Hey there! It’s Dr. Dave and welcome back to The David Madow Lifestyle Show. It’s the show where I help you live stronger, thinner, healthier, and happier.
I’ve got a lot of great people with me today. I want to thank all of you for listening! Some of the guys and gals that I spoke to at the Whole Foods talk last week in Annapolis, Maryland said they would be listening too. The talk was great! I had about 60 people out there. It was a great audience. I showed them 10 ways to supercharge their life and we had a great time. I want to thank you so much for having me out there. I can’t wait to come back again. It was incredible!
Before we get into our main topic today, if you have not signed up for the Vegan Indian Buffet & Open Mic on May 6th, I think I’ve got 2 or 3 seats left. The thing is virtually sold out. I am holding a few so if you want to come let me know.
By the way, if you think you are too far from Owings Mills, Maryland, we have somebody coming in from Oklahoma City which is quite a distance. I’ve got somebody that just signed up last night that is coming in from Las Vegas, Nevada to attend this event. Plus, I have a couple people that are going to be in from Japan. So, if you think you are too far away and the distance is separating us, shut up! You’ve got to get there because it’s going to be awesome. The first one we did was incredible. We had not only fantastic food from the all you can eat vegan Indian buffet but then people stepped up to the mic and it was amazing. I want to see you there! Let me know if you want to take those last few tickets. I would love to hang out with you. [UPDATE: This event is now SOLD OUT. Stay tuned for information about our next event.]
Let’s get into our main topic of the day. And that’s a topic that I want to call “side hustle.” What is a side hustle exactly? Well, a side hustle is a side business or a job that you have in addition to your day job to either have fun with or potentially make some money on the side. A lot of people do a little side hustle because it’s something they ultimately want to turn into their full-time business.
Now, I have to admit, I have been using this term for a while. It’s been around for quite some time. I did some research and the term actually goes back to the 1950s where it was primarily used in the African American community for a side or part-time job to make extra money for the family.
The word hustle can have many different connotations. When you hustle somebody usually that’s bad. But no, a side hustle is not that at all. A side hustle is simply something you are doing in addition to your regular work as a hobby or to potentially make some money.
I’m going to share something. I think you have a side hustle in you and I am going to prove it to you right now. When I was practicing dentist back in the 80s, I had some patients in my practice that were delinquent payers. They rightfully owed me money for treatment that was done and for some reason they just never paid me. I also have a brother that’s a dentist as well, Dr. Rich Madow. And he was practicing about 30 miles away from where I was and he was experiencing the same problem. So together we designed a collection form completely on our own and we started sending it to our patients that owed us money. Sure enough, wham! Checks started coming in to the mailbox. Sometimes patients would even come in and put cash on the counter. This thing worked incredibly well.
So, we had this idea to start a side hustle. This was back in 1989. I didn’t know the term at all. But what we started doing was to market this collection form to other dentists in the area first. Then we decided to market it through direct mail. There was no internet back then. And sure enough dentists all over the country started buying our little collection form.
It didn’t stop there. We started marketing this thing to other doctors. It didn’t stop there either. We then marketed it to other types of businesses. Florist, funeral homes, automotive, anybody that had the potential to be owed money by clients, patients, or customers. This little business started taking off. That was my side hustle.
Fast forward a few years from that, we started developing some other products for dentists and other doctors and in 1993 I sold my dental practice. Which by the way was a very successful and lucrative practice. But I sold it to promote my full-time side hustle. And over many, many years it has blossomed into pretty much an international business. We speak all over North America and Canada. We have products for doctors. We do all kinds of things to help people become more successful.
So that was my side hustle that turned into my full-time hustle or rather full-time business. A serious business. I have fun with it. And I can pretty much work from wherever I want. If you have a cell phone, a computer, and an internet connection, you can pretty much do anything these days.
Side hustles are a way to do other things outside of your main job. The s ide hustle I’ve had lately is helping people like you make your life better. I have been working with individuals on a one on one basis coaching and really turning lives around. I love it! It’s something I can do from pretty much wherever I am. It is so rewarding to meet someone and after several phone calls and communicating with them by email, they change their life. There really isn’t anything better.
If you have something that you are trying to achieve in your life and you’re not sure what direction to turn, it may be worth a phone call. It may be worth you and I chatting on the phone. Now, do I talk to every single person that requests a call. No, my life is really, really busy. Thank God! Things are really great and I just don’t have the time to talk to every person that wants to talk. But if I think there’s a match and I think we are vibrating at the same frequency. Send me an email to rundrdave@gmail.com. Let me know what you are thinking and why you want to talk. It could be anything. From losing weight to being stronger to developing a side hustle or something that you want to do in your regular business or job or whatever it might be. Throw it out there to me. If you want we can jump on the phone and chat about it a little bit and see if we can work together.
I just want to go back to my Annapolis talk that I did last week one more time. It was great talking to 60 people. So many people came up to me at the end. I was getting asked great questions and giving business cards hoping to stay in touch.
My wife Yoko actually made a pretty big hit there. If you are a long-time listener you probably know that she is a massage therapist. And she does a lot of different modalities and energy work. And she is a great Yogi and meditator. I think when we come back there, Yoko and I may do a talk together. She has so much to share. So, look out for Yoko to be speaking with me in the near future. I think she would be a tremendous asset. She just connects with people even though English is not her first language. She has some incredible life changing things to say.
I am going to go ahead and have a healthy breakfast right now. People ask all the time what I eat for breakfast so I am going to share this with you because it’s healthy, it works for me, and it gives me energy. I have some type of vegan cereal and pile it with fresh organic fruit. One of my favorite cereals is Veganic Sprouted Ancient Maize Flakes. It’s by a company called One Degree Foods. I also add things like chia seeds, flax seeds, hemp seeds, pecans, walnuts, and almond milk. It is an incredibly filling healthy meal that I enjoy almost every single morning. When I am traveling and staying in a hotel room, I’ll bring instant oatmeal with no sugar added. I also bring almond milk and hemp seed or flax seed and shake it up in one of those shaker bottles and let it sit for a while. You do not have to heat oatmeal for it to work really well.
Another thing I’ve been asked to do is to help people travel for pennies on the dollar. I’ve literally figured out how to travel all across the U.S.A. and more basically on the cheap. I do not spend a lot of money when I travel. And if you follow me you know that I travel quite a bit. Some of it is purely for pleasure but I have totally mastered the art of being able to travel around for not very much.
I’m going to get back in there and have a healthy vegan breakfast. Until next week, I am Dr. Dave! See ya!
CONNECT WITH ME AND SHARE
“Thank you very much for listening! The show is literally downloaded by the thousands each week now. In fact, we have passed the 375,000+ downloads mark! Wow! I so appreciate you listening and sharing this show with your family and friends. I love to help people live a healthier life! It is so great that we have listeners from all over the world from the United States to the UK to Canada to Europe to Japan to Australia. I love hearing from people all over the world on Facebook, Twitter, Email, and our phone hotline too!” – Dr. Dave.
Did you enjoy today’s show? Do you have any questions for me? Do you have any comments or feedback? You are not alone! We want to help you live better, stronger, happier, thinner lives!
https://davidmadow.com/wp-content/uploads/2016/12/DMM-Show-itunes-3000x3000.jpg30003000David M. Madowhttps://www.davidmadow.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/07/Dare-to-Change.jpgDavid M. Madow2017-04-24 03:00:322017-04-25 17:44:22184 - Your Side Hustle
Hey, it’s Dr. D the “V”! Welcome back to another episode of The David Madow Lifestyle Show. It’s the show where I help you live stronger, thinner, healthier, and happier. I appreciate you being here with me.
By the way, before we get started, I want to thank you so much for being here. I’ve got so many people reaching out to me asking how my mom is doing after last episode. If you missed last episode, about a week or so ago I took her to the emergency room at the hospital. She called me in the morning saying that she had been having chest pain and shortness of breath for about 2 weeks. Yeah, she waited 2 weeks to call me and tell me that.
So, I took her over there, they admitted her, did a lot of tests, and they didn’t find anything. Fortunately, they couldn’t find any definite reason. So, they released her. They told her she has to lose some weight. Not work as hard. And relax a little bit more.
She’s got a few more tests but I think she’s fine. God bless her! So, thank you so much for the outreach of love and concern. It’s greatly appreciated! I will keep you informed if there’s any change in her health.
You know, it’s tough having parents that are aging. My dad will be 88 in a few months and my mom is 83. It’s tough. Things just happen and it’s stressful for the kids. Thanks again! Thanks so much for your love. I appreciate that!
Home Gym
I am in my home gym right now getting ready to go outside. I’ve talked to you very often about getting out there and doing the “Magic 4.” The “Magic 4” is walking (or running) 4 miles every day. It will make a tremendous difference in your body, in your health, in the way you feel physically, your psyche, all kinds of things. I’ve talked to so many of you that are doing the “Magic 4” every day.
But I want to stress that it’s not just walking that’s going to keep you healthy. I’ve got a little home gym here. And when I say gym, I use the word really loosely because there are just some things I do also around the house. You do not have to belong to a gym and you don’t have to pay any kind of membership fee. I will share with you again the things that I do in my home to stay healthy besides walking or running.
Squats – I like free squats which generally means that I am not holding any weight. I start standing up then lower myself to the floor. You can also look them up on Google. It’s a great exercise. Think about doing a set of 10 of a set of 15 throughout the day. It really does help quite a bit.
Curls & Shoulder Presses – I’ve got 2 (15) pound dumbbells and I do curls and shoulder presses with them. They don’t cost a whole lot.
Push Ups – I love push-ups. Push-ups have been in my repertoire for quite some time. You just feel good after doing sets of push-ups. How may should you do? That depends on the level you are at right now. You should have a goal for a certain number of sets per day and slowly increase the number as you can.
Chin Ups & Pull Ups – As I’ve told you before, I’ve got a bar that sits inside my closet door. I got it at a pharmacy around here years ago. It’s one of the best investments I’ve ever made for something like $20. It’s really strong. It’s really sturdy. Pull ups are a difficult exercise if you do them properly. It’s hands facing out not in. See how many you can do. Start from hanging and see if you can pull yourself up even one time. As you do that, try to increase to 2 and then to 3. You’ll see some definite changes in your body when you’re able to start doing pull ups.
Crunches – I do crunches. I have a little crunch bench here that’s inverted so when I’m doing crunches it becomes a little more difficult to do crunches that way. It’s a very important exercise for your abs.
Abs – I’ve also got an abs wheel. I don’t use it all that often but when I use it I feel really good. It works well. You can go online and find one. It’s nice to have in your arsenal (in your home).
I like to change things up a lot. If I am doing the same exercises all the time, it becomes routine and monotonous and you get bored with it. I am combining a walk and a run today. I’ll probably go for about 5 to 6 miles or something like that. I’ll also do some squats outside. If there’s a comfortable area, I’ll get down on the ground and do some push-ups while I’m out there. Switch things up. There is no right or wrong. Be creative!
I am going to be running in the Bay 2 Breakers 12K next month in San Francisco. And I just have to make sure that I am in shape. In the winter, I’m doing a lot of skiing but that doesn’t mean I am in shape for running. So, I am out there today running and walking to get in shape for the 12K. A 12K is about 7.3 miles. Not only do we run/walk the race through beautiful San Francisco in costumes but we also walk back to the finish so that day is at least 14 to 15 miles of pure fun.
If you’re going to be in the area, let me know so that we can catch up. There’s literally probably like 100,000 people on the roads of San Francisco doing this. It’s an incredible day! I know I have talked to you quite a bit about it in the past but it’s something we started about 10 years ago and we got hooked. It does help that my daughter and son-in-law live in San Francisco. So, it’s kind of an excuse to go every year to have some fun, exercise, see my son and daughter in law, and eat some good vegan food of course.
Those are just some of the things we love to do. Getting out on the trail in the woods and hiking. Running a trail or walking a trail. When you put a backpack on when hiking a trail, let me tell you something, it takes the hike to a totally different level. I’ve talk to you in the past about how I’ve done some backpacking that’s been 2 to 3 to 7 days long. And when you’re backpacking for 7 days and when you’ve got to carry basically everything you need for 7 days on your back it’s a work out. That backpack can weigh 40 pounds. You could backpack around your neighborhood and load your backpack with a bag of sand.
You’ll start to notice some tremendous differences in your body immediately. One thing I noticed is that, with heavy weight, your abs have to get very strong. Your core is balancing everything so your abs get strong and thin really quickly. If you want a good abs workout, believe it or not, backpacking is it. It really is! Most backpackers have really thin stomachs.
I always want to try to help you live the life that I live. I figure things out over many years. It’s always a work in progress. But if I can just share with you the things that I do, and you pick and choose the tips you want to use here and there; I’m telling you, your life will be pretty good.
Vision Board
I have something else in my home gym here that I am going to suggest that you check out or try. It’s called a vision board. It looks like a thick piece of black board that you can get at the office supply store. Then I started cutting things out of magazines that I wanted to see take place in my life. So, for example, I have a picture of a man who is definitely a lot younger than I am. I know I can’t get younger but the reason I cut him out and put him on my vision board is that he has some really strong looking abs and that’s always been a goal of mine. So, I put that on my vision board.
I’ve actually got something that says be kind. So, when I look at my vision board I am reminded every day to be kind. You never know what somebody else’s story might be. Somebody that’s acting like a jerk to you, you never know what’s going on in their life. Give them a break. Be kind to them.
I also put a picture on of a scale to remind me to stay at my ideal weight. Now, I am not at my ideal weight right now. I am actually a few pounds over but I am working to get down to it.
I also have something on here about skiing moguls. The past few years I’ve tried to get better and better at skiing moguls. In case you are not a skier, those are the big bumps in the snow which can be difficult and intimidating if you don’t know how to ski them.
But vision boards are great! They really do help! It’s very similar to writing down your goals and reading them every day. Instead of writing them down, you’re looking at a vision of a goal which really does help a lot.
So that’s a little bit of a tour through my home gym and what I recommend doing for keeping your body in the best shape ever. Again, it’s not just physical, a lot of it is mental and psyche. And when you work out and exercise and move your body, your brain is going to feel better in so many ways.
I’m going to leave you with this. Get out and do something! Just enjoy the day and enjoy movement! I am going to try to talk to you very soon about the law of attraction too. I did a little Facebook video yesterday on it which has gotten a lot of views and I’ll just leave you with this about the law of attraction. I used to think that I had to be friends with everybody. Everybody that came into my life, I had to be friendly and close with them. And if we weren’t good friends, something was wrong with me. I’ve learned over the years that as soon as I was able to clear out some of the people that I was not in alignment with it makes room for more people that are aligned with me. And my life has never been better as far as that goes.
Don’t feel that you need to keep somebody in your life if you don’t feel the positive vibration. We have talked about this before. Don’t wish them any harm. Just release them to the universe. It will make room for so many more great people that are vibrating with you on your frequency. Trust me it works! I’ve been doing this and there’s nothing like it. I may be doing an entire episode on this because it is really powerful stuff.
I’m going to get out and do a beautiful run/walk right now. Until next time! I’m Dr. Dave and I love ya. See you later!
CONNECT WITH ME AND SHARE
“Thank you very much for listening! The show is literally downloaded by the thousands each week now. In fact, we have passed the 375,000+ downloads mark! Wow! I so appreciate you listening and sharing this show with your family and friends. I love to help people live a healthier life! It is so great that we have listeners from all over the world from the United States to the UK to Canada to Europe to Japan to Australia. I love hearing from people all over the world on Facebook, Twitter, Email, and our phone hotline too!” – Dr. Dave.
Did you enjoy today’s show? Do you have any questions for me? Do you have any comments or feedback? You are not alone! We want to help you live better, stronger, happier, thinner lives!
https://davidmadow.com/wp-content/uploads/2016/12/DMM-Show-itunes-3000x3000.jpg30003000David M. Madowhttps://www.davidmadow.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/07/Dare-to-Change.jpgDavid M. Madow2017-04-17 03:00:342017-04-18 17:42:02183 - Movement and The Law of Attraction
Hey there! It’s Dr. D the “V”, David Madow. Welcome back to The David Madow Lifestyle Show. It’s the show where I help you live stronger, thinner, healthier, and happier.
Life has some strange twists and I want to share one of them with you. I just got back from Park City, Utah and from Portland, Oregon where I was speaking. I got back a day ago. And life is going on and regular things are happening. Then I get this call this morning from my mom saying, “hey Dave, I think I want to go to the emergency room.” And I said, “why mom?” She said, “well, I have been having chest pains and shortness of breath.” And I said, “about how long has this been going on?” And she said, “oh for about 2 weeks now.” I said, “mom, why didn’t you so something before 2 weeks?” She said, “oh because I had all this stuff to do and it was our anniversary and we were going out to dinner with the kids and I had all this stuff to get together.” So I said, “mom I am taking you to the emergency room now let’s go.”
It’s going to be a short show today and I’ll tell you why. And I’ll tell you what I want you to get out of this today as well.
My mom is a hard worker and somebody that always puts everybody before herself to her detriment. I think she has lost some of her health because she is always worried and doing things for everybody else. And maybe not worried about her own health and her own life as much as she should be. And I’ve always told you this from the start of the show, there’s probably nothing more important in our lives than our health. We cannot enjoy what’s going on around us and we can’t be happy. We have to be fundamentally healthy to be able to live a good life.
That’s the most important thing and I’m afraid my mom has let her health go because she’s just so worried about other things and other people. I was in there with her this morning and when the doc came in and said it looks like we are going to have to admit you because I want to run some tests. I am not so sure what’s going on but this could be something serious. And the first thing that came out of her mouth was, “I shouldn’t have said anything. I should have kept going the way I was.” Wow, great!
Hey look guys and gals! Let’s make sure that our health takes precedence and if something’s wrong, let’s take care of it. If something’s going on in your body and you feel something or you’re not sure of something. Get it checked out before it gets to the point where it’s too late. Promise me you’re going to do that.
But more importantly than that, while I was driving over here in the car, I was very blunt with my mom. I said mom I ‘ve told you this for many many years. My mom is really overweight. She is clinically obese. And when you are overweight, you are going to be more predisposed to chronic medical conditions. I can’t remember what she said but it was something negative like “I don’t have time to mess with that now, I have too many things going on.” She is too busy in her life right now to lose weight.
This is really tough. We all have to face parents getting older. There’s nothing that we can do about that. Like I have told you for so many years, life is unpredictable! Because I eat plant based and work out my body doesn’t mean there are any guarantees. No! Something can happen to me tomorrow. It certainly could. I am not going to be up here preaching that I am immune to any disease. I’m not! I’m human just like you are, just like my mom is, just like my dad is, just like everybody else. We’re human and we’re going to have something happen at some point. But let’s mitigate the possibility of having something happen too soon by doing the things that are smart. Putting the right fuel into our body, not junk into our body. Not overeating, not being overweight, moving our body.
I am not trying to be selfish, but sometimes we have to put ourselves first. Don’t let your own health be sacrificed. Let’s look out for our own health. Relax! Rest for a while! Don’t worry about everything you have going on in your life because that’s going to be there. Obligations are important but they are secondary to your health.
All this stuff can be taken care of. Please trust me when I say this! You can tell the difference in my voice between today and other shows. I’m frustrated and I’m aggravated because sometimes I just can’t talk sense into my mom.
She is very hard headed and very determined. And probably I guess you could say very type “A.” And she has to get all this stuff done. But for what? To end up in a hospital.
I think today I am going to give you some food for thought. Some motivation. And inspiration to look at your life really seriously and realize that you need to do everything you can do to make your life better to keep yourself healthy.
I do everything I can do to make my life better to keep myself healthy. So then when I get better, I can teach other people. And I can make sure my life is ok. And not only that but my life, my health, and my financial situation. People let their financial situations go because they are thinking about other people and they are responsible. My parents have done that as well.
Let’s think about ourselves! Not to be selfish. Not to be narcissistic but to take care of ourselves first so that we can be the best for other people.
Guys, I’m Dr. Dave! Let me go check on her! I love you! I’ll talk to you soon!
CONNECT WITH ME AND SHARE
“Thank you very much for listening! The show is literally downloaded by the thousands each week now. In fact, we have passed the 375,000+ downloads mark! Wow! I so appreciate you listening and sharing this show with your family and friends. I love to help people live a healthier life! It is so great that we have listeners from all over the world from the United States to the UK to Canada to Europe to Japan to Australia. I love hearing from people all over the world on Facebook, Twitter, Email, and our phone hotline too!” – Dr. Dave.
Did you enjoy today’s show? Do you have any questions for me? Do you have any comments or feedback? You are not alone! We want to help you live better, stronger, happier, thinner lives!
https://davidmadow.com/wp-content/uploads/2016/12/DMM-Show-itunes-3000x3000.jpg30003000David M. Madowhttps://www.davidmadow.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/07/Dare-to-Change.jpgDavid M. Madow2017-04-10 03:00:502017-04-18 11:58:14182 - To the Hospital
Hello there! It’s Dr. D the “V”. This is The David Madow Lifestyle Show. And I am here to teach you how to become stronger, thinner, healthier, and happier.
I’ve got a great one for you today! You can tell I’m excited! You can probably tell in my voice. I hope my voice always sounds excited because that’s the way that I live my life. Do I ever have bad days? Shit yeah! Of course I have bad days. Just like you do. But I try to figure out how to handle the bad days so they turn into good ones. Or realize that they’ll pass.
But I’m having a great day today. I’m in Park City, Utah and I want to share a few things with you. I’m here with my buddy, Mike. We are skiing for 6 days as I talked about on my previous podcast. He’s a good friend of mine who lives in Atlanta, Georgia. In the old days, we used to spend every winter skiing. We would meet somewhere in Colorado or Utah and just ski for a week. But our lives got busier. And now Yoko and I spend a good part of the winter out in Breckenridge, Colorado. And it just became more difficult. For no reason other than we just didn’t try to schedule it. But now we’re out here together. We made it a point to schedule 6 ski days.
One of the reasons I was able to do it pretty easily is because I am on my way to Portland, Oregon. I am speaking there next week. Like I told you before I always try my best to combine a business trip with a fun trip if possible. I’ve done 4 Hippie Road Trips already. All combined with business. This one is combined with business.
It’s April 1st today and we are having Spring skiing conditions. When I am in Colorado skiing, it is generally cold all day and all night. So when the snow falls down on the mountain, it falls in the form of powder. And then the powder starts to go away as either the wind blows it away or it gets skied off. Underneath the powder is generally very hard packed snow. Anywhere from 60″ to over 100″ of packed snow.
But when it turns into Spring ski conditions like it was today, here’s what happens. It’s very cold at night. It goes below freezing at night especially up on the mountains but during the day it gets warm. So imagine the snow during the day on the mountain starting to melt and it gets a little bit slushy like melting snow. And then in the evening it gets frozen over. So it changes. In other words, when we get out there first thing in the morning, we’re basically skiing on frozen icy hard snow. It’s hard if you’re not a seasoned skier. Sometimes your skis go in a direction that you can’t manage. It’s hard to maneuver through this thick hard crud and junk. It’s hard to explain but it makes skiing very difficult.
But then as they sun comes out, it starts to warm up and probably at about 11am you notice a definite difference. The snow starts to soften up. So basically from 11am to the end of the ski day at about 4pm, you’re skiing in Spring conditions. It’s not powder. It’s softer more granular snow.
So it’s not like you go up on the mountain and you’re always skiing in the same conditions. Being a skier, you’ve got to be prepared for changing conditions. I’m talking about powder, ice, soft snow, hard snow, steep conditions, not so steep conditions, windy, snowing, raining; you have to be prepared for anything. Your technique has to change depending on what type of snow or conditions you are skiing in.
That’s kind of like life isn’t it?! It’s kind of like life. I’ve never thought about that but skiing is kind of mimicking life. We wake up every day and you never know what’s going to hit us or what kind of situations you’re going to be in. You never know what kind of problem you’re going to have. Is it going to be fun or is it going to be bumpy? We never know. But whatever conditions we’re in, we have to adapt. We have to be good at adapting.
In your life you’re going to hit obstacles. As you hit these in your life, I want you to think about this metaphor that I am describing and remember what David Madow is teaching you. Life throws a lot of different things at us and we have to be able to handle all of them. Sometimes beginning skiers and intermediate skiers get to a point where they can’t do it because they are afraid it won’t be safe enough so they take off their skis and just walk down or slide down. Sometimes in life you get to an obstacle that you feel you can’t handle. Get around it somehow. Work it out. Get around it. Get down to the bottom of the mountain if you know what I mean. And life will be much better. And you’ll be able to handle it from there.
That’s my skiing analogy for you. To tell you the truth, I just wanted to describe the mountain conditions to you. And as I was describing the conditions, it hit me. This was not planned. It just kinda hit me that skiing totally mimics real life. It’s so cool!
Now, getting here was a problem. The day I was getting here, Mike was traveling from Atlanta and I was traveling from Maryland. We timed the flights so that we would literally land within 5 minutes of each other. Isn’t air travel incredible? We live basically 1000 miles apart from each other but we can time it so that we can arrive in the same spot in the Salt Lake City Airport 5 minutes apart. We get our bags, jump in the rental car, and bam we’re off to the mountain.
But it didn’t quite work like that. I got to the airport and my transfer to Denver was running really late. Over an hour late. It was so late that I had literally about 15 minutes to get off the plane in Denver and get onto the place going to Salt Lake City. Now, 15 minutes sounds like it would be enough time but remember when you’re on a plane and it lands, you don’t just walk off the plane. It takes a while to get off the plane. That adds at the very least 5 to 10 minutes trying to get off the plane. So then I would have 5 minutes to run through the airport to catch a plane. And usually they close the door 5 minutes before they taxi out to the runway. So I was praying that there would be some kind of miracle and I would catch this plane.
So,I sat down and was waiting around. As I was on my way to the gate to take this flight that was already running so late, I got a text message that said the flight was going to be delayed another hour. Now I know there is zero chance of me catching that flight to Denver.
So here I am. I’m walking from gate to gate at the airport trying to figure out what to do. And I found out that there was a nonstop to Salt Lake. It would leave around 2pm and get into Salt Lake around 4:30pm. So I would be getting in about 2 1/2 hours after Mike. So my poor buddy Mike would have to wait around the airport basically doing nothing except waiting for me for 2 1/2 hours. The line to change the flight was super long but I had an idea. I was going to call the 800 number for Southwest Airlines as I am standing in line. I figured that would probably be a lot faster. As I am standing in this long line, the person answers and I tell her my situation. She went ahead and changed my flight right then and there.
I tried to print my new boarding pass using my iPhone but I couldn’t do it. There was some kind of technical reason and it said that that I had to get re-ticketed. Well, in order to get re-ticketed, I found out I had to pass security again. That’s not too big a deal.
So I went outside and passed through security again. I went to the counter and they took care of everything for me. She was really nice. So then I wanted to make sure that my luggage, which was checked for the other flight, follows me. And she said “oh, we are going to have to figure out how to do this. We will have to pull your luggage from the flight. We can’t really do that from here so you will have to go back in through security and go up to a counter there where they can help you there.”
So I did and after talking to a couple different people, they were extremely helpful. They were able to pull my luggage and be sure it follows me on the next flight. I was excited!
Now, here I am. Walking around the airport. Going from gate to gate. Outside security, inside security. And I am getting a little bit frustrated because it’s a lot of walking.
Let me share with you how much walking I did through the airport. I wear a Fitbit. I happened to check my Fitbit and most of the steps were from the airport. I had to get to the airport super early so most of the steps were there. By the time I was ready to take off, I had walked through the airport close to 12,000 steps. For those of you that have Fitbits or any kind of device like that, you know that is roughly equivalent to 5 miles. Imagine me walking 5 miles around the airport trying to get this stuff done.
I was getting frustrated during that day. I got to the airport at around 6am and I didn’t wind up taking off until about 2:15pm. So I was there all day long. Walking around, going from gate to gate, going out, going in. 5 miles! I was getting frustrated.
So sometime during that day I was talking on the phone to my brother Rich. I was kind of sharing my frustration with Rich. I was saying how crazy this was and how Mike was supposed to be meeting me but I was going to be 2 1/2 hours late and how horrible I felt. And Rich said to me. He really helped me. He said, “Dave take a deep breath. Think about it this way. You’re in Baltimore now but before you close your eyes tonight you are going to be in Salt Lake City, Utah. Think about that! It’s a miracle! So don’t stress and don’t really worry. Even if it’s delayed, you will be there by tomorrow morning. You’re still going to be there. So just relax.”
He was right! I was starting to stress out a little bit. I should have meditated but I didn’t. I should have. But he was totally right. Think about the story. Yeah, I didn’t get much sleep the night before because I got up super early. I was stressed at the airport walking from gate to gate all over the place. 5 miles at the airport. I did get great exercise. That’s a plus! But, in the end, after all the frustration, and all the craziness, and changing my bags, and tickets; I landed in Salt Lake City at 4:30pm. Not that bad. Not that bad at all.
So friends, keep this little story in mind. When things are crazy, just relax. I know I preach this all the time and I was going against my advice by stressing out. But then I thought about it and Rich brought me to my senses. I was fine. I got there and met up with Mike, who by the way, had already gotten the rental car. He was in a totally great mood. It was fine. He understood. It was out of my control. I felt bad for him but it was out of my control.
We went on up the mountain to Park City and had a great dinner. It’s just great to be here. It really is! I’m so glad. I try to be happy everywhere I go. As you know, I live in Maryland most of the year. And when I am there I love it! I live in a beautiful rural area. We’ve got 3 cats. I walk and I run. We’ve got a beautiful Cherry Blossom tree that’s blooming right now and I’m missing a lot of it.
So I try to really enjoy wherever I am. Whatever life throws at me. Whether there’s ice, steeps, slush; I try to take whatever it is and work through it. It’s worked for me. Am I perfect at it? No! I never claim to be perfect. I try to teach you from what I’ve learned in my (close to) 62 years on this planet. I’ve made tons of mistakes. Tons!! I could do many episodes just talking about my mistakes. I share with you some of them. And I learn through my mistakes and my failures. I try to give you enough information so that maybe you won’t make the same mistakes I do.
We talked last week about financial craziness and how people are spending money on new cars that they can’t afford. I am here to tell you that almost everybody can become a millionaire. Almost everybody can do it if you look at your numbers and you spend much less than you make. I know people with very average incomes that have lived the “millionaire next door” lifestyle by being very frugal. And they wake up one day and they’ve accumulated a million dollars. Let me tell you something, that feels good! You can do that!
So just learn from my mistakes and learn from my lessons that I share with you. In the few minutes that we have left today, I want to share something really cool. We were on the mountain today taking a well deserved lunch break. It was really tough to get a seat so we shared a table with a woman. She had a ski helmet with a sticker from practically every ski resort. It was a conversation starter.
As it turns out, this woman named Carol, is 73 years old and has been skiing for 60 years! She looked fantastic! She exuded youth. She looked great and was talking about all these places that she’s skied over the years. I have so much respect for this woman at 73 years old skiing by herself on the mountains. She owns a place here in Utah. She’s from New York but she comes here and spends a good part of the winter. She said that’s why she looks so good. She is doing what she loves and she is moving her body.
Have you heard a recurring theme in The David Madow Lifestyle Show? Do what you love. Move your body. Put the right foods and the right fuel into your body.
I am vegan and Mike is gluten free. It’s really funny. We joke with the waitress that they are going to have a lot of fun with us. We have to figure out what we can eat. They are so accomodating. People want to work with you and they want to help you. Most do. I still believe that most people on this planet are good people. There is a small percentage that are not. We stay away from them.
That’s what I teach. Stick with positive people. That’s why you’re with me. Positivity exudes from this podcast. Positivity, inspiration, success! There’s great stuff in your life. Stick with me. There’s going to be more. I promise you. I’ll see you next week! I’m Dr. Dave –
CONNECT WITH ME AND SHARE
“Thank you very much for listening! The show is literally downloaded by the thousands each week now. In fact, we have passed the 375,000+ downloads mark! Wow! I so appreciate you listening and sharing this show with your family and friends. I love to help people live a healthier life! It is so great that we have listeners from all over the world from the United States to the UK to Canada to Europe to Japan to Australia. I love hearing from people all over the world on Facebook, Twitter, Email, and our phone hotline too!” – Dr. Dave.
Did you enjoy today’s show? Do you have any questions for me? Do you have any comments or feedback? You are not alone! We want to help you live better, stronger, happier, thinner lives!
https://davidmadow.com/wp-content/uploads/2016/12/DMM-Show-itunes-3000x3000.jpg30003000David M. Madowhttps://www.davidmadow.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/07/Dare-to-Change.jpgDavid M. Madow2017-04-03 03:00:252017-04-04 14:34:55181 - Changing Conditions
Hello there! It’s Dr. D the “V”, Dr. David Madow. Welcome back to another episode of The David Madow Lifestyle Show. I am so glad to have you with me. Whether you’re a brand new listener or whether you’ve been listening to me from the start, I really appreciate you!
Let’s dive right into today’s show. I was about to do another topic, I have to admit. But something else just came up this morning and I’ve got to talk about this because it’s so important.
Here’s what happened. I put a Facebook post up telling people that if they are looking for a new car that they should buy a used one. And oh my god some I the answers I got! Some of them were good. But some of the answers I got were from people that have no idea – no clue – how to manage financial aspects of your life. It’s very scary. And I want to make sure that I give you some guidelines and parameters because if you’re financially responsible your life will generally fall into place. But if you’re haphazard and doing things that don’t make financial sense, your life could fall apart and it could be very very dangerous.
As I’ve told you before, the great majority of breakups of marriages are for financial reasons. If you’re not on the same page financially and if you’re not doing the right financially, you’re going to have problems. And I don’t want you to have problems.
So here’s what I did. I put a post up this morning on Facebook and I just gave some guidelines like, “if you’re looking for a new car, here’s what to do.” What I said was to only pay cash for a car. Never lease. Never finance. Only pay cash for a car. Buy a used car that you can afford. Buy a good quality used car that is just a couple of years old. But make sure it’s a car you can afford and pay cash for it. Never lease and never finance.
Here’s another great rule that you might want to write down. I didn’t make this up. This is actually Dave Ramsey’s rule. Dave Ramsey is a mentor of mine and somebody that I have been following for many many years. When I started adhering to his principles, things started changing in my life totally. Like no stress because I was doing things right. I’m doing things that I can afford. I’m doing things smart. But Dave Ramsey’s rule for buying anything with a motor is that the sum of the value of your cars (boats, planes, etc) should not be more than 50% of your take home pay.
So let’s say you make $70,000 a year as your household income or whatever that number is. Then go outside and total up the current value of all your cars. If you’re not sure what they are check online at Kelley Blue Book. Once you do that, check to make sure that the value of the cars in your driveway do not exceed 1/2 of your annual salary. So if you have a household income of $70,000, then they should not total up to be more than $35,000. If they do, you are not in alignment with where you should be. You might want to consider selling a car or downsizing to something less expensive.
A lot of times when people buy a new car and they get a loan, as soon as they drive the car off the showroom floor they owe more than it’s worth. It’s crazy. I cannot stress this enough.
And I want to share with you some of what people said on my Facebook page. They are dead wrong. But I want to share with you some of the thinking out there because it’s dangerous. Some of these people come across sounding like they really know what they’re talking about but they don’t. As my good friend Dave Ramsey says,
“Almost everybody is broke.”
Don’t listen to broke people when they are giving financial advice. Listen to smart people that have done it right. Dave Ramsey is doing better than me. He is a multi millionaire. He’s done really well for himself. He was once bankrupt because he made a lot of mistakes and now has built up quite an empire of businesses.
I will not be a Dave Ramsey nor do I need to be. But I am definitely fine and I have definitely made a lot of good financial decisions. I live way below my means and I am debt free. So when I bring money in, a lot of my money goes towards investing, retirement, and charitable giving. It feels really good to be able to do that. And you can do that at any level. You don’t have to be making six figures a year. You can be making a moderate income and still be living way below your means.
So here are some of the things I am seeing on my Facebook page. These people are espousing total misinformation and unfortunately sounding very authoritative.
One guy told me that I was dead wrong. He said that maybe my thinking was ok many years ago but times have changed. And these days it makes sense to buy a new car and possibly lease it because the warranty is going to prevent you from needing expensive repairs and you’ll also get the latest safety features.
Now, that just doesn’t make any sense because no matter what year we are in right now, there is nothing that is ever going to be better than paying cash for a car that you can afford. There is nothing that’s going to come around to Trump that. Nothing’s going to be better than that.
Unless you have a net worth of one million dollars or more, don’t buy new. My net worth is well over a million dollars and I still don’t buy new. I don’t need to buy new. Why would I? I drive around in a 2005 Volvo XC90. I love it. It just turned over to 112,000 miles and the thing still looks like it came off the showroom floor. Why would I get rid of it to spend $40,000 to $50,000 on a new car? Why would I ever do that. It drives great. I upgraded the sound system a few years back so it’s totally up to date and modern. What would I want to give this up to spend cash on a new car? That’s crazy!
For the most part people that are leasing cars cannot afford them. But they find the monthly payment to be palatable and they feel that they can afford more car. They’ll never own the car, they just lease it. So they drive more car than they can afford. It just doesn’t work mathematically. But people on Facebook are saying these crazy things about how wrong I am and how you have to buy a new up to date car. Well, my car is a 2005 and I’ve got airbags. A Volvo is a very strong safe car and I don’t feel that I need to buy a new car to be safer. Number one, I drive safely. Some of the thinking out there just does not make any sense.
Leasing is the most expensive way to drive a car. Do I need to repeat that? Don’t lease! Now, people came onto my Facebook page and told me that leasing makes sense because if you own a business you can write it off and the tax benefits outweigh the cost of the lease. That sounds good. But guess what? They’re totally wrong! Dave Ramsey has done all of the math on this and even as a multi-millionaire he has said that he would never lease a car. Even if you get a tax write off, how could it be better than paying cash for a car that you can afford?
I am not saying to pay cash for a brand new $80,000 Tesla. That’s crazy! If you’re making $40,000 a year and you’re looking for a car, then go out and find a $4,000 Honda that maybe has some mileage on it but somebody took good care of it and you drive that. There’s nothing wrong with that. That’s what I would do!
I am worried about people that need to go around and show off at stop lights and gas stations because they have these fancy cars that are bankrupting them. Take the difference of the money that would have spent buying yourself a fancy car and invest that in your retirement so later on you can live like no one else lives. Take time to save money so that you can pay for your kid’s college. Invest in that. Have the proper health care that you need. Live in a comfortable house that’s paid off. Cars are a depreciating asset. I would rather see you put money into a home. And buy the way, it’s best to pay cash for that too.
I am quoting Dave Ramsey a lot because I love the guy. The only debt that he allows is a 15-year mortgage where the monthly payment is no more than 25% of your take home pay.
You might be thinking to yourself, “I listen to your podcast Dave because I want to be healthier and stronger.” Of course I come on and say “this is the show where I help you live stronger, thinner, healthier, and happier”, and I didn’t do it today for a reason. But think about this. If you are financially independent, you will be stronger. You’ll be thinner because it’s true that people who live their lives stress free are healthier. They choose to eat better. You’ll be happier. You’ll be stronger, thinner, healthier, and happier if you are financially responsible.
I’ve got a good friend, Eric, who I think is in his early 40s. I love this guy! He messages me all the time on Facebook telling me his financial situation and let me tell you something, he is a smart young man. It’s almost like we’re twin sons of different mothers but we’re a generation apart. Everything he says to me is right. There is no question in my mind that he’s going to be a multi-millionaire. Every time he writes to me I say, “Eric you totally get it.” He’s investing and saving. He spends much less money than what he makes. He’s eating right. He’s moving his body. He could do this podcast if I ever want to give this thing up or if I ever need a substitute. The guy is really smart. He’s no smarter than you or I. He just knows this stuff. He chooses to live his life on purpose.
You know darn well that if you go into a car dealership and buy a car for $40,000 or $50,000 and decide to lease it or make payments, you know in your heart that it’s not the right thing to do. You know in your heart that you can’t afford it. But some people just do it anyway. They like the flash. They like the appearance of that. What does it matter what other people think about you?
Do people think that I am poor because I am driving around in a 12 year old car with 112,000 miles on it? Well they can think whatever they want. I don’t care. I have money that I can do whatever I want with. It’s a comfortable feeling. And I am not saying this to brag or say I am better than anybody. I am just saying this because I am comfortable with my life. It pays off and it’s never too late to do this. Whether you’re 20 years old and listening to me or whether you are 70 years old, it’s never too late to start.
I love this old expression. When is the best time to plant an oak tree? Well the best time was probably 40 years ago because you would see all this growth. But the second best time is now! If not now, when?! It’s never too late to start doing the right thing, the responsible thing. I hope you do it my friend.
I want to share one more thing with you before I leave you today. I’ve got some exciting stuff coming down the pike. I am leaving in a few days for Park City, Utah. I love the place! I haven’t skied in Park City in many years now but I am meeting my friend, Mike, out there and we are going to ski for about six days. This trip coincides with my trip to Portland, Oregon where I will be speaking the following Friday. When I travel for business, I try to my best to arrange a Hippie Road Trip or something like that. Life is not all about work, work, work. Do fun stuff!
But work is fun also! We just had a group of people in town that we had a Mastermind with a few days ago. And it was just amazing. I love helping people! I love changing lives! I love motivating! I love inspiring! If you need me for anything, you know where to get me. If you know my name, you can reach me. My preferred method of communication these days is Facebook messenger.
I am here to help you. You are not alone anymore!
I’m getting ready for my trip. Let me run! And ss you know, I promise you I will be back next week! I’m Dr. Dave and I love ya!
CONNECT WITH ME AND SHARE
“Thank you very much for listening! The show is literally downloaded by the thousands each week now. In fact, we have passed the 375,000+ downloads mark! Wow! I so appreciate you listening and sharing this show with your family and friends. I love to help people live a healthier life! It is so great that we have listeners from all over the world from the United States to the UK to Canada to Europe to Japan to Australia. I love hearing from people all over the world on Facebook, Twitter, Email, and our phone hotline too!” – Dr. Dave.
Did you enjoy today’s show? Do you have any questions for me? Do you have any comments or feedback? You are not alone! We want to help you live better, stronger, happier, thinner lives!
https://davidmadow.com/wp-content/uploads/2016/12/DMM-Show-itunes-3000x3000.jpg30003000David M. Madowhttps://www.davidmadow.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/07/Dare-to-Change.jpgDavid M. Madow2017-03-27 04:26:072017-03-29 13:38:01180 - Some Important Financial Advice
Hey there! Welcome back! It’s Dr. D the “V”, David Madow. Back for another fantastic episode. I welcome you to The David Madow Lifestyle Show. Thanks so much for being here. I really appreciate the feedback so many of you have given me!
I took a week off. We did not do a show last week and skipped the week. It was the first time I skipped an episode in about 2 years actually. And the outpouring of love from you guys asking me what was going on because you hadn’t seen the show this past week. I love you guys and thanks so much for being concerned!
To answer many of your questions, everything is great! I just had come off of the end of Hippie Road Trip #4, I had a lot of stuff going on in my business. And you know something? I never want to put out a show unless I think it is a great one for you. The last thing I want to do is waste 20 minutes of your day listening to something that is not valuable or something that doesn’t make sense. So I decided not to do a show last week. Will I ever skip any more weeks in the future? Yes, perhaps I will just depending on what I’ve got going on and my schedule. Trust me if I miss a week, I love you still. It has nothing to do with anything except for the fact that I just didn’t have it in me to do a show that week. That’s all.
So, getting past that, I am super super excited. As I am recording this, I am getting ready for the first Vegan Indian Buffet & Open Mic (VIBOM) dinner. It’s going to take place this evening in Owings Mills, MD. If you’re listening to this now, it has already passed and I am sure it was a huge success.
If you’re not on my list and you want to know more about upcoming events such as more vegan buffets and open mics, please make sure you get on my list. The way to do that is to visit my website and enter your email address to join the VIP list or find my Facebook group.
We are actually over capacity tonight and are expecting 44 people. I will be scheduling another one and the next time I do one I am going to see if I can get more capacity because this thing has taken off like crazy. It’s not just locals. We’ve got Mark “ThePro” Jackson coming in from North Carolina. He’s taking a train up to Baltimore from North Carolina to join us in this Vegan Indian Buffet & Open Mic. It’s going to be awesome and I cannot wait to see you. If you’re listening to this and you were there, I am so glad that I saw you at the Vegan Open Mic.
I want to share a few little things I learned from Hippie Road Trip #4. If you remember, Hippie Road Trip #4 went from Memphis, TN (where I spoke on a Saturday) and I had some time to take and drive down to West Palm Beach Florida where I would be speaking about 6 days later. I went through Memphis into Mississippi, Alabama, Georgia, then into Florida. It was an awesome trip and I learned a lot actually.
One of the things I learned is that southerners are really good people. I want to back up and say, most people are really good people. But when I was driving through the south through Mississippi, Tennessee, and Alabama, and Georgia, and Florida, I had the opportunity to stop at a lot of truck stops. One of my favorites is Love’s Truck Stop and I make it a point to stop at a Love’s whenever I can and get some fresh brewed iced tea. Unsweetened of course. And you come in contact with a lot of people. Not necessarily conversations but let me tell you something. People are so nice and polite. If they’re walking down an aisle or opening a door, they’ll say thank you or excuse me. I really took a step back and just really tried to observe. You hear so many people these days saying that people these days aren’t nice and they think only about themselves. But I’m not finding that, my friend! I am not finding that. I am finding some really good people wherever I go. Maybe 1 out of 10 or 1 out of 20 aren’t so nice but I don’t know. Maybe it’s my energy. Maybe it’s my vibration. But I’m running into a lot of good people. I use the analogy about the south because I just spent a lot of time in the south but when I drive up north, people are really good there too. I think basic human nature is to be good. Do we have a few bad apples because of things that have happened in their lives? We do, but you know something? I try my best not to ever judge other people because you never know what somebody’s real story is. Somebody could appear like a total jerk to you or a total ahole. Maybe they do something wrong to you. But you never know why or what their whole story is or if something just happened to them. Maybe they had a bad day. Maybe they found out that a relative has a serious illness. Maybe they just broke up with their wife. You never know what’s going on. So don’t take it for granted that somebody was not a good person because maybe they just weren’t nice at that moment or maybe they crossed you the wrong way. I have learned this in my life and I am learning it more and more as each day goes by. Have faith in humanity. Let’s give people the benefit of the doubt. Let’s not judge. And let’s be kind to people!
Speaking of being kind to people, I want to talk about social media for a few minutes. Facebook in particular because that’s my main means of social media and of communicating with you. I see a lot of things on Facebook. Sometimes I think it’s a curse and sometimes I think it gets to be too much because it definitely takes a lot of time to be involved with the entire community on Facebook. But I see a lot of things. And what I am seeing now is that I am seeing people that are unfriending others at the drop of a hat. Someone makes a comment that someone else doesn’t like, they are unfriended. Someone makes a political comment one time or even several times and they are unfriended. I had a friend of mine that said their cousin, who he’s been close with his entire life (this guy is in his 60s), unfriended him because of a political comment. Guys I don’t see that. I just don’t understand. How can you unfriend somebody? How can you not be somebody’s friend because of their opinion on something?
There is no message or notification that you get when someone unfriends you but I was recently looking for a friend of mine on Facebook and noticed that when I went to her page it said “add friend.” So I was thinking, “wow she unfriended me for some reason.” I didn’t know why. When I reached out to her and said “hey what’s going on? I see that we’re not friends on Facebook anymore.” She said something interesting to me. She said, “yeah you know the last time I saw you a couple of years ago at one of your events, I just didn’t feel that you were giving me the love like you used to or that you were paying attention to me.” So I took a step back and thought about it for a minute and thought maybe I didn’t. But then I thought, this was an event that I had about 1500 people at and it’s really tough to give 1500 people the attention they deserve. You try to. When you’re on the stage you try to give energy but talking to 1500 separate people and trying to give them love is virtually impossible in a two day period. So for some reason this woman had a vibe from me that I didn’t like her anymore. That’s crazy! I felt horrible! So I said to her,
“hey look, that’s not the case. I always love you. Maybe we don’t talk for a few months or maybe even a couple years but you know I am your friend.” She finally understood and she asked for my friendship again which I gladly gave to her. We can’t be everywhere at every moment and sometimes our imagination and our assumptions are wrong.
I had somebody else recently who said to me that she didn’t think I was a friend because I just wasn’t paying attention to her also. I felt bad but this person was imagining all kinds of crazy things why I didn’t like her anymore. None of which were true!
I told you about the book The Four Agreements. I hope you read that. If you haven’t read it, I hope you read it because it’s really really powerful. One of the four agreements is to never assume. I have found, in my life, that when I assume something or get worked up over something as I have in the past, 90% (or more) of the time, I was dead wrong. So I try my best. I’m human. I’m not a machine. It’s not a 100% that I don’t assume anymore because I am not perfect. But I try my best not to assume because more often than not everytime I assume something about why somebody did something or why somebody didn’t do something, I was almost always wrong. Are you assuming? I’m going to highly recommend that you go back to that book and read The Four Agreements again. You’ll see what the other ones are. I have talked about them all on the show. I’m such a big fan and follower of this book. I am not doing it for any other reason besides it has changed my life.
Another one of the agreements is to be impeccable with your word. And I have tried my best not to say anything that’s going to get me in trouble or get another person in trouble. Be impeccable with your word. It will catch up with you ultimately. Everything does. Especially in this world of social media. This is my assumption, and I know I am not supposed to assume, but my it’s a principle. That might be better. But I go by the principle or assumption that whatever you put out there or whatever you tell somebody, there is no way that you can hide it. So if you tell somebody something or put something online, even if you think it’s hidden somewhere, assume that it’s out there for the public to see (I give you permission to assume in this case). So before you put something online or talk about somebody behind their back, you can assume that once you put it out there, it will be public. Please remember that! It’s true. Trust me on this one. And if you have a friend or an acquaintance or coworker that is always talking about other people, trust me when you turn your back they are talking about you. Trust me. In my almost 62 years on this planet, I’ve experienced a lot. If you’ve got one of those people, you know exactly who they are, and they are talking about people in a negative way, they are talking about you when they are not with you. Believe me. I try to separate myself from negative people. Sometimes they come across as really positive people. And then when you talk to them personally, they are bad mouthing other people. When you have to bad mouth somebody else, there is generally something going on. Some people may not be as great as they appear to be on social media because they talk about other people.
On Hippie Road Trip #1, I came up with a list of about 20 things I learned. If you remember one of them was…get rid of the mother fuckers (pardon my language). That’s harsh word. It’s a bad word. I would not use that word on stage although this is sort of like my stage here. But these people that you are not aligned with and that are saying bad things about other people, get rid of them. Don’t wish them any harm. I’m not saying they are bad people but when your life gets filled up there is no room for anything else. There’s not room for any other people or events or anything like that.
So make sure you’re spending your time with the people that you are aligned with or that you are vibrating with. I could give you a list of people that are great people but I just don’t feel that I’m vibrating with. I feel like I’ve got nothing to share with them. And they probably feel the same about me and that’s ok. I’ve got plenty (that’s you) that I feel like I am aligned with and we’re vibrating on that same frequency.
So be kind to people. Spend your time with the people that mean the most to you. I can’t emphasize that enough. I did a lot of thinking on Hippie Road Trip #4.
I met up with a friend of mine that I had not seen in quite some time. We actually graduated from dental school together in 1980. I hope he is listening to this. His name is Tony and what a great guy he is! We spent 3 hours in a restaurant one evening just talking and reminiscing. And when we talked, we talked about positive things. We didn’t say anything bad about anybody at all. We didn’t bad mouth anybody. We did talk about generalities. Like people who have to show off and have to acquire so many material things because something is wrong in their lives. Their lives are empty. So they’ve got to make up for that by driving expensive cars, and having jewelry, and fancy possessions.
It’s funny. Tony and I have not spent a lot of time together except online for the past 37 years but we’re so similar in our thinking. We both done very well financially over many many years. We’ve both been very fiscally (financially) responsible. And neither of us show off anything. Both of us are very down to earth family oriented people. We don’t necessarily have to have a lot of material things in our lives because we are basically happy. We don’t need junk to show people that we are successful or happy. Or to become happy. We don’t need that stuff.
I learned a lot. Hippie Road Trip #4 was great. Just driving from Memphis to the point where I actually put my feet in the Atlantic ocean was an incredible feeling. If you ever can get out on the road and do this, I beg you to. Please try a Hippie Road Trip. They do not have to cost a lot of money. I stay in very inexpensive hotels. Or you can “boondock” which means that if you have a car or truck, you can just sleep in your car or truck. Or pitch a tent somewhere. You don’t need a lot of money to do a Hippie Road Trip. I go online to hotels.com the day of and get a good deal in the area where I am going to be. I look at reviews. And I do not stay in the most expensive places. Trust me!
I am looking forward to Hippie Road Trip #5. I am not sure when or where but it’s going to be coming up. And when it does, I am going to be sharing with you. It’s one of the things in my life now that has become really important for me. Getting out on the road and observing and looking around and meeting people all over North America. It’s been incredible and I love it. I cannot wait to do the next one.
I’m getting ready for the Vegan Indian Buffet & Open Mic night. I am moving some equipment right now. I really hope you can join me at the next one. Please get on the VIP list!
I want you to have a great week! I’ll see you next week. Hopefully I won’t be taking any time off soon but if I do bear with me. You know I will be back. Here’s my promise to you. I am not going anywhere and I promise you that. I am going to be here for the long run to help you, to inspire you, to change your life, and to be with you so you will not be alone anymore. Because I’m with you my friend.
I’m Dr. Dave. See you next week!
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“Thank you very much for listening! The show is literally downloaded by the thousands each week now. In fact, we have passed the 375,000+ downloads mark! Wow! I so appreciate you listening and sharing this show with your family and friends. I love to help people live a healthier life! It is so great that we have listeners from all over the world from the United States to the UK to Canada to Europe to Japan to Australia. I love hearing from people all over the world on Facebook, Twitter, Email, and our phone hotline too!” – Dr. Dave.
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https://davidmadow.com/wp-content/uploads/2016/12/DMM-Show-itunes-3000x3000.jpg30003000David M. Madowhttps://www.davidmadow.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/07/Dare-to-Change.jpgDavid M. Madow2017-03-20 03:22:332017-03-22 15:34:27179 - Why I Took a Week Off
Hello! Hey, welcome back! It’s Dr. D the “V”, David Madow. I am really excited to be bringing you this news today. As I record this it is Sunday, March 5th, 2017. Today is the day that I am departing Memphis, Tennessee, that’s where I am right now. I am departing for Hippie Road Trip #4 in literally a couple hours.
I just had breakfast and I am getting a couple things ready. I am going to jump in the shower and hit the road. Hippie Road Trip #4 is going to be from Memphis, Tennessee down to West Palm Beach, Florida where I am speaking.
I just spoke yesterday here in Memphis, which by the way was to a great group of people. Speaking with my brother Rich. And we’ll be speaking again in West Palm on Friday so I’ve got a lot of time. I just need to be in West Palm by Thursday.
So I am going to be hitting the road going through Atlanta, Jacksonville, Florida, and then to West Palm. This Hippie Road Trip is a little bit different than my past Hippie Road trips because I’ve got somethings planned along the way. And that’s good and bad. Good because I’m seeing some friends, some family, and some people that I want to meet up with. Bad because a true Hippie Road Trip has no schedule whatsoever. Since I am trying to meet up with some people, I’ve got to have a little bit of a schedule because I have to have consideration for these people, like my daughter and son-in-law in Jacksonville, Florida. They want to know when I’m coming in case they want to prepare a dinner or something like that. They need to know. I can’t just roll in at any time.
So, even though it’s a Hippie Road Trip, it’s a little bit more structured. Which I don’t really like the structure but I’m going to deal with it this trip.
What am I going to be doing? I am going to be learning, and giving, and broadcasting. By the way, y0u can follow this. I’ll be broadcasting and taking a lot of pictures. Follow my Hippie Road Trip on Facebook. I’m going to be live streaming and I am going to be posting. I’ll try to do a Periscope or 2 or 3 or 4. But it seems as if since I got away from Periscope a little bit lately, my following on Facebook Live is so much stronger than Periscope. When I broadcast on Facebook, I get between 500 and 1000+ views on the video. Which is definitely a lot wider of an audience than I had on Periscope. So I’ll continue to use Facebook Live streaming so that you can keep up with my Hippie Road Trip.
What does it matter to you? I’ll tell you why. I’ve learned that I share with you along the way. I am going to try to meet some interesting people along the way. Get into conversations with some strangers. Help them with their lives in any way that I can. I’m going to be setting examples. I am going to be eating my totally plant based vegan diet. I don’t eat any animal products whatsoever. So I share along the way if I possibly can.
I’ll talk about anything that I can. Anything that comes to my mind. This morning I actually put a very interesting post on Facebook. The post was a little bit of a setup because it was a line from a song. What I posted was, “If I had a million dollars, I’d ________________.” For those of you that know the Barenaked Ladies song, the true answer is, “If I had a million dollars, I’d be rich.” That’s how the song goes. But it was very interesting and I am still following every answer. It was still interesting to see how many of my friends and followers who thought, “wow, if I had a million dollars my life would be totally different. I could do anything I want.” People were talking about if they had a million dollars, they would buy land, they’d buy islands, they’d buy restaurants.”
You know? A million dollars is good but I don’t think that if you have a million dollars you’re super wealthy or anything. You’ve got to be careful because that million dollars can be chipped away so fast. Faster than you’ll ever believe! And you’ll be right back to the same situation. Very few people said I would invest it for the long term. Everybody’s got to be buying something. That just goes to show how the average person out there thinks about wealth, about financial matters. Everyone wants to just buy something. Now granted, some of you said I want to buy something to help other people or start something to help other people, which I loved by the way. you’ve got to reevaluate that.
I’m talking about all kinds of things on this Hippie Road Trip. I’m really excited. I’m feeling great. I am going to try to share with you ways to travel very inexpensively. When you travel you don’t have to spend a lot of money. My friend Steve from Oklahoma city told me that I should “boondock” along the way. If you’re not familiar with what the term boondocking means, it means pretty much staying in your vehicle. Not renting a hotel room.
Right now I’ve got a rental Toyota Rav 4. It is large enough for me to put the seats down and I think I could fit in there as far as sleeping. But I only carried a backpack and a small bag with me so I don’t have a sleeping bag or a pillow. I don’t have anything to be comfortable in the car so I am not sure what I am going to do. I really hate to buy even inexpensive ones just to throw them out. I guess I could donate them. I could probably buy a sleeping pad and pillow for under $50 at the Target but would it pay to do that? I don’t know. Where I am going I don’t know if there’s going to be a lot of national parks or anything along the way. I don’t even know if you can boondock in a national park. I guess you could. I don’t know that much about boondocking but it would be very interesting.
My first stop is going to be in Atlanta. And my good friend Mike, who is probably listening to this episode, has been gracious enough to offer me a bed and a place for the evening. So I might be sleeping in Atlanta this evening and visiting with my good friend Mike and having a cool vegan breakfast tomorrow morning.
So I am not sure what I am going to do. Do I go to Target and pick up a cheap sleeping bag, a pad, and a pillow and just donate when I’m in West Palm Beach? I don’t know. Maybe!
The first stop that I have to make before I get on the road is Whole Foods. As you know, I carry healthy vegan food in my car. I try to stay away from restaurants. I’ll probably slip into a restaurant for dinner at some point. But for lunch on the road, I make a healthy sandwich from my Whole Foods purchase. I carry some stuff in the front seat and I carry some stuff in the back. I just have stuff with me. And I am going to share with you how to travel for pennies on the dollar.
As you can tell I am excited! I have some stuff to do in the room here before I get out of here. And I hate to think I am on a time schedule but something’s telling me that I have to get going pretty soon. So what else do I have to share with you guys?
I’m going to figure out a way to get some exercise in a long the trip as well. I’ve got a Hippie Road Trip playlist I’ve made up. It’s on Spotify and I will share it with you on Facebook. And you can play it right along with me.
So, how are you doing? Is everything good in your life? I want to help you in any way I can. And that’s one of the reasons why I do this David Madow Lifestyle Show. I get on the recording once a week and I ask you to follow along with my life. You don’t have to do everything I do. You don’t have to copy me exactly. I give little tips about living a great life. Try them out! I’m pretty sure they’re going to help you! I’ve learned so much over my almost 62 years on this planet.
One of the things I’ve done recently if you’ve seen pictures of me on Facebook, is that I cut my hair pretty short. I let it go totally grey. I don’t color it anymore. I’ve colored it for so many years, I think it’s kind of like a fake. For so many years, a couple decades or so I had brownish hair and I’ve tried red at one point basically to cover up the grey. Which was stupid because there’s nothing wrong with grey hair. I’m proud to have grey hair. And maybe the grey hair makes me look a lot older than had I died it. But it is what it is. This is what I am.
I do everything to stay in shape, and to keep young, and to look as good as I can, but you know something? Why do I need to mask something that is just there? There’s nothing wrong with grey hair. I should be proud of my grey hair. And so many people that have seen me in real life have told me that I should never go back. The hair that I’ve got now looks better than it did before. So I’m not going to go back. I’m not going to color it again.
You’ve got to be proud of what you have. I am totally fine with aging. If you would have asked me this when I was 30 or maybe even when I turned 40, I hated my birthdays back then. I hated the fact that I was getting older. But I think it’s because I wasn’t really happy within. I wasn’t happy with who I was. But now I am 100% happy with my life. How things are going with my wonderful wife. And it’s ok. As the years pass, yeah you get greyer. You look older. But that’s the way it is. We can’t change that. So embrace it! Have fun! Enjoy it!
I think I am going to look back in 10 years when I am 72 and think 62 was so young. And I am embracing it. I am going to be skiing with my good friend Mike. Mike, I can’t wait to hit the slopes with you in Park City (UT) in a few weeks. We get in the chair lift and we get immature like we always do.
I think that being you and acting really young and immature is that secret to a long life. Joking around, having fun, acting like a child. I think it’s the secret to a long life. I find that the people that smile the most and laugh the most and act like kids the most, are the youngest. I’m glad to fit into that category there.
So I’ve got a lot going on. And I am just happy and proud enough to share it with you, my friend. If we’ve never met in person, if you’re listening to this somehow, I still feel like there is a serious connection between me and you and I am so glad that you are with me. We’ve got a lot to talk about.
So I’m gonna end this a little bit earlier. A few of my episodes lately have been a little bit over. I like to keep my episodes to about 20 minutes but a few of them lately have gone over so I feel like it’s ok if I take off a little bit early today. I’m going to get going.
It looks like it’s raining out but the rain does not stop a Hippie Road Trip. Nothing stops a Hippie Road Trip. The planet needs rain. The planet needs water. The beautiful green lush vegetation I’m looking at out my window here in Memphis, it just looks beautiful. If we didn’t have rain, we wouldn’t have that. So embrace all types of weather. Embrace all types of situations in your life. Embrace whatever life throws at you. And make it a good one. Make it better if you can.
Hey, I love you! Keep following me! I am so excited for the Hippie Road Trip. And I’ll see you again on the David Madow Lifestyle Show in a week. Follow me on Facebook. Follow me on my live stream broadcasts. Follow me wherever you can. We can have fun together. We’re going to learn. And we’re going to teach. And we’re going to just maximize this life. I’m Dr. Dave.
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“Thank you very much for listening! The show is literally downloaded by the thousands each week now. In fact, we have passed the 350,000+ downloads mark! Wow! I so appreciate you listening and sharing this show with your family and friends. I love to help people live a healthier life! It is so great that we have listeners from all over the world from the United States to the UK to Canada to Europe to Japan to Australia. I love hearing from people all over the world on Facebook, Twitter, Email, and our phone hotline too!” – Dr. Dave.
Did you enjoy today’s show? Do you have any questions for me? Do you have any comments or feedback? You are not alone! We want to help you live better, stronger, happier, thinner lives!
Hey welcome back! It’s Dr. Dave! Dr. D the “V” and this is the show where I help you live stronger, thinner, healthier, and happier. Thanks so much for being back with me on The David Madow Lifestyle Show. I’ve got a great one for you today.
Before we get into it, I want to remind you first that Hippie Road Trip #4 is beginning on March 4th. So if you’re listening to the show before that just know that I am going to be on the road for about 5 or 6 days. It’s between two speaking gigs and I will be driving from Memphis, Tennessee all the way down to West Palm Beach, Florida. It’s going to be a great one. I’ve got a few stops already that I am thinking about. One of them hopefully is stopping off in Jacksonville, Florida to see my daughter, son in law, and two grandkids. So if that works out schedule wise, that could be a really good one.
Hippie Road Trips pretty much don’t have schedules so I could pretty much go with the flow wherever I want. Stopping at truck stops along the way. As long as I get to my gig in West Palm Beach by Thursday, March 9th, I’ll be ok. So I’ve got a bunch of days for hippie road trippin’.
And by the way, thanks so much to all of you that have commented on some of my Facebook posts lately. My wife Yoko and I really want to ultimately look into taking an RV trip. Getting rid of some of the junk we have, finding an RV, and going off and exploring the country. Maybe for a long period of time. I’m not sure. It’s still in the works. I am researching it. There are pros and cons. I found out about RV traveling and it looks very glamorous from the outside but there are some crazy things when you dig into it and find out. It’s not as easy as it looks so it’s something we are exploring right now.
Coincidentally, there happens to be a RV show in Maryland tomorrow which we are going to go check out. I’m not going to buy anything tomorrow. But I’m doing my research and figuring it out. Yoko and I want to be on the ultimate hippie road trip and just exploring this beautiful country of ours.
The thing is as soon as I posted this on Facebook, that I just wanted to get into a RV and travel around the country for a long period of time. Maybe a year or whatever. So many people responded like “go for it”, “I wish I could do this”, “I’m jealous, this is my dream”. And it led me to start thinking; wow, people have a lot of dreams but maybe they live vicariously through other people because they can’t fulfill them. Why can’t you do this? Why can’t I do this? Why can’t we do what we want in life instead of getting up in the morning, working for “the man”, doing a 9-5. Why can’t we live out our dreams? I am doing this.
You can do this! I am no different than you, trust me. We can live our dreams and if you want to live your dreams vicariously through me that’s ok but I want YOU to live the life of your dreams. Not just listen to me. Not just watch what I do. You can watch what I do but I hope you follow. That’s why it’s The David Madow Lifestyle Show. It’s not just me telling you what to do.I’d like you to try this stuff because it really does work.
Trust me. I am no smarter. I am not special or gifted in any type of way. I just figured out how to do this stuff and you can do the same thing. Just follow me. If you’re brand new start with Episode #1. Now we’re into the 170s so it’s going to take you some time. [Dave laughs] But start with episode #1 and start listening. Immerse yourself in the culture and we will change lives for sure.
By the way, one other quick announcement. If you happen to be local to the Maryland area and even it you’re not, I’ve got some people traveling in for this little event. It’s going to be taking place on Saturday March 18th. It’s the Vegan Indian Buffet and Open Mic. We are renting out a room at a local Indian restaurant and they are setting up a special vegan buffet. We’re going to have a great time! It’s actually pretty full right now. I’ve got maybe a couple of seats left that I am holding for VIPs and last minute people. I didn’t want to use every single ticket just in case.
By the way, if you’re ever doing any kind of events or anything like that always hold back a couple tickets just in case. You never know what’s going to happen at the last minute if somebody that you didn’t think about wants to come.
But it’s going to be an incredible event! And we’re going to do another one. We’re definitely going to. This one will take place on March 18th and then we’re going to look at sometime in May to do another one. I’ve got people coming in from out of town so no matter where you are on this planet look for future announcements for future vegan buffets and open mics because this is going to be a wild cool fun event. I’ll be hanging out with you guys and Yoko my wife will be there. It’s going to be full and it’s going to be fun!
So I want to segue into today’s topic. This is a free form podcast where I just talk and help you. It’s never scripted. Never. It’s basically what flows out of my brain.
This morning, I turned on my music and for some reason I was in the mood to hear an album that I hadn’t heard in many years. It’s called Seventh Sojourn. Without going to Google, do you know the artist that made that album? I’ll give you a hint. It came out in 1972. It’s old, very old. Seventh Sojourn was the seventh album by a group called the Moody Blues. I loved them when I was back in high school and college. They are just one of my favorite groups. I had a chance to see them live in the early 70s at the Baltimore Civic Center. It was one of my first concerts ever actually. I remember that it was so loud and distorted and I brought this little tape recorder and I tried to record some of their songs and it didn’t work. Just imagine someone sitting in the 50th row in this big arena with this little tape recorder. Imagine how that sounded. I played this album this morning.
So anyhow, I played this album this morning and it was really strange. I had this flashback to 1972 and I started feeling the way I felt in 1972. I had visions of me being in high school. I graduated in 1972 and I think it was right before I graduated high school when this came out. It was not necessarily a good thing. I had these feelings that I was kind of like a misguided kid who had no direction in life. That’s the feeling that came over me when I put this on. And I remember I was on a family camping trip with my dad and brothers and a couple other dads and their sons. It was a really cool time. It was very misty out and raining and I kind of had a flashback to that. But the overall feeling was that my childhood and adolescence was weird. To this day, I don’t know if I was depressed, misguided, or no ambition. I don’t know. But this all came from this album. My parents didn’t give me a lot of guidance. God love them. My parents were great! But they weren’t really on top of things as far as guiding me in the right direction.
I sort of remember to this day how I chose the college that I went to. I went to two undergraduate colleges because I transferred after two years. But the first college I went to was called Randolph Macon which is a very small liberal arts college in Ashland, Virginia. It’s not like a did a whole lot of research to find the perfect school for me.
I will tell you how I landed at Randolph Macon in Virginia. I don’t know how it happened, but it’s weird as shit. My mom, her friend Elaine, her son Jeff, and I went down to visit this college Randolph Macon. The four of us went down to visit this college and walked around the campus. We had dinner at some restaurant in Richmond, Virginia. That evening we decided that not only would Jeff and I go to this school but we decided that Jeff and I would be roommates. Boy that was stupid! That’s the way that I was guided to pick my college. It was ridiculous! And he was a nice guy and everything but Jeff and I didn’t really fit as roommates at all. It would have been much better if I maybe had someone randomly selected for me. I would have met someone new maybe from a different culture. It was just bizarre. It was weird and the school turned out not to be good for me. Not at all. It was tiny, very conservative, maybe something like a southern Baptist. I’m Jewish and they were sending me to a southern Baptist type school with maybe 1000 students total. And they had just begun admitting women the previous year. So there were like 930 men and 70 women in this whole school. Talk about a formula for disaster.
So this is what I started thinking about when this Moody Blues album come on this morning. I really did flashback to my whole weird life. It was like one series of misguided steps to the next. Don’t get me wrong. Anybody looking at me from the outside probably thought things were ok and I don’t really know that they were. I’m wondering if I had been guided in a different direction, would my life be different? Better? My life is good so maybe I needed the weirdness when I was younger. Maybe I needed that. But I lasted 2 years at that school. Jeff lasted all 4 years. He loved it! It was probably good for him but bad for me.
In the second year, I did have another roommate. Jeff and I kind of parted ways. I guess we figured we weren’t the best as roommates for each other. I think he moved into the frat house anyway. My second roommate’s name was Scott. He was a diabetic. It was like my first introduction into diabetes. I didn’t know anything about diabetes. But this guy had to take insulin. I didn’t even know what that was back then. He was a diabetic and he was a big masturbator. I don’t know if it had anything to do with the diabetes, but this guy masturbated so much. I would always walk into the room and catch this guy masturbating. It’s not like a really uncomfortable thing for me to always walk in on this. It was just really weird.
And again this album flashed me back to this weirdness. After 2 years at Randolph Macon. I came to my senses and I transferred closer to home at the University of Maryland Baltimore County (UMBC). By the way, my grades at Randolph Macon were average at best. They were “B” and “C” type grades. They were ok not great. I didn’t even know what I wanted to do with my life so I transferred to UMBC where I then figured out that I had to grow up a little bit. I’ve got to start studying and working hard. And then I started getting “A’s”. It not that UMBC was easier. It was probably more difficult. But I totally grew up a little bit and moved back home. I studied hard because I wanted to go to dental school. Why did I want to go to dental school? I have no flipping idea. Again, it was probably because I was guided in that direction. But nobody gave me any tests or said, “Dave, I think you should be a dentist because…” So I am going to do something for the rest of my life because somebody said to try this.
This album brought this all back. I feel like this is my shrink appointment now. I feel like I am talking to my shrink. I don’t even have a shrink. Don’t get me wrong, there’s nothing wrong with seeing a shrink. I have seen shrinks in my life. When I was married the first time, I saw shrinks when I got divorced. I saw shrinks when I met Yoko because I was trying to figure out my life. There’s nothing at all wrong with it. It actually helped me a lot.
I’ll tell you the last time I spoke to a shrink. I remember exactly what happened. I spoke to my shrink 9 years ago. The reason I remember it was 9 years ago or so was because Obama was campaigning to be president. It was before he was elected. I said to my shrink, “I don’t think I am going to vote for Obama. I just don’t love him.”And she looked at me straight in the eye and said, “well Dave, if you are not voting for Obama that means you are racist.” And you know, I will never forget that. Because I wasn’t voting for somebody whose skin happened to be black, that meant I was racist. That was my last appointment ever with this woman. Up until then I thought she gave me a lot of good advice and helped me along with some questions I had with my life. That was the last time I ever saw shrink. The nerve of her looking at me and telling me, who loves everyone and looks at everyone the same regardless of skin color or sexual preference or age or gender. Whatever it is. I try my best to look at everybody as a human being. And this woman told me that I am a racist. So does that mean if I didn’t vote for Carter back in the 80s who I think ran against Reagan. Does that mean I hate southern people? That’s such a weird statement for a professional to tell me that if I didn’t vote for Obama I was racist. That’s just crazy.
Anyway, I digress. But again, my life was weird. I did a lot of crazy things and weird things when I was in college and dental school. But I just felt like I was a misguided mess. Thank God I finally came to my senses. It was really not until I divorced my wife of 23 years. And I went through some really tough times after that. I dated different women but I finally met Yoko and we got married. It was not until then, that I really figured it out. We’ve been married for 13 years now and it wasn’t until then that my life really started to come together. And I am going to thank the Moody Blues for coming on my iTunes this morning. Actually it might have been Spotify but I am the one that played it. But I want to thank the Moody Blues for flashing my entire adolescent life in front of me simply by playing that album. I might play it again. I’m not sure. I don’t know if I am going to play it again but I probably will. But I am going to be prepared to go back into 1972.
How about you? Do you ever listen to any music from your past that suddenly takes you back to that past whether it was good, bad, a mixture? Do you ever do that? Does it ever get you to think about how you’ve come such a long way? And how you’ve changed over many years?
I think a lot of it just has to do with life experience. When I was 17, 18, 19, I had almost no life experience and very little guidance and I had to figure things out on my own. But now about 45 years later, I think I am just starting to figure life out. Oh I wish God could give me 60 more years because I think in 60 more years I could figure a lot more out. But until then I have to enjoy every single day I have on this planet. The way I enjoy every single day is not only doing my thing but working and exploring this beautiful planet. But the way I really get my pleasure is by helping you. I love to help YOU live your best life!
Until next week! I’m Dr. Dave. I love you!
CONNECT WITH ME AND SHARE
“Thank you very much for listening! The show is literally downloaded by the thousands each week now. In fact, we have passed the 350,000+ downloads mark! Wow! I so appreciate you listening and sharing this show with your family and friends. I love to help people live a healthier life! It is so great that we have listeners from all over the world from the United States to the UK to Canada to Europe to Japan to Australia. I love hearing from people all over the world on Facebook, Twitter, Email, and our phone hotline too!” – Dr. Dave.
Did you enjoy today’s show? Do you have any questions for me? Do you have any comments or feedback? You are not alone! We want to help you live better, stronger, happier, thinner lives!
https://davidmadow.com/wp-content/uploads/2016/12/DMM-Show-itunes-3000x3000.jpg30003000David M. Madowhttps://www.davidmadow.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/07/Dare-to-Change.jpgDavid M. Madow2017-02-27 03:33:382017-03-01 11:57:21177 - My Therapy Session
Welcome back to the David Madow Lifestyle show! It’s Dr. D the “V”! It’s the show where we help you live stronger, thinner, healthier and happier. I’ve got a great show for you today, coming live from Breckenridge, Colorado.
Normally, I banter for a little bit at the beginning of the show. But right now, I’m going to get right into this because it’s going to be a show that is packed with some really cool stuff.
Yoko and I come here a lot and we spend a good part of the winter here. And we are always looking for good vegan food. So we found it. We heard about this plant based restaurant that opened up a short time ago in Breckenridge, Colorado. It’s 100 percent plant based, and I believe it’s the first one. We went in there (it’s similar to a pizza shop) and we had a great meal.
The owners came over and talked to us. And they didn’t just come over for a couple minutes to ask “how was your meal?” They came over for a while and we bonded with them. We started to hear their whole story about why they wanted to open a plant based restaurant in Breckenridge, Colorado. And now a week later we ended up in their home here in Blue River, Colorado doing a podcast finding out the entire story about Jason Goldstein and Twee Merrigan Goldstein.
I feel honored to be in your house, guys thanks so much for the invitation. Its beautiful! You guys told me you came from Westchester, New York and you drove around in like a hippie RV for I don’t know how long. I want to hear your story starting from New York to why you figured out that you wanted to start a plant based restaurant. I just want to hear your story. You will be talking to people from all over the world. I just want to hear about how you started this thing and go back to New York and why you’re here.
Jason: “Well, we decided to leave New York because we wanted to have a different life for ourselves and our family. So we thought we would move to Boulder, Colorado. After attending the National Gourmet Institute in New York, I said let’s go check out Boulder. And I was like, it seems like a beautiful place, but it’s a lot like where we were currently living in. We wanted a change from that. So I looked at my wife and she looked at me, and we said we don’t know where we’re going to live if it’s not Boulder. So we bought an RV and put our house on the market and started driving around the country until we figured out where we wanted to move. So as soon as we got to Cleveland, we thought, let’s move here. With all due respect, Westchester is a beautiful place and we loved it. But we wanted something different. Cleveland was a change. And that’s what we were looking for after being in my old career of hardwood lumber and hardwood plywood. distribution for 27 years.”
Dr. Dave: “So tell me how a Jason Goldstein who comes from Westchester, New York came to Breckenridge, Colorado? You had this vision of opening a plant based restaurant. How do you even start with that? What is the first step? What did you do?”
Jason: “I just did a Google search for restaurants that were for sale in Breckenridge and this one was available. It’s a very small restaurant, as you know, just over 800 square feet. I thought that it was in our price range and was something that was manageable and doable for us to start out in this type of industry.”
Dr. Dave: “Ok now, so Thui and Jason, you are both vegan. And I think you said you’ve both been vegan for about 3 years or so. So I’m guessing there’s no way that you would ever open up a restaurant that served animal products? So if you want to own a restaurant, you are absolutely serving plant based food. Were you worried at all that coming into Breckenridge and being the first that this thing wouldn’t really take off? That people wouldn’t accept it? Let’s face it, people love meat. I see them eating meat all the time. Were you worried that people wouldn’t come to your place if it were plant based?”
Jason: “Yes, we were very worried. In fact, on the second day after many people came in and we told them we weren’t selling because we just hadn’t taken the sign down yet. Groups of 6 and 8 were getting up and walking out. I looked at my wife and she looked at me, and I said I think we made a big mistake.”
Dr. Dave: “So now run us through this. You’ve got this vegan pizza business that’s open for business and you’ve got groups of 6 and 8 people that are coming in hungry and have probably just finished a day of skiing. They are ready to order. So what took place? At what point they figure out that they’re not going to get regular cheese from a cow or sausage? How did they figure it out? They just got up and walked out? What happened? You didn’t try to convince them to stay?”
Jason: “I am going to pass this over to my wife right now because she’s more front of the house and she was on the front lines of the situation.”
Twee: “I remember we put the sign out front that said vegan pizzeria. And I was thinking, yeah, so many people will just walk in the door. But sometimes they didn’t even get inside. They just spun on their heels. There were moments when they came and we would just say but it’s organic and sustainable and it’s non GMO. Here, can we give you a sample? We’d start getting the sample ready, and sometimes they would stay. But once they ate it, they were done. Once they ate it, they just looked at us like whoa! Here’s what it came down to. It was over the Christmas holiday and you’ve got people that come to Breck who come once a year. So they came back to the same pizzeria they were used to last year. But now that we are slammed on 3 of the 4 nights we are open it’s a totally different story and it’s only 3 weekends later. It’s just because it might have been a little bit too confrontational. You know? They just came in to get their pizza, they didn’t want to know what was in it. They just wanted to know it tasted good and they could feed their family because they either just drove into town or like you said, they just got off the mountain. So bottom line is here they are now like, “oh wait, what! It’s a vegan place? And there’s a lot more to that than you’re choosing to eat paleo or you’re choosing to eat low carbs or you’re choosing to eat gluten free. We’re talking about compassion for animals. And it was like whoa, you’re digging into a deeper belief system than mine right now. And there were people that got angry at us. I had this one group, a 4 top of adults and about 6 children. They were raving about the pizza. And again, this is when we were just opening up and figuring out how we were going to run it eventually. We wrote something on there about vegan meat or that it was plant based. Anyway, I had a family that just raved about it. And then all of a sudden, the one woman says what is that cheese? Is that like ricotta? And I looked at her and I said actually no it’s organic cashew based mozzarella. And oh my God, the look she gave me. She felt like she was tricked. At the end of the dinner, she looked at me and goes, I just want you to know that I really felt like I was tricked and we were duped. And I looked at her and said that’s the last thing we wanted to do. So here we are Jason and I busting our butts and somehow deciding to land in Breckenridge, Colorado. We were pulled here. If we were going to move to the west and moved to Colorado, we were going to make sure that opening a vegan restaurant in the middle of America. In the coastal cities, it’s very easy to go vegan. But there’s something about middle America, that it’s not that available yet. So we said we were going to move to a city or town or mountain resort that was going to have a lot of traffic. What is it? 7000 people that live here and 1.5 million that come through. So we figured even if we’re not going to do well, if we could get a couple percentages out of that, we’ll do all right. So anyway here we are. I just couldn’t believe that I had this woman who raved about it and couldn’t stop talking about it. And the other 4 adults that loved it. But once we told them, it was cashew mozzarella, I just saw people react differently. And the ones who were confronted, they were a little defensive. The ones who were open and tasted it walked away with a seed planted in their head like wow I just ate plant based food, and it tasted good. And maybe I might try again another time. And that’s what keeps the doors open for my husband and I. We don’t need to be making pizza, we don’t need to be converting anyone. We don’t want to. We could be making money and doing other things with our kids. It’s our first season in Breckenridge. Our plan was to just go riding every day. But this restaurant became available because it was meant to be. And here we are all of a sudden, the server, the staff. It just organically happened where we’re at now. It started to build. We are not building it. It’s being built with us as a part of it. But there is a family, there’s magic. Things are happening. Now we closed after that week. And for those 3 weeks, we just hung out and regrouped and said, do we really want to do this? Is this what we’re supposed to do? We wrote each other love notes like we are meant to dig our roots deep and build a mini community within this amazing community. And that’s what we’re doing. 3 weeks in and we don’t have enough staff. We have people knocking on our doors trying to get our hours extended. We’ve met people like you. A conscious community that has a gathering. And that’s what keeps us working 12 hours a day until we find the right balance. We are being called to do this. We’re being called.”
Dr. Dave: “I’ll share something that you told us when Yoko and I came into your house this evening to record this podcast. You were looking around at some houses and then you found one that was just perfect for you. And then you found this restaurant. Do you think you were asking the universe in some way for this whole thing to work out perfectly as you’re driving around in your RV for 14 months?”
Twee: Absolutely! I don’t think, I feel that is how we operate now or it’s how we’re being called to operate. Even today, we were riding on Valentine’s Day and Jason and I, of course you can’t help yourself but to talk about business especially this early in the game. And I said, what do we need. What’s the next step? He goes, I need a couple more Gregorios. Gregorio is one of our hardest workers in the kitchen. I mean this guy works 3 jobs and you know he’s sending money back home to Mexico. He said I need about 2 more of these. And so we stopped, rode the rest of the lift, and prayed to the universe. I said please, God we are dropping down on our knees of what you want us to do. We need your help. And within a half an hour, my husband just looked at his emails and said we just got 3 emails for kitchen staff and I said wow! I just prayed.I believe that if you put your mind towards a vibration that is on another level of consciousness. I’m not saying we are better than or less than. It’s like tuning in to a podcast. If you’re on the same vibration, its happening.”
Dr. Dave: “I totally agree with you there. I have told my listeners stories about when I went through a really difficult divorce, I asked the universe for a soul mate. It didn’t happen overnight. But it did happen. I teach my listeners about this. So let’s get back to the restaurant for a second. The other night, Yoko and I came in there, and we really didn’t know what to expect. We were greeted by a really nice woman her name was Victoria, I believe. She pretty much said sit wherever you want and get comfortable. We chose a great seat we were sitting next to each other with wonderful cushions next to our backs. It was great. But we still didn’t know what to expect. Then, as we were ordering, Thui I think you came over to our table and pretty much made us feel like we were old time friends. But it wasn’t just me and Yoko I noticed that you went over to every customer in the restaurant at some point and sat down with them and had a really nice conversation. And Jason, you were in the back, I think, doing a lot of the cooking but mainly the kitchen area. But Jason came over to our table, ultimately, and we all sat down and talked for a while. I am a business person as well, you know that and I think the way you’re doing, it is really really smart. You want to know your customer. You want to bond with them you want to connect with them. I imagine once you do that they’re kind of hooked and they want to come back. It’s like a family there. Tell me a little bit about how that’s working out for you. Because let’s face it, the average restaurant you walk into the owner is not going to come, sit at your table, and ask you a bunch of questions and be friendly. they might ask you how your food is, and that’s pretty much it. How’s that working out?”
Twee: ” I just did a little head count. You know, let’s make it’s relevant to the restaurant. It’s an intimate, cozy space. I think we have like 7 tables and then 5 seats at the bar and 5 seats at the island. So it’s cozy. And we love it cozy. For me, it’s about connecting with each other. I don’t know if you know, but I teach yoga professionally as well. And I teach a yoga class. You can be in and out, and it can be a real fitness experience. But what we try to offer people is some type of experience where you connect with yourself and connect with other people. It’s like we are having a dinner party. And I loved throwing dinner parties when we were back in New York. But now our restaurant is an extended dinner party from our home. So when we said to you, come over here. We met you in the restaurant, but here you are in our home because it’s an extension. The restaurant is and an extension of our home. So when you walk into our kitchen, our restaurant, or our dining room, it’s like we’re having a dinner party. And when we have dinner parties, we want to talk to everyone. Even if you bought a friend, you know? We want to know who you are and how we can serve you. Especially at the beginning. We’re not always going to be there, but we want to make sure that someone else there is also doing the same thing.”
Dr. Dave: “Well, it definitely worked. And as I said before, I felt really comfortable meeting you and talking to you. It was great. Jason, I want to talk to you a little bit more about your. I can’t say I’m a pizza expert. Being vegan, we don’t eat a lot of pizzas. And I am not just saying this because I am here in your house doing this podcast. The pizza, Jason, was unbelievable. We ordered a little too much. I was expecting a little 12 inch pizza but it came out and we had kale Cesar salads too as an appetizer. It was awesome. We split it and it was incredible. We decided to get 2 pizzas, but there were about 8 or 9 different pizzas on the menu. So I said to Yoko, a 12 inch pizza isn’t too big, let’s get 2 of them. Yoko said, are you sure? and I said yes, please, I’m starved. When they came out, they appeared to be a lot bigger than 12 inches because they’re square. Not only that the dough was incredible. Jason, something you are doing here is magical. We had a lasagna pizza and I think the other one was the pesto. So the combination of lasagna, pizza and the pesto pizza , we were in heaven. I want to talk to you in a second about how you make these things. We couldn’t finish it all, we took it home and we had pizza to eat for the next few days. So Jason, tell us just a little bit about how you are making this delicious pizza that is all vegan? And it’s different than anything I’ve ever tasted in my life. I’ve had vegan pizza in New York, trust me. This is different . This is better. So give us a little explanation as to what’s going on here?”
Jason: “All I can say is that we’re trying to honor the pizza traditions from New York from Napoli from Chicago, basically from the great pizza places around the world. That means using a top grade flour. It’s double refined and you won’t usually get that at most pizza restaurants. And putting it in a wood fire oven at 750 to 800 degrees for 90 seconds. We’re still working it out. It’s not a completed product yet. It’s not there yet. It’s close, but we’re still trying to figure this out. We have hopefully a truffle pizza coming on the menu for this weekend. So after I finished chef school, this wonderful chef opened up an unbelievable woodfire pizza restaurant in New York which is called Fortina. It’s not vegan or even close to vegan. The chef/owner Christian Petroni has won Chopped twice and is now a judge on the TV show. So everything I know started there. I did my internship there after I finished chef school. I was so inspired by these guys in their early 30s. It comes in our nature to be comfortable around our customers but these guys run an 80 seater restaurant if not larger and they sit down with everybody when they’re in there. We love how they do that. We want to connect with out customers in the same way. A lot of our inspiration comes from them.”
Twee: “So when we had our 5year old, it was an amazing time. He [Jason] was working at the family business in the South Bronx. And he would see our newborn baby about 15 minutes a night. Like most people, who unfortunately have to work, they only get to see their babies for a few hours if that. He only got to see his baby for 15 minutes a night. So it just kept happening like that and we had a “fantastic lifestyle.” One day I just said, you know babe is this what you want to do? Is this your dream? And he said no one ever asked me that question before. Here he was working at the family business since he was 13 and 27 years later his wife comes along and asks him this question and says is this what you want to do? And he said no one asked me. So I said, I’m asking you. I’m your wife, who is also a yoga teacher and goes around asking that same question every day of every single person. So what is your dream? And what are you doing about it? And here my husband was never asked or thought about it. So he thought about it. Finally he looked at me kind of shyly and said, I want to own a bar or restaurant maybe. That’s how it all started. Once he said it, then the wheels started coming into motion.”
Dr. Dave: “Jason, we need to get you back for a second because I have a really important question to ask you. You made this decision to leave the family business after 27 years which was obviously very lucrative. Is there turning back? Would you ever go back to your old lifestyle?”
Jason: “Not to my old lifestyle but there can always be unfinished business with the family business. There’s a lot of my heart and soul over there too. But not the old lifestyle, no.”
Dr. Dave: “What was the old lifestyle that you would never go back to? Give me 6o seconds. Tell me about the old lifestyle. I want to know about it”
Jason: “It was just basically living the “American dream.” In my case, just being born and raised in New Jersey and New York. My whole life I thought that New York was the center of the universe. Why would I even think about leaving? And that’s kinda the mentality of a lot of my family and people I know in that part of the country. I don’t want to go back to that. I like living with nature and a freer lifestyle to me. That’s my own personal opinion but you can ask my wife the same question.”
Dr. Dave: “Thui, we’re going to end it with this. You told me one story at the restaurant when we were sitting down talking. Can you tell that story again? Just take a few seconds. It was a great story that pretty much made me feel that, wow this person is really cool.”
Twee: “We lived next to the town Greenwich, Connecticut which was a beautiful place where you feel like you’ve jumped into the middle of Architecture Digest magazine. You go on house tours of 47 million dollar mansions. It was nice to look at, you know? And then 2 towns down was Hillary Clinton’s Chappaqua. So here we are and we’ve “made it.” But then you look around and wonder is there a deep connection with each other’s souls, beyond all the stuff that you have and the education that you require. When you look at a 5 year old daughter of an acquaintance and say, hey I like your shoes. And she looks at me and says, oh thanks they’re Steve Madden. I wanted to just stick her fingernails into dirt and mess up her hair and say go hang out in the woods for God’s sake. You’re 5! Who taught you that labels are important enough to say to another human being. What?! I just went wow babe! Do we want to live in a community where we can find a few good people who we resonate with? I am not saying it’s wrong or right, better or less than, I’m just saying it wasn’t what we were looking for. I grew up on the Jersey shore. And he ran in Ringwood, New Jersey in the woods. We were connected to nature. He was connected to the woods and I was connected to the ocean. To each his own. You do what you need to do for your children. And we were very knowing and in our power that was not how we wanted our children to ever reply to a compliment about her shoes at 5 years old. You know what I’m saying? We want them to say thank you and then maybe give a compliment back. Remember the sun is on their face. They can hear the stream or the babbling brook and it’s time to take off your clothes and go naked in the pond. Let’s get back to it! So we left that place to go into a deeper richness.”
Dr. Dave: “We’re going to end it on that because you are preaching to the choir. I love the story. We’ve got beads here. We’ve got Jason with his grey ponytail. I love these guys. They’re like vegan hippies!” [Jason laughs]
Twee: “Crunchy luxury” 😉
Dr. Dave: “Crunchy luxury, I love it!”
Twee: “We can make change happen more consciously and more quickly.”
Dr. Dave: “At the restaurant I knew I loved you guys. I am so glad that I’m over here doing this. We’re going to end it like this. Tell us the name of your restaurant and any information you want listeners to hear because I’ve got a lot listeners that come through places like Breckenridge. The restaurant is called Piante Pizzeria. And where can we find Piante in Breckenridge?”
Twee: “It’s at 520 Main Street. At the corner of Park and Main Street on top floor. We hope to have a peace sign up there or a cool little sign that you’ll be drawn to. Piante means plant in Italian. A good friend of Jason’s gave him the suggestion and we’re forever grateful because he nailed it.”
Dr. Dave: “So if you’re listening to me now wherever you are, when you comes through Breckenridge, Colorado, your homework is to come to Piante on the corner of Park and Main. It’s like the 3rd floor. You do have to take some steps up. Trust me, it’s a great place! And I want you to meet Thui and Jason personally. Tell them you heard about it on The David Madow Show. And Thui and Jason, thanks so much for your time. And thanks for inviting me and Yoko in your home tonight with your dogs and your wonderful kitchen and food. We really appreciate you. We really appreciate it. You guys are welcome back on the show anytime.”
Thanks so much for being here!
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“Thank you very much for listening! The show is literally downloaded by the thousands each week now. In fact, we have passed the 350,000+ downloads mark! Wow! I so appreciate you listening and sharing this show with your family and friends. I love to help people live a healthier life! It is so great that we have listeners from all over the world from the United States to the UK to Canada to Europe to Japan to Australia. I love hearing from people all over the world on Facebook, Twitter, Email, and our phone hotline too!” – Dr. Dave.
Did you enjoy today’s show? Do you have any questions for me? Do you have any comments or feedback? You are not alone! We want to help you live better, stronger, happier, thinner lives!
https://davidmadow.com/wp-content/uploads/2016/12/DMM-Show-itunes-3000x3000.jpg30003000David M. Madowhttps://www.davidmadow.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/07/Dare-to-Change.jpgDavid M. Madow2017-02-20 03:57:132017-03-01 12:23:50176 - Jason and Twee Start a Vegan Restaurant
Hey there! How ya doing? It’s Dr. D the “V” back with you! Welcome to The David Madow Lifestyle Show. It’s the show where I help you live stronger, thinner, healthier, and happier. I’ve got a lot of great stuff coming at you today.
I’ve got a great show for you today. You can bookmark it and always come back to this one. Because I have been doing this show for about 3 years now as you know but this is going to be one of the most important shows I am doing for you. I’m serious about it! Bookmark it! Share it with your friends. Listen to it. And listen to it again, because it is going to help your life immensely.
Before I get into this subject, I have a couple of things for you real quick. I am still in Colorado. And it’s a beautiful cloudy snowy fairly warm day today in town. I am not skiing today, I am just cruising around doing my thing. I am really happy to say that the lifestyle here has worked really well for me. I’ve shed about 12 pounds in just about 3 weeks. I am concerned about going back East now because I have got to keep the lifestyle up. This is the way to live people! This is the way to do it! Love your body and eat healthy. These are important.
Speaking of moving your body and being outdoors, I want to share something with you. A good friend of mine, Steve Moore, down in Oklahoma City has started a Facebook group. I want you to check this out. It’s a small group right now.
I’ve talked about him a little bit before on the show. He is a retired truck driver who’s lived in the Oklahoma and Texas area I believe almost his whole life. Through listening to my shows and meeting me on Periscope video broadcasts, Steve told me his life changed. He told me that I was the one who was very influential. I am not going to take all the credit but Steve told me when we met up on Hippie Road Trip #1 that I changed his life. Steve grew up in an area that was pretty much a meat-eating area. Let’s face it, in Oklahoma and Texas, most people eat meat. And Steve, through listening to my words. Steve is in his late 50’s and now has totally changed his life. Steve I am proud of you and I want to share your group. The Facebook group is called Outdoor Tripin.
Steve now realizes that life is all about getting outdoors. If you’re going to run or do something, do it outside. Reconnect with the Earth. Steve put up a daily (almost) inspirational quote. I want you to check it out. It’s free! Steve doesn’t charge anything for his motivation and advice. I am honored to be the one (or one of the ones) that has mentored Steve in his new lifestyle.
So, I did a Facebook Live stream a few weeks ago on today’s topic so if you saw the video thanks for joining me there. I want you to listen very closely. A short time ago, maybe about a year ago, I made 4 agreements with myself and no one else. I did not come up with these 4 agreements. I did not invent them. I read the book The 4 Agreements by Don Miguel Ruiz. In this book, he very succinctly explains that if you abide by these 4 agreements and do the best you can, it’s going to come back to you. If you do the best you can with them, your life will change for the better. I’m doing this! I am going to share some experiences with you as I describe to you these 4 agreements.
I do recommend you read the book if you can. The book expands on what I am going to make a 10 minute version of. It’s not a thick book but it’s a regular book. So I am going to try my best to condense Don’s words into 10 minutes or so.
Admittedly, when I read this about 2 years ago, I read it on audiobook. So as I was out there every day doing my “Magic 4” I was listening to the book as an audiobook on my iPhone. If you don’t have the time to sit down and read page after page, it helps to listen to it on audiobook. Let’s get into this! I really want you to try your best to incorporate these into your life.
Agreement #1: Be impeccable with your word
What does that mean? In the old days there was a saying that went “sticks and stones may break my bones but words can never hurt me.” You know something? That’s really not true. Words can really hurt people. When Don Miguel Ruiz says to be impeccable with your word, it means that before you say something just think. Think about what you’re saying. Is it true? Can it possibly hurt somebody? Is it gossip? Is it ill-intended?
Since I’ve read this book, I’ve tried so hard to not say bad things about anybody. I’m full of love and I try my best but let’s face it there are some people who are just whack jobs out there. [Dave laughs] Let’s face the facts. But I am really sticking to the 4 agreements and I try not to say anything bad.
I’ll give you an example. About 1-2 weeks ago somebody got ahold of me on Facebook. And he was trying to bring up somebody’s name and trying to trash the person. And I said to my friend, “hey I am not going there. I choose not to say anything bad about this person.” Then I said, “have you read the 4 agreements?” He hadn’t so I told him that I highly recommend it.
Let’s just be really careful. Those of us that gossip and say bad things, what good does it do? Trust me I have done it both ways. Of course we are all grown ups and if there’s somebody you don’t like you may say something bad. I don’t do that anymore. And I haven’t done it in some time. It really really does make a tremendous difference.
Be impeccable with your word. Speak with integrity. Say what you mean.
“Avoid using the word to speak against yourself or to gossip about others. Use the power of your word in the direction of truth and love.”
– Don Miguel Ruiz
Agreement #2: Don’t take anything personally
I was a big violator of this agreement for a long time. There are a million examples of things that happen in life. I always used to take things personally. What did I do wrong? Why did they do that to me? But you know something? You never know the circumstances. You might think you know. But you don’t know the circumstances and it doesn’t do any good to take something personally. So just forget about it. Don’t worry!
Don’t take it personally! Nothing others do is because of you. Chances are that someone is not even thinking of you. It’s not all about you. What others say and do is a projection of their reality. When you are immune to the opinions and actions of others, you won’t be the victim of needless suffering. Don’t take anything personally. Let it just fly away.
Agreement #3: Don’t make assumptions
Here’s another one that I know I have been super guilty of this. Super guilty! You always assume, oh this person didn’t do x because of… and that’s the reason. I’ve found that 90% of the time, I was wrong in my assumptions. It’s not good to make assumptions. It’s unhealthy to make assumptions. Trust me. Since I listened to the audio book I stopped making assumptions. I’m telling you it really is true.
Try this. If you’re assuming things, go back and take a look at the things you have assumed. Over the past few months or year the assumptions that you made were wrong.
I had somebody recently assume something about me. And she stopped talking to me. I noticed on Facebook and through other little hints that she just was pissed at me. And I am thinking to myself , “wow it’s a friend. What did I do?” So I got ahold of her and we started talking it out and she made these assumptions that were totally wrong. And I recommended the book to her, so I said “hey have you read the book The 4 Agreements?” And she said “I have not heard of it.” And I said, “I’ve learned over the years that when you assume and when I assume, it’s almost always wrong. Don’t assume.” It’s not good. Find the courage to ask questions and to express what you really want.
Communicate with others as clearly as you can to avoid misunderstandings. With just this one agreement you can completely transform your life. It’s true. It really is!
What’s the last agreement? Well that’s funny. I started the show off with this. When I first started talking about the 4 agreements, I said this is a little hint.
Agreement #4: Always do your best
No matter how good you are at something or if you’re really healthy whatever. All you can be asked to do is to do your best. Nobody’s perfect. I am far from perfect. We all try things. Sometimes we fail. Sometimes we just give up. A lot of times we give up way too quickly.
Over the years I’ve found that I thought I had a good idea, I started something and if it didn’t hit right away, I just gave up. Which is the stupidest thing ever by the way because sometimes success takes a long time. It does not happen overnight. You look at these overnight sensations on the internet and people that put out videos and they go viral and have millions and millions of views. But that is such a small tiny fraction of the minority. Most people, like me included, have to work hard at what they do and nothing is ever an overnight success.
For example, I have been doing The David Madow Lifestyle Show for 3 years now. And it’s not an overnight success. I’ve got a lot of great listeners and subscribers like you. And by the way if you find this helpful, share it with someone else. I’ve grown quite a bit but I really want to grow it more. I want to change the entire world even if it’s one person at a time. Even if it’s one person in the world. As I told you before, I don’t get paid for this podcast. All of my equipment I pay for, my time thinking about an episode and what I am going to talk about. It’s all time and money and I don’t get paid.
The way I do get paid is not really in cash. The way I get paid is when somebody like Steve Moore comes up to me and says “hey Dave you’ve changed my life!” That’s all I need people. That’s what I like to hear and I want to change lives. So the more people we can share this with, I appreciate it. I want the word to get out to more people.
But anyway this last agreement is just to do your best. Nobody is asking you to be perfect. You’re not going to be perfect. You’re not going to be the best in the world at something. Or probably not. But just do your best! Do the best you can. Your best is going to change from moment to moment. It will be different when you’re healthy as opposed to when you’re sick. Under any circumstance simply do your best and you will avoid self judgement, self abuse, and regret.
How do you like that? The 4 agreements that are so powerful and so life changing. I want you to start with those today. And when I say today I mean today. So think before you say something. Don’t talk about anybody else. Don’t gossip. Don’t say anything bad. Being impeccable with you word means that your words are really powerful and they will affect others. So speak the truth my friend.
The other 3 agreements I don’t need to repeat them because you can just rewind. I guess we don’t really rewind these days do we? [Dave laughs] In the old days when we had cassette tapes. Some of you might be too young to remember this but in the old days before we had online streaming videos we had to go to the video store if we wanted to watch a movie. So we went and rented one of these large bulky tapes. And when you brought them back to the shop if you didn’t rewind, many shops would charge a $2 rewind fee. There would be a sticker on the VHS that said “be kind, rewind.”
So I want you to be kind and I want you to rewind this and I want you to listen to it. How about if we make this a goal? Let’s do this! I look at the stats to see how many people are listening to each episode. Let’s do this! If you like this episode, which I hope you did, I’d like you to share this with 2 like minded people. 2 people that you’re close with. Maybe a family member. Maybe a spouse or significant other. Maybe a cousin or an associate at work. Someone that you are like minded with and you feel that they could really benefit from learning these 4 agreements. I’d like you to share this. Send them the link. Share with them how to listen to my podcast. I would appreciate it!
And you know what I am going to be doing? I am going to be looking at the statistics. I won’t be able to tell if you actually shared but I do get statistics on how many people download, what countries they’re from. But don’t worry, I don’t get names. But I’ll be able to tell if there is a spike in the downloads. And I’ll be happy because I am seeing that more people are getting it. More people want to live a better life, to help others, to help yourself, to help the planet, to help animals, and just to help everything and everybody. Isn’t that good enough? That’s the way I try to live my life. Is my life perfect? No! Not at all! I go through tough times like any of you. I go through difficult times. Trust me. Trust me I do. But I always know there’s going to be sunlight at the end of that tunnel for sure.
Thanks for being with me. If you’ve been with me for quite some time, thank for being with me today again. If you’re brand new to me, I really appreciate it. I love you! I appreciate you! And guess what? I’ll see you next week. I’m Dr. D the “V”. Have a great one!
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“Thank you very much for listening! The show is literally downloaded by the thousands each week now. In fact, we have passed the 350,000+ downloads mark! Wow! I so appreciate you listening and sharing this show with your family and friends. I love to help people live a healthier life! It is so great that we have listeners from all over the world from the United States to the UK to Canada to Europe to Japan to Australia. I love hearing from people all over the world on Facebook, Twitter, Email, and our phone hotline too!” – Dr. Dave.
Did you enjoy today’s show? Do you have any questions for me? Do you have any comments or feedback? You are not alone! We want to help you live better, stronger, happier, thinner lives!
https://davidmadow.com/wp-content/uploads/2016/12/DMM-Show-itunes-3000x3000.jpg30003000David M. Madowhttps://www.davidmadow.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/07/Dare-to-Change.jpgDavid M. Madow2017-02-13 03:00:422017-02-15 16:43:24175 - Four Agreements
