like what he would say is I think he used the example of you know, like, if you ate like one oreo, like a couple times a week, would that be harmful to your body? Probably not, probably not, but you probably aren't just eating one oreo a couple times a week.
Speaker 1A, you're eating more oreos b you're you're busy and you're throwing in you know a few, a few packs of Cheez-Its and you know Cheetos or whatever. And it's just like this cumulative effect, and so that's how people become so unhealthy.
Speaker 2I've always heard it, the phrase toxic overload. It's the phrase that I've heard, like within my crunchy mom circles. You know where they talk about.
Speaker 1you know it's okay for maybe that tiny little bit you know where they talk about.
Speaker 2You know, it's okay for maybe that tiny little bit, but your body just gets this cumulative effect where it can no longer process it out because you're adding more than it can process at a time. Yeah, yeah, exactly.
Speaker 1Yeah, and you know, like, once again, you know, pbd asked him about like those mid-afternoon energy crashes or whatever. And I thought it was interesting because, rather than just you know, say well, you should, you know, drink this or not, do that, he literally said like, well, did you get a good night of sleep last night? You know, what did you eat for breakfast this morning? Yeah, what did you eat for lunch? And it's again this cumulative effect where, like, it's not about preventing that or the putting a bandaid on that mid-afternoon crash, energy crash, it's about truly preventing it through good choices all the way throughout your life. And you know, and as we know, it can compound to the good or it can compound to the bad right.
Speaker 2If you get a bad night of sleep.
Speaker 1You know you go to bed late, you're cramming for, you know, a presentation or a test or whatever you know, and then you wake up late if you even went to bed, you know and then you're just wolfing down some you know energy bar or whatever for breakfast, and this boom, boom, boom, boom.
Speaker 1And now it's like even worse you know, so it's like, if you kind of start in, this is a little aside my own little thing but years and years and years ago, when I read the book the Miracle Morning and things like that and I was really trying to dial in on my schedule and how I approach life, I did come to the conclusion that everything kind of starts with my bedtime the night before and I'm a night owl and I keep you up.
Speaker 2I'm so sorry, you're such a bad influence on me.
Speaker 1So, yeah, it's, um, yeah, it's that cumulative effect and you gotta get off the hamster wheel of this just never ending, you know, cycle of of doom. But um, so, uh, this is where, uh, PBD said all right, you know, let's start like, let's say, I'm at level one, I've been eating terrible, not healthy at all. What do I need to start with? And Paul mentioned cut out liquid calories, you know, ditch the, you know any pop, even diet soda, whatever, pop soda Coke any of the above Northern, southern whatever you are, we'll cover all of them.
Speaker 1And he said you know, cut that out. Obviously, energy drinks, monsters, you know, red Bulls, things like that. So, all right, that's level one. What's level two? Level two is snacks, like, really, you know, cut out the the bad snacks, the ones that we've just been talking about um, he suggested basically, only eat fruit and cheese like real cheese if you're going to snack. Yep and um, he said. Uh, the pbd asked him you know like? Well, like what kind of cheese?
Speaker 1and he said anything as close to raw as you can get they pulled up something and he actually said, yeah, I've been to that farm, you know I've. I've seen them make these. You know this raw cheese, you know that's the real food. You know anything real food. And I remember PBD asked he's like, well, what about these almonds? And he's like read the ingredients. And he's like they're almonds. He's like read the ingredients, so I think they were like a Kirkland brand.
Speaker 1You know almonds, and it was almonds, salt and peanut oil, yeah, and I'm just like, wow, you know that's crazy. So again, a seed oil and what you would think is a healthy snack.
Speaker 2And.
Speaker 1I don't know yeah.
Speaker 2It kind of makes you feel a little overwhelmed, like are we ever going to be able to reach this? You know, quote unquote, perfection of our eating, and the answer is no like we never will. But I think the the point of like discussing this is what small changes can we make so that when we do, you know, eat something outside of these parameters or whatever it's, it's not going to completely ruin us? Yes, exactly.
Speaker 1And don't let it get off the rails too far right.
Speaker 1You know once you do, I'll actually insert this Maybe he did use this, but I've obviously used it a lot as well is don't let perfect become the enemy of progress. So that's a good reminder. What you just said is you know, like, don't worry about being perfect, like that's kind of why I liked you know what PBDS about these levels, it's like, all right, let's cut out like one thing you know, like if you love your pop and you drink it a lot, um, just stop that, you know like replace it with.
Speaker 1You know he. He even talked about you know like cause. You know you'll hear about a lot of negatives about juices and things like that.
Speaker 1And yeah, if you go get ocean spray juice or whatever at the store, it's full of whatever. But if you can find kind of fresh squeezed orange juice, start with that, yeah, I'll just kind of leave it at that. So level three was stop eating fast food or highly processed foods, and so I think PBD asked well, what if I'm busy lifestyle, you know what if I have to kind of you know quote unquote have to um, you know, go to fast food places? And he said, basically, try to find places that don't use um seed oils and you cook their food and seed oils. And I love five guys. And he actually used five guys as a positive. He's like, if there's a Five Guys around, just order a hamburger and he's like, don't put all the sauces on it because those have all the high fructose, whatever's in them.
Speaker 1But he's like get basically you know no bun, get lettuce, tomato, onion, whatever. And he did talk about those vegetables and you know like, so basically, ditch the bun, eat the meat and some vegetables on there, like skip the fries because those are deep fried and whatnot, and so it's like you can do it you know is it as enjoyable as getting that big old meal?
Speaker 2absolutely not, but what's enjoyable in the long run, though? Because it's like you do feel so much better when you are eating healthy.
Speaker 1You almost feel like you're like in a like cheat mode or something. You know when you're feeling really good.
Speaker 2I've been telling you that recently, where I just am like why am I sacrificing the long-term feeling of feeling really good for this short-term gratification of having whatever snack? You know where. It's just like I want this right now, but the next day I'm kind of like man. Why did I do that? I would have felt so much better today if I didn't eat that, yeah exactly.
Speaker 1No, I get it, I'm there with you. I'll admit like level four and five to me kind of were the same, so I'll just kind of combine them. It's basically like level four, he said, was cook your own food and only use like single ingredient foods or single ingredients to make your food. And then, like level five, he just kind of was like basically do level four, only even more.
Speaker 1You know like kind of like really pay attention to. You know, don't use seed oils ever in your cooking, just use he actually suggests beef, tallow or animal fats. You know things like that. Avocado oil is better than all the other seed oils. But you know, he said something about like avocado oil can maybe, depending on what kind it is and how it's processed. Maybe isn't the best or whatever.
Speaker 2All right, looks like we have to start getting some tallow to cook with or something, because we use a lot of avocado oil. Right yeah exactly.
Speaker 1So that, yep, I'll just I'm kind of just regurgitating what he said, you know. Then he talked about sleep a little bit more in depth. Try to get seven or eight hours of sleep per night. Get outdoors he's a big proponent of. He's basically said, like bright days and dark nights. Try to do that.
Speaker 2Okay.
Speaker 1And you know, don't have artificial lights on, you know, like before bed. I mean, he got pretty into it right you? Know, but um, you know filters on, you know stuff don't don't be on your phone, or um different screens. Uh, within a certain amount of time of of going to sleep, whatever, okay. But, um, you know, and he did read, you know, kind of reiterate, that phones are very disruptive to sleep.
Speaker 1So you know, even just the practical side of it right, you know, like they talked about, you know he didn't get into this, but like I've, you know, I would kind of like pay attention to all this stuff and listen. I've heard this stuff for years. You know about the refresh rate of your screen and the flickering lights and you know that stuff and it, you know, keeps your mind going, but even just literally the mindless scrolling and the waste of time, you know, and I know we've talked about that, you know, even in recent podcasts, but it's like basically just ditch the phone, you know, to a certain time.
Speaker 2Did he have a set amount of time that you shouldn't be looking at your phone before bed, or screens?
Speaker 1He did not.
Health Investment for Family Impact
Speaker 1Um but I have heard in the past um, you know, it's like kind of that two hour window, um, or if you do prior to, um, like I think I can't remember if it's like blue light filtering glasses or something like that, Um, you know. So, again, they didn't say this, but it's probably something that he does. Okay, I had to guess just based on other things I've heard. So, yeah, I think there's a lot of merit to that. He talked about hydration and basically he's like don't overthink it. He said regardless of your size, body weight, composition, all of it. He said, basically, everyone needs between eight and 10 glasses of fluids a day.
Speaker 1And he specifically said, because a lot of people will say like water, water, water, water. He did say just fluids. He said if it's juices, he was a big fan of raw milk so I don't want to give you hours.
Speaker 2I love my raw milk. Yeah, exactly, and I mean honestly, I'll actually interject this now you have been. I love my raw milk. And we'll take like one thing and implement it, and you know, use that for a little bit, right?
Speaker 1Yeah, I mean, we have the chickens now. We have we do? We've been doing raw milk for years.
Speaker 2You got me a grain mill a couple of years ago for Christmas, and so we've been. I mean, not all of it is, you know, fresh milled, but a lot of the grains that we eat are fresh milled and whatnot, because when you're milling your own grains it's retaining all of the, the wheat germ, the jacket, like everything. So you're getting all of the nutrients by milling your own grains, and the same with the milk You're. You're keeping all of the nutrients that are in the milk. You have the lactase, which helps break down the lactose, um, and when you've processed milk, it removes the lactase, which maybe that's why people struggle with lactose, you know, because it's not in its whole form. Sure.
Speaker 1Yeah, and once again, the body, can you know, basically digest these things in their natural state.
Speaker 2It's like God knew what he was doing when he created this stuff.
Speaker 1Yeah, yeah, so so thank you. I'll just say thank you for doing that, because, yeah, I mean, I've always wanted to be healthier, but it takes a lot of work. I mean you put a lot of time and effort into that and we're thankful that we are able to have you as a stay-at-home mom and wife, but it still takes a lot of work.
Speaker 2It does, it takes a lot of work, and I want to say too, like this doesn't mean that we don't go out to eat you know, because, like we, probably do that far more than we should Because like we are so busy that sometimes it is just easy to hit the easy button and, you know, swing into a restaurant on our way home, you know from wherever we're going because we've been busy.
Speaker 2But one thing that I've you know I've been more faithful with the past couple of months is meal planning and if I can just make sure that I have the meat out and thawed that. I need for that meal. I can usually have something whipped up fairly fast, but if I don't have it planned ahead, I'm not going to have that even remotely ready in a reasonable amount of time, because the meat's usually still frozen. So just that planning ahead is what has helped set us up for a little bit better success. Absolutely.
Speaker 1Yeah, Like again those little things adding up over time. That cumulative effect is important and you know, like we said earlier, I can fall off the rails with the best of them, but I think in general you know why not still do the right stuff the right way.
Speaker 2Yeah.
Speaker 1Even if you do, you know, eat too much sugar, you know, from time to time, or too often, it's like it's still good to do good. Yeah, exactly. So Pat asked him about vitamins. You know that I take vitamins regularly and again I kind of liked Paul's. He kind of answered his question with a question and just said, well, what food do you eat? Because I think it seemed like he was basically indicating that you can get all the vitamins you need if you eat the right foods. So again, I follow thrills whatever time to time and so I feel like I don't think these vitamins are bad for me and I'll supplement, but he didn't necessarily say you have to.
Speaker 2So I thought that was an interesting thing.
Speaker 1They talked a lot about water, fluoride and water, iq effects to children, developmental things. I mean it was pretty. You know across the board that Paul said you need to filter your water. He suggested that you get. I mean the best version would be to get a whole home RO you know reverse osmosis system. You know, because if you think about it, even showering, you know it's hot water your pores open, you're absorbing things, chlorine, you know all the different fluoride and stuff like that.
Speaker 1So, yeah, obviously know all the different fluoride and stuff like that. So yeah, obviously those can be really expensive. So maybe start with your drinking water. If you don't, you know, just start somewhere and you know the forever chemicals and stuff. He actually they kind of went on a little side with tooth decay and really that whole argument is bogus with the fluoride stuff meaning that once again, if you eat the right foods, I guess and I didn't jot it down, but there was a doctor, a dentist, you know doctor that went to Africa, I believe, and maybe even South America as well, and did kind of a worldwide study with Western civilization, eastern and then just kind of you know these tribes that have no dental. You know support at all in some of the tribes that their diet was very like good, like they. Literally it looked like they had like orthodontics and like they had perfect teeth.
Speaker 2Interesting, yes, so. So when we were at the dentist two times ago, our daughter ended up with a cavity right, but she also had a tooth that hadn't come in for a little while and our dentist was like it's not a big deal, it will come down. But he said and it was really interesting he said we're actually seeing a lot of kids whose teeth are not descending. And he said we I actually have to go in and manually pull them down because their adult teeth aren't descending after their baby teeth have fallen out. No thanks, I know, and he's not very naturally minded, but I asked him. I said why do you think that is? And without skipping a beat, he said it's the kid's diet. He said our kids are so malnourished and they're just basically living off of junk food. And he said they. He said that's why their teeth aren't descending.
Speaker 1And.
Speaker 2I was like really, and he was like I'm not worried about your kids. Like her tooth is going to come in. You know, it's just not ready to yet, but and it did, it ended up coming in. But I just I thought that that was an interesting response from him. I wasn't expecting that from this dentist.
Speaker 1Yeah, I appreciate you sharing that, because it is fascinating to me just how our body all works together.
Speaker 2Yeah.
Speaker 1It's amazing, it really is. I mean, we are fearfully and wonderfully made and created by God in His image and I think there's some type of spiritual component to treat. You know, take care of the temple of the.
Speaker 2Holy Ghost. Yeah, our body is the temple of the Holy Ghost and we are, to you know, discipline our bodies and bring them into subjection, right, yeah.
Speaker 1Yeah, no, I think it's awesome. So kind of one last thing in. You know there's there's a lot of like tidbits in, in and out of you know all of this. I think it was a two hourhour-plus podcast or whatever, and this is becoming a little bit longer, but hopefully you're all enjoying this because it's fun. Like I said, this is kind of how Shanda and I talk all the time and it's I don't know. Like I said just to me, it's awesome and I love evaluating whether it's our spiritual lives, our health, our marriage, parenting, finances all of it?
Speaker 1Yes. I think it's great. One kind of last thing is I guess there's this guy and I actually hadn't heard his name before, but his name is Brian Johnson, and he's, I guess, the man who wants to live forever, and so he, I believe he spends $2 million a year on his health, so a little bit more than we spend on our health.
Speaker 2I sure hope he lives forever for that amount of money. Oh my goodness. So, and again, we just got to get him saved, and then he will live forever. There you go, exactly.
Speaker 1But yeah, he, I guess he's some tech tycoon and that's his big thing in life and he like gets all these tests and whatnot and um and again whatever. I'm not saying like again positive, negative, whatever about paul, but I guess paul has been reaching out to him and wanting to do like an mma fight with him to see who, because he, paul, disagrees with a lot of what Brian is doing so.
Speaker 1Brian is like, puts I don't know seven different creams on his face, like every day, morning and night or whatever. He never goes out in the sunlight, literally Like he has an umbrella.
Speaker 2Oh, my goodness. And he like, does all of this kind of not natural stuff I was going to say, has he not?
Speaker 1read about all the benefits of sunlight, right yeah, and it's mind blowing to me how you can have. That's why, really, why I wanted to bring this up is I'm not saying Paul is right, like I've said numerous times throughout this podcast, um, and I'm not saying Brian is wrong, but like it really seems like Paul to me, just logically, like if you just step back and look and listen there's some you're like, this doesn't make sense what Brian is doing and it makes a lot of sense what Paul's doing and maybe the balance is somewhere in between.
Speaker 1But um, yeah, again, it was just very fascinating to me all, like the little bit, cause they went into a few clips of like what he does and or doesn't do and like that is seems so illogical.
Speaker 2Yeah.
Speaker 1And so Brian is a vegan, or I shouldn't. I shouldn't use terms that I don't know exactly. See, he's some form of doesn't eat meat.
Speaker 2OK.
Speaker 1You know, vegetarian, vegan. I honestly don't know what all the different nuances are but um and it sounds like Paul is probably a little more carnivore diet than what we would even agree with or want to do. I should say Um, and you know so. But to me, I mean, you know I love hunting, I love um, you know harvesting. I'll use the word killing um, you know, killing our own meat and food no-transcript going to the grocery store, so obviously it aligns.
Speaker 1Paul's stuff aligns more with my already thinking and logistics. You know of what I want to do, but just again it was fascinating to me and you know you have two people that are, in some respects, devoting their entire lives to their own health and to promoting health for others, two total opposite ends of the spectrum, and it's just fascinating.
Speaker 1And one thing that I did kind of love um Paul, I guess uh, I should have jotted it down, but I think it's called uh, um bio Olympics or something where I guess there's this kind of movement or, you know, like group of people, elites, that are trying to like reverse the effects of aging the most you know like and so this Brian is doing it, obviously, and then, but I guess, based on certain testing criteria and things like that, there's a lot of people who are kind of through their action and their own testing and markers and their own bodies, beating Brian with like way, way, way less money, basically like what the common person could or would do. I mean, they're extreme, you know, in their, you know just actions every day or whatever, but they don't spend.
Speaker 2But health doesn't have to cost you that much money.
Speaker 1Yeah, and it's very meat based, protein based, things like that, and they're kind of beating him, I guess. Interesting I don't know if it's bio Olympics or some version of that. Okay, picks or some some version of that.
Speaker 2But, yeah.
Speaker 1so with that um kind of and they didn't say this, but I jotted this down, kind of, this is what my mind thought at one point is, um, to encourage you all and us to make a decision to be a little more healthy. And even if you don't become more healthy for you, maybe you should be more healthy for the people who are watching you and so, like, maybe you don't care about your health.
Speaker 1I know you do, but you know whoever's listening, whatever you know, maybe you're like you know, if I make it to 75 and live a decent life, I'll be thrilled. And with modern medicine I'm probably going to make it to 75, whatever, but it's like who's watching.
Speaker 2You know, do you have?
Speaker 1little kids at home? Do you have loved ones? Do you have, you know, even maybe people who are older than you that see you make a difference in your own life? And become more healthy and more vibrant and, you know, be able to do more things, and they want to too, you know. So I don't think this is just something that you know we're doing just for ourselves.
Speaker 2Yeah.
Speaker 1I think you know not that we have to or even should do things only for other people, but I think it matters right.
Speaker 2Yeah, I don't disagree. You know like our kids see us work out and they, you know we talk to them about nutrition and why we eat certain things, why we limit the amount of sugar that they have. We try to, you know, find a balance because we don't want them to go to extremes with their food.
Speaker 2I mean, especially as little kids like you don't want to, you know, give them a complex, you know. But I think it's, it's healthy for them to see us trying to be healthy, you know, and it just teaches them to steward their bodies well, exactly.
Speaker 1Yeah, find that balance, you know. Find that, you know just those simple wins, you know simple choices and yeah, I think it's good.
Speaker 2So what is like after listening to the podcast? What is one thing that you want to see our family try to start doing? I was going to ask you that. Oh well, I didn't listen to the whole one and I beat you to the question, so you get to answer that, yeah, I think.
Speaker 1Just knowing so, my mind immediately goes to like each one of our children. You know, I think for me just to try to reduce my sugar intake would be the one thing, but each of our children have a different tendency, good, or I should say, making a lot of positive decisions with her food, and I think it's a very healthy relationship with food too, because it's not like she doesn't eat or whatever, and I feel like she just kind of came on that on her own.
Speaker 2Yeah.
Speaker 1You know, and then you know know, one of our children eats way too many snacks and sure like, basically, if it's in front of them they'll just smash it you know, and it's like we're teaching self-control. Yeah, you know like no regard for anything and, um you know, it's like we all it. It affects us all differently so I guess, to come back to your question, um, you know I think in general eat less sugar and um, maybe like the next step would be to um just kind of reduce our processed food intake.
Practical Steps and Takeaways
Speaker 2Okay, yeah, I think the thing that I was kind of coming back to was, um, maybe learning to replace our sugar intake with something more natural you know, like um, I think the past couple of days you have been trying to do maple syrup in your coffee rather than the cane sugar or simple syrup that I usually make. I haven't quite gotten there yet. I tried yours and it was almost actually too sweet, so I need to maybe give it a try tomorrow. But I don't like to waste my coffee.
Speaker 2I want to enjoy it. So I think that was kind of one that I want to maybe try doing is maybe find just some simple switches, specifically my coffee, see if I can find a more natural sweetener. I've tried a couple different things recently. I didn't love coconut sugar and coffee was terrible. I did try, or I did get date sugar and I haven't tried that yet in there, but I don't know if that would even be something that he would recommend, because that would be something where it's been extracted from dates.
Speaker 1So maybe I can see if I can get it to a honey or a maple syrup or something like that. I think he for sure would recommend honey, probably a maple syrup, and then, yeah, beyond that I don't think. I think he so.
Speaker 1in that podcast they actually looked at a bunch of different products and they would go through the ingredients list on the products and I think one of the drinks, um, they used monk fruit um as a sweetener and he's like, of all the things you know, he said it's probably the the best of the worst you know, type thing, a monk fruit. Um he, he didn't like criticize it um significantly.
Speaker 2So monk fruit's been confusing to me because I've heard a lot of people mention monk fruit but when I've been looking at it because I almost bought it the other day but all monk fruit has two ingredients it's monk fruit and I think it's xylitol. So I was like I didn't know and I need to do more research on that, because I was like it's not a true, just monk fruit.
Speaker 1There's something else added into it as well. Maybe the xylitol is a naturally occurring thing, maybe it's actually better.
Speaker 2Maybe I don't know, maybe it's one of those complex things. Yeah, maybe I'll have to look into that one a bit more, but that was one change. You didn't promote it.
Speaker 1Just to be clear it was just like yeah, I'm not going to criticize you. There's a lot worse things you could be.
Speaker 2Yeah, exactly, okay. Yeah, I think the probably would not have guessed that peanut oil was a seed oil yeah, so um, I would have always just thought it was some type of seed, you know um which? I mean, I guess peanuts, I don't, I don't know why. I never really put that together, but yeah, I, uh, that would be the one that I'd probably want to research a little bit more and maybe just be more cognizant of, because I've heard a lot of people talking about seed oils.
Speaker 2And like I said, we do try to eat fairly clean and you know the single ingredient lists of things, but yeah, that'll be the next thing on our list, I guess.
Speaker 1Yeah, yeah, again, I think it's good to just be mindful of it, even when you are making a bad decision.
Speaker 2You know it's like at least think about it right.
Speaker 1Right, like all right, well, I'm gonna do this anyways, but you know, maybe tomorrow I'll do a little better or whatever. Um, but yeah, um, yeah, like basically he doesn't drink, um, any coffee at all. Um, and you know like I started off for what, 15, 18 years or whatever, you know just drinking coffee, black. You know of kind of my adult life and you know you kind of suckered me into adding you know some sweetener who suckered who into that?
Speaker 2I literally didn't even drink coffee until three years ago. And then you were like we have to have coffee together on a Saturday morning and I told you the only way I was doing that is if I had a really good sweetener, I know, and then you ruined me.
Speaker 1I gave you bougie coffee is what I did. He brought you to the dark side. I actually wanted to be the light side, yeah, yeah. And they, you know again just lots of different things like that. They went into where he wasn't necessarily condoning them, but it's kind of like again those levels right.
Speaker 1They talked to, I think PBD asked him. He's like like, okay, there's cigarettes, there's cigars, there's nicotine patches, there's vaping, you know like what's the best or worst of that, you know? And he's like, well, I'm not going to tell you any of them are good, but you know, but he's like cigarettes are worst.
Speaker 1He said vaping would be second worst and he said any nicotine substitute would be, like you know, next worst. And then I guess he said he's like a cigar with, like organic, non-pesticide tobacco leaves would probably be the least You're rolling your own stogie, right?
Speaker 2yeah, oh, my goodness so.
Speaker 1But he did, you know, I mean, we've heard actually, you know, even talked about not ourselves using it, but you know, but people who use nicotine almost as like a booster or whatever. And he even just said he's like I think there's going to be negative consequences of neurotransmitter, like basically tweaking your neurotransmitters and you know it's like this kind of untested you know I mean nicotine's been around for a while but like the zins and all of that stuff that people are using you know, like it's.
Speaker 1They're basically manipulating their neurotransmitters. So you know, again, it doesn't really affect us, but I think that's all like factors to you know, think about and be cognizant of.
Speaker 2Yeah, absolutely, yep, all right. Well, any other closing thoughts? Or are we kind of wrapping this up? I think that's it. I see we chatted for quite a while on this one, but I think that was good. We have something to. I love it. I mean, health affects us all.
Speaker 1Yeah, and I mean there's a financial side to health. There's a just vibrancy, you know, and that's kind of longevity and vibrancy, being able to, you know, like literally the reason why I work out every day. It started with my kids having a strong, capable father that they remember. That was my why, I guess, and it was at the time like through my 30s and late 20s, early 30s, then late 30s, and now I'm 40.
Speaker 1So now I want it to be through my 40s too, but then also kind of like my goal now is to be able to get down on the floor and roll around with my grandchild.
Speaker 1So like that's why kind of like my goal now is to be able to get down on the floor and roll around with my grandchild. Yeah, so like that's why you know, I don't need to be the biggest, bulkiest, whatever, I just want to work out, stay capable, competent and, you know, fit for longevity. So I think that's something like I said. It can affect us all and eating is a big part of it right, absolutely All right.
Speaker 2I'll stop talking. All right. Well, until next time. We want to encourage you to seek God, love your spouse, hug your kids and stay devoted. Thank you for tuning in to this Devoted Life podcast with James and Shanda. We appreciate your support in sharing biblical, uplifting truths with the world. If you found value in this episode, please leave us a rating and review on your favorite podcast platform. Your feedback helps us to improve the show and we'd love to hear from you. Be sure to hit subscribe so you never miss an episode. To learn more about how to live a life devoted to God and family, head over to thisdevotedlifecom. You can also follow me, shanda, on Instagram at devoted underscore motherhood. Thank you again for listening and we look forward to seeing you next time on this Devoted Life podcast.