Taking a ‘First Principles’ Approach to Good Nutrition with Colin Stuckert

 

Doug Lotz  00:00

Hey everyone! This is Doug Lotz, active lifestyle enthusiastic armchair futurist and founder of CardioCast an audio guided fitness app where we help people get fit and stay fit by making studio quality fitness classes more accessible and affordable than ever, in delivering the best music and coaching possible. Anytime, anywhere. You’re listening to the CardioCast CoolDown Podcast, where we explore topics, the intersection of health, fitness and personal wellness, you’re ready? Let’s go.  Welcome to the CardioCast CoolDown podcast where we explore topics of the intersection between health, fitness and personal wellness. I am your host, Doug Lotz and today we’re excited to have with us, Colin Stuckert. Colin is an entrepreneur, podcaster, and educator, focused on building better humans through first principles thinking and exposing status quo. He is the founder of Wild Foods and host of The Better Human Podcast. Thank you so much for joining us. It’s great to have you here.

 

Colin Stuckert  00:30

Yeah, thanks. I’m gonna write down exactly what you said from my intro, because that’s, that’s how I need to say it. I never say that succinctly. So thank you for that.

 

Doug Lotz  00:39

Yeah, no problem. Cool. Yeah. Well, I always love to steal a page out of Simon Synnex book and start with why Oh, yeah. Which, which kind of inevitably leads to kind of the, the, what and the how? So So, you know, what are you? or Why do you do what you do? And you know, maybe what inspired you to do what you’re doing now?

 

Colin Stuckert  01:00

Yeah, that’s, that’s a good question. I actually recommend that book a lot. In that talk, the TED Talk he did about Apple to everybody, or anybody that’s an entrepreneurship, you know. I mean, it goes way back, it’s kind of just like, it’s, if I could summarize it, it’s get into health into fitness, always kind of had a growth mindset, just accidentally through upbringing in through, you know, family life, whatever, some very fortunate for that. So I always want to get better, I got into personal development, and, you know, read all the all the self help books, and then podcasting, like blew my mind. Like, when I got into entrepreneurship, podcasting was like the thing that let me self educate, right, because I never did really well in traditional school. And I had to make that connection between like self learning, taking action, and then getting results in the real world. And when you can really connect that in real life, it’s actually amazing what you can do. So, you know, got into health and fitness, work some odd jobs here and there went to community college, cuz I don’t know what else to do, that didn’t really work out, and then found poker play professionally poker for a bit. And then I was like, this is actually a hard way to make a living, and then eventually found entrepreneurship, and basically took my entire bankroll and someone who didn’t have started a small Juice Bar inside an LA Fitness. And then that kind of gave me room to pursue more of health, fitness, entrepreneurship. And then I got into CrossFit in about 2000 acts that I remember the years 15 years ago. And then that kind of took me into a rabbit hole of CrossFit, and health and nutrition, and then pursuing my own goals that way. And then I’m interested across the gym, I did that for a while, eventually decided I want to do something bigger, I wanted to kind of reach more people, and eventually sold that to my partner, the gym still there today, actually, which I’m proud of, you know, 10 years, still still exists, right? And just kept pulling on threads, like what can I do to help you? What can I do to help people and then usually what I’m good at, with helping people something that I’m doing myself, right, so it’s always like, first pursue my interest and my passions and kind of self Master, and then share that with the world. So really, it’s just, I’m doing things, I’m experimenting, I’m growing, I’m thinking, and then I like to share that with with other people. And I, you know, I think that, that kind of thought process, and the things I learned along the way can be useful to others. And so that really summarizes everything, I do things for myself, and what I believe in my principles, and then I share that with others.

 

Doug Lotz  03:15

Interesting. Yeah. So as a framework for entrepreneurship, that’s an interesting one, where you kind of, you know, just almost taking a look at yourself what you’re doing right, and then figure out, you know, what you’re doing to help yourself maybe how that can be sort of expanded upon? That’s cool. That’s a cool way to look at it. Yeah, I mean, the whole story is pretty interesting. And I’m particularly I mean, the poker player thing, obviously, kind of like stands out a little bit when you’re like, going through, you know, just was, you know, a special board player. Okay. So I’m just curious, because it’s kind of an interesting tidbit. I’m curious about how that plays into your decision making, you know, whether there’s risk taking and that sort of thing. You know, that’s maybe a little different than the average mindset and how that plays into your, your, you know, your business life these days.

 

Colin Stuckert  04:07

Yeah, I mean, I think it was probably the best school for entrepreneurship you could have ever created is throw somebody into the poker world, you have to manage your own money, you have no manager, you have to manage your time, you have to manage your mental state. And I mean, everything that you need as an entrepreneur, money, risk, time management, self management, yeah, like not getting pulled into the muck when you’re in a losing streak, not getting pulled into the muck when problems arise in your business, like fighting through that building mental resilience, every single thing that you need for poker to be even even a little bit successful. You need for entrepreneurship, as well. I’ve always been the type that like if I have a problem, I want to solve it right? I have that entrepreneur kind of just problem solution, problem solution. Okay. So in poker when I was losing, and I knew I need to make sure I would quit when you’re it’s all about quitting at the right time and playing when you’re feeling good, not playing when you’re not good, right. And there’s a lot of Psychology around that there’s a lot of energy, you have to manage around that you always have to manage your money. So there’s a lot of these different things that I would run into the same walls that other poker players would run into. And there’s books written about it, there’s podcasts, there’s videos, and I was like, What do I need, I need to do something because I’m not quitting when I should, I’m chasing losses, my mindset is going into a dark place, right. And somehow, I don’t know what it was. But it was actually I believe it was a podcast, Tommy Angelo, who’s a writer and a poker dude. And he was big into Buddhism. And he kind of shared his journey about how he used Buddhism, to control his mental mental state to play poker. And that was like, just a huge for me, like I got super into it, mindfulness meditation. And that was just like, the next rung up the self development personal development ladder. And then eventually, I found stoicism. And then I got into the things like ownership. And you know, what you can’t control is yourself and nothing else. And you know, that was a whole nother world that I was introduced to that also helped me with entrepreneurship. But what I’ve learned about through all this is what you need to be good at entrepreneurship, or playing poker, professionally, or managing your money is all applicable to life. It’s the same stuff, it’s the same thing. Like if you if you have a relationship, and you’re dealing with stuff, it’s very stressful, like, you get audited by the IRS, that’s the thing you get sued, like, the same stuff that happens in entrepreneurship is how can happen in your personal life and the way you deal with them. And the way you kind of get better at playing these games. It’s all the same stuff, you know, so it was just the best education really, for entrepreneurship.

 

Doug Lotz  06:29

Yeah, I mean, you mentioned Buddhism, Buddhism, stoicism, you know, those are large topics. To jump into topics, I don’t know if you have any recommendations for folks on like snow, sort of dip your toe in the waterways to, or books or outlets to apply, you know, ways to apply that stuff to their entrepreneurial or everyday lives. Sounds like you read a few things that were helpful.

 

Colin Stuckert  06:52

Yeah, I would just say the one book recommendation is the art of living by Sharon liability, believe it’s an interpretation of the art of living by Epictetus, but it’s kind of modernized with modern speak. For me, I always, like simple language. So that book, I’ve gifted more, and read, and I’ve read it multiple times I try to read every year, that’s a really big one. You know, Ryan, Ryan, holiday stuff is pretty good, like obstacles away and things like that. But just pulling the threads like Google it, watching YouTube videos, and just keep clicking, and clicking and read and clicking reading. Same thing with mindfulness or meditation, you’ll find kind of the, the most popular content is usually the simplest and most succinct, that’s why it’s popular. And then if you want to go deeper into that, go deeper into that. But these things take time, you’re not gonna wake up tomorrow and be like, mindful of you. And you’re not gonna be like an expert at metta meditation, or whatever. And you just have to kind of start one step at a time, have a growth mindset, and just realize, like, Okay, this is a journey, I make mistakes, that’s fine, I get better, I get better, I make mistakes, I get better. And I think we have too much of kind of a shame and guilt narrative in our culture where people believe they have to be perfect, or look perfect or whatever. It’s kind of social media, manicured, you know, the manicured image that we all see most of you have no idea what goes on behind closed doors, people need to be more compassionate with themselves, this kind of stuff, like it is so much a journey, and you’re gonna have all the money and power in the world, and you’re still dealing with your own personal stuff, or your mental state or whatever, right? So we’re all on these paths. We’re all on this journey. And just having some compassion towards yourself, and realizing that every mistake you make is a is a opportunity for growth, right? every mistake should be a learning mechanism to help you take better actions in the future. Instead, when people do say, I made a mistake, I’m not perfect. And I’m going to dwell on that I’m going to be a victim. And I’m going to literally hold myself back instead of moving forward. Yeah, so you know, yeah.

 

Doug Lotz  08:36

I mean, you mentioned you know, it’s, it’s hard to say like, you know, oh, when the quit on something, you know, especially as an entrepreneur, you’re like, nope, do or die, I’m gonna make this work, like whatever I got to do. I don’t know, it’s, it’s tough. There’s a, there’s probably a fine line between quitting and then taking what you’re actually working on, and maybe sort of changing it in some way to improve it. But yeah, but that’s always a challenge, I think is kind of knowing, knowing when to maybe give up on something that is not working, or maybe subtly change it. And I’m not saying anybody’s necessarily figured that out, for sure. Because it matters, you know, what situation you’re in and whatnot, but, but, um, you know, going back to sort of, well, I’m actually curious about wild foods. I know you’re, you know, it’s I think you jumped into the space around what 2015 was it? Yes, I’m sorry. 2015. So to me, I mean, that’s like, Okay, I’m thinking back to that time. And I’m just thinking that, that seems I mean, there’s a lot of supplement companies, you know, where they’re probably starting up. So the dashboard is key at the time jumping into that space, or what was your approach to it to make you sort of, you know, feel like, Oh, I got something here and, you know, how did you you manage, right, and sort of measure yourself as you got into that very competitive industry?

 

Colin Stuckert  09:53

Yeah, yeah, very easily. So, most people look at entrepreneurship, or successful business and they’re like, wow, they had this amazing plan and they probably mapped it all out and they had this robust business plan. I did not I literally scratch my own itch as we talked about. My problem is something I’m sure at the time was okay, I’m getting heavily into CrossFit. I’m getting to bulletproof coffee, keto, all these different things like I’m pursuing all these different rabbit holes of this kind of new on like Internet fueled nutrition movement, right. And it was really exciting. And then I started doing I started applying these things in my own life, right fasting in the morning, doing a butter coffee, instead not eating breakfast, you know, like sourcing my, my beans and my foods as close to the farm level in nature as possible. So I became very, very obsessed with the quality of mind greens and the labels and what was going into products. And this includes food, and supplements, but someone’s Bernard Toria, even to this day, for really having no idea how it’s made, where it comes from, what the sources, it’s just like the supplements on the panel, these are the ingredients, maybe there’s a country of origin, a lot of times there isn’t. And a lot of times like the cheapest ones come from China, right? You’ve no idea what happens from China, and from that raw material, even at the farm level, to processing the shipping to stores to this to that. So I was like, you know, I’m using a lot of whey protein, right? I’m putting that my my butter coffee I’m doing for my post workout. Okay, so why do I try to source that myself. That was literally what I did. I was like, I want to find a cold process, non denatured Grass Fed Whey protein, and I want to buy it in bulk, so that I can at least save on my serving per scoop, right, I’m gonna buy in bulk, and I’m probably save some money. So I found a farm that cows were in Australia, happy, healthy cows, they use a proprietary cold process technique where they have to pasteurize at a certain temperature like a minimum, but then they immediately air cooled. So you get a lot of the immune boosting properties of raw milk in there. And I was like, okay, cool, send me some samples, this is pricing, whatever, and I started using it loved it, it actually smelled kind of milky, whereas most whey protein, there’s really no sense whatsoever, which shows you how deodorize and process it really is. And I was like, Man, this is a really great product. So I started using it, I would get these huge 40 pound bakery bags of grass or a protein that you open up and like waves going everywhere. And they would deliver these to the front of my apartment, Austin, Texas. And I was like, you know, why don’t I put this in a package and try to sell on Amazon? Because I was kind of like Internet Marketing at the time. Listen to Pat Flynn, smart, passive income, like, like, you know, Amazon’s kind of a thing right now. And I was like, Okay, cool. So I figured out a great little thing. definitely easier than the now. I mean, there’s a lot more restrictions selling on Amazon right now. There’s still opportunity, of course, but I was definitely like, I was late in the sense of the real Amazon Gold Rush. But I’m definitely early compared to today. So like, you know, it’s hard, I just have to take action, you know. So I listed on Amazon, and I set a price, I look at some other things I like I take some copy from other listings, and I do all that, all that kind of stuff. And I just take action, I build a listing, maybe an hour to two hours of work, I do very simple picture mock up of the bag of a label that I design everything. And I listed and literally that first month, 30 days later, without even really paying attention to my Amazon account, I sold $500 worth of product. And I was like okay, whoa, you know, what happens if I like make some tweaks here? Well, I sell 1000 next month, or like, you know, and then the next month I sold 1000. And then the next month I sold like it was like literally doubling every month for eight months. That first year. Yeah was 12 months or 12 months, I decided to launch a few other products on the same method. I probably had 10 to 15 skews local coffee, tea, and I created the brand well, foods around this one product. It started with that one product right? Within that first year, we had done half a million dollars in sales on Amazon. And then I was like, okay, that’s crazy. And most of my I’ve ever seen my life, it’s actually just like I do this. And I just kept going with it. And then by year three, we had, you know, or the next year, we had reached a million dollar mark. And then we kept growing and there was no plan. There was no business plan. There was no financials there was literally a listing from a product that I was sourcing for my own personal use that I thought other people might be interested in. And then the market said yes, we’d like this. And then so I doubled down and I reinvested in I reinvested and then I grew it into a business completely on accident by pursuing something that I was interested in. So I was solving a problem for myself, which is there’s no transparency in supplements, right? And my way to solve that is literally just find a whey protein like that’s the core thing I’m doing and I sourced it and it was quality and then I provide that quality to the marketplace.

 

Doug Lotz  14:10

Sounds like a very sort of the famously Elan musk game concept of first principles they’re going back to you know your way your your farm and everything so yeah, actually that’s that’s probably it’s a little bit of a different topic for Jupiter what we normally talk about on this podcast but i you know i think it’s it’s helpful for everyone to kind of understand what first principles what a first principles approach looks like. So you know if you could maybe if you could have done it before and can put it in a nutshell for people that would be helpful I think.

 

Colin Stuckert  14:41

Yeah, I’m a huge fan of first principles thinking I kind of self identify as a first principles thinker more now especially musk made a popular James clear has written about it a lot, and it’s become more of a thing. first principles are basically like the things you know for sure, right or for that are true like math is a first principle physics are first principles. And when you take those as the foundation, and you say, what can I build up from here rather than reasoning as much as from analogy, whereas most people reason from analogy, they say, Oh, well, this is the way it’s done, or this is what the sub industry is, or this is what the rocket industry is you have to buy 70 millionare ICBM, and that said, it must have like 20 million. And he just got to do that. So he had to literally reverse engineer from an atom by atom basis, right? And if most people don’t know the story, but this is very illustrative of this concept, he said, Well, what if I took an atom by atom basis? What would the cost be to build a rocket and then fill it with rocket fuel? Right. And what he found was, it was like a fraction of what the industry rate was going for, because you obviously had suppliers where they would source 1000s of parts, they would all build in a profit margin, right? And you were operating in this aerospace industry that does things a certain way. And he’s like, what if we just 3d manufacture the parts in house, and he’s like, wow, that was the big breakthrough. And he, and then the last launch, famously, the last launch was successful, they got a $3 billion contract for NASA, rest is history, etc. But it took him shopping around talking to aerospace people, talking people, government, and all them all telling him he’s crazy. This is how it’s done. There’s no way around it, blah, blah, blah. But that’s what that’s what every incumbent says about every new technology in the history of civilization.

 

Doug Lotz  16:19

I’m laughing because I had worked in as an aerospace supplier. So I know like the layers upon layers upon layers. Got to make a profit. Right? goes all the way up. So yeah, cool, thank you for that just sort of wanted to bring that topic in. So people could kind of maybe get interested in and go off on their own. But to bring it back to sort of health and wellness a little bit more. I want to talk about diets. And when I say diets, I don’t mean weight loss techniques, but like full time strategies for what food you put in your body. So So first, I want to check I believe you either were or are but are you practicing a carnivore diet at this point.

 

Colin Stuckert  17:04

I wouldn’t call it a carnivore because of any defined carnivore. Most people think of like just animals only. Yeah, but in my mind, carnivore, ancestral senses, even the hunter gatherers, or ancestors that would have eaten mostly meat, like it, let’s say the Plains Indians that could have hunted Buffalo and basically eaten meat every single day. Even for those sub sects of hunter gatherers, they would have still eating plants, and there would have been spices and fruits and honey and like, you know.

 

Doug Lotz  17:30

I was gonna challenge you, if you didn’t say, you’re gonna eat all meat, you don’t always eat only. Exactly

 

Colin Stuckert  17:37

Right. And so there’s probably very few humans throughout history that have had the opportunity to eat only meat, right. But in a modern society with supply chains, we can actually do that. Now, this is where it gets very nuanced. Because if you have autoimmune issues, for example, like if you’re Michaela Peterson, which is Jordan Peterson’s daughter, that I interviewed on the podcast, she did an experiment where she was carnivore, and then she decided, oh, I’m doing good, whatever all my symptoms, like major health problems, like, I don’t remember all the things but it was really, really bad for her to the point of she, she had debilitating disease. She was doing carnivore, her senses, were going away, her medications were going away. And then she’s like, I’m gonna have a little thing of all. So she had this little thing of all of organic oils in olive oil. She ate that her symptoms flared up for 30 days afterwards. So for someone like her, she has to treat her food as literal medicine and or literal poison that has an immediate effect on her biology. So yeah, she shouldn’t do strict carnivore because look, what happens is she just has a few olives, right? She’s hypersensitive from to the certain foods for various reasons. Okay. Now, that doesn’t mean carnivore is great for everyone or for everyone. Where I’ve come with this after doing strict carnivore myself and kind of coming from a paleo ish background. ancestrally focused way of eating is, I love food. I’m a foodie, right, I really, really love steak. But I don’t really want to eat it every single day. I love. I really love all foods, right. And so for me if I don’t have a specific goal in mind, and I just want health and longevity, and my way of eating is a animal focused way of eating with. If I make it at home, I can eat it. So I might even do like einkorn sourdough bread that we make at home or something like that. And I’ve kind of opened up a little bit more from my paleo days where I was a lot, a lot more strict and a lot more dogmatic about grains and things like that. Now, that being said, though, this is where the first principles comes in, because it doesn’t matter what diet you’re doing. If you’re eating out of packages, and restaurants, you’re failing. And that’s kind of my perspective on this because the first principle is, if you can’t control the foods, and ingredients and the cooking methods that go into your food prep, and you outsource that to a company, a bigger or, or like restaurants, which are built for speed, you’re not controlling all those variables. And that’s why they use cheap, refined, processed ingredients that you seed oils that you use all these other things that are common in those industries, as well as heavy machinery to to make things and transport and they’re doing at a scale that is generally just not conducive. human health, right. But when you source ingredients, and you bring it in your house, and you control the oil, the cooking method, the salt, this that whatever. That is a first principle for me. So I really think the simplest way to explain nutrition if you’re going to the masses, right not to specific niches with specific goals, right? Just the masses, the very general approach to nutrition is very simple. If you make it from scratch at home, you can eat it, that like it’s just source ingredients, prep it at home, you make it if you want to make bread or ice cream, or whatever, and you make it from scratch. The reality is you almost could have a food that as long as you’re not hypersensitive to it could actually be nutritious to your biology. Right? Like, and this is where it’s just so hard to understand. Because for most people, because they want like a simple black and white, I can’t eat this, I can’t eat that. And then they also want to feel like they can eat other packages and restaurants and you know, like convenient food that is in our modern environment. They want to do that because it’s easier. And it doesn’t require cooking know how and prep and whatever. Right? So unfortunately, if you outsource the prep of your food and ingredients, you’re going to be paying health costs. There’s just no way around it.

 

Doug Lotz  21:02

yeah, I guess it has to do with sort of the mass production that goes into it, right? I mean, yeah, I asked, you know, what are your thoughts? Just Where do you think it’s going wrong? Like, where is it that you know, hey, we’re growing food from the ground, we’re growing, you know, then it goes, you know, through these invisible boxes, and then all of a sudden, boom, it’s on your plate at a restaurant and like, Okay, well, this has all this checks all the boxes that my dietician said I need to like, you know, check off but like, seems like something’s wrong in there somewhere, right? I mean, obviously going out and eating fast food or something like you know, it’s it’s going to be like mega process to begin with. But even if you’re going out, and just eating something where it’s maybe grocery store quality, like or like mass produce quality. I just, I don’t know what it is. It’s to me, it’s a bit of a head scratcher. Because I don’t really know where the you know what all these things are getting put in. But I don’t know if you can shed any more light on what happens that may get Okay, the things that you buy at home, or that you can make it from scratch good and things you eat at a restaurant bad.

 

Colin Stuckert  21:58

Yeah, there’s there’s a lot of variables here, like you said, and I mean, you can go into every single food group like chicken, eggs, beef, like you can go to each one of those and you can look at, okay, what’s the best version of this on this on the foreign like, locally raised grass fed beef, where a farmer literally is named his cows and treats them like gods, right? Like, that’s the best stuff like that. No portlandia. And then on the far end, you have like mass produce feedlot, where they spend a lot in the feedlot, and they they’re treated poorly, and they’re shipped around, they’re all stressed to stress hormones, they’re low, the antibiotics, whatever. And you have everything in between like, and you can find a lot of products at the grocery store, like I get these local hcb steaks here in Texas. And they’re not the grass fed, but they’re not organic, or fully grass finished, whatever. So they’re definitely some grains. But they’re tasty. They’re local, they don’t have a super long supply chain. So it’s likely it was slaughtered nearby, it’s likely wasn’t having having to ship across the the cow itself alive being shipped or the carcass being shipped. So every single time you increase time and distance into a food product, I mean, think about it, how many foods do we throw away that are just sitting on our fridge, not even moving or doing anything, and they just go bad. Now imagine having complex logistics added to that, right. So that’s one thing. As food gets further from its source, nutrients are depleted. heat, light temperature, all these things keep it’s if they’re managed properly, you’re trying to keep the nutrient nutrition and that food at a stable and as close to what you got from as possible. But over time, and over distance, right. And over different variables, those nutrients deplete. So that’s one thing. The other thing is the bigger production of a food stuff, whether it’s beef, whether it’s plants, whether it’s grains, whatever the bigger it is, the more likely that there’s all these other inputs, these chemical inputs, these soil inputs, these things that they have to do, just to get it like to be able to be even produced at that scale. They’re not even trying to make it nutritious. They’re not even trying to make a quality or whatever. They’re just trying to get like, massive, massive amount of this thing into a package onto as many shelves around the country as possible. Like I said, there’s so many variables of that, because each one has their own thing, right? Where the chicken, beef, whatever, but just assume that the further something is right. This is why the local is always usually better. Because it’s fresher, it’s cleaner, it’s less adultery, it’s less having to have spray dried with chemicals, or stored or whatever, right? The closer it is to the better, the less, the smaller It is usually the better because small producers can have more care. And they can do things slowly. And they can even do things by hand rather than huge machines and whatever. And every time you use a big mechanized process or a big chemical process, there’s other things that have to go into it. And we literally have so little transparency into what I mean, we have no transparency, I have no idea what happens behind closed doors, none of us do we just see it in a package with a little bit of labeling on it. And if you actually dive into the labeling stuff, and how like how many scams there actually are, there’s like a ton of food fraud and there’s all the stuff that goes on. It’s pretty scary. And that’s why again, if you take the first principle that Okay, I’m gonna source from producers that I trust small, smaller, there’s better, high quality ingredients, you know, and then prep that at home. I just cut out like 99% of this stuff. You know, and then I even sourced directly from farms where I have all my meat and seafood shipped to me. So it’s just very simple. You know,

 

Doug Lotz  25:06

that’s cool. Is there any tips or tricks you can recommend for folks looking to do that sort of thing is that like, just a bunch of googling,

 

Colin Stuckert  25:15

Googling and find people you trust that have high quality standard, like for me, I have super high quality standards. So like I saw some crowd, cow otter spring Ranch is a farm that super, it’s regenerative, it’s organic, they’re a small family, I’ve interviewed them as well, their their stuff is really good. And you know, there’s just a lot of really good farms actually, that are doing it. And you just have to kind of shop around, try the product to like, try it and see how you feel, make sure everything’s good flavor, and all these different things matter. And, you know, as long as you’re feeling good about it, and the price point fits in your budget, and then keep supporting those suppliers, because like, you’re going to be supporting smaller producers, and they can keep investing back into their, their farm and the animals and you know, whatever they’re doing, right, it’s just better to support smaller producers, I think I think just as a first principle, the bigger the more consolidated, and the more scale you try to achieve with something that that involves nature, right, or just even humans and society, you get all these fragilities and problems occur as a result of that, right? So get back to basic get back to cooking at home, get back to like growing some vegetables in the backyard, maybe having a few chickens like things like that, right? That’s the truth. It’s literally the opposite of where we’ve gone in the past 50 years with this hyper industrialized movement of processed food and this and that, and then you get in pharmaceuticals and healthcare like, you know, you’re just a mess.

 

Doug Lotz  26:30

Yeah, no at all. I mean, it all ties together, I’m just thinking about the just the, the more times that something changes, or more hands are on it, the more like, I’m just thinking about any industry, going back to the aerospace thing, I’m just thinking about bugs in code, and like layers upon layers of people, like you know, touching something, the more you do there, the more complex it gets, the less sort of close to the original. Yeah, it’s, it’s interesting. I’ve never drawn that parallel between aerospace and in clean food. It’s definitely there. Yeah. So I, you know, supplements are obviously part of, you know, the wild foods business. And I’m just thinking, you know, okay, you know, farm to table and like locally sourced food, you’re going to get a lot of your nutrition, or you should at least from that food. But when it comes to supplementation, what’s your Where’s your head out on that in terms of, you know, how do you choosing a supplement stack, what’s maybe your supplements stack, you know, top supplements that people might be, should be aware of? Maybe they’re not getting, you know, where’s your take on that, as it relates to diet and nutrition?

 

Colin Stuckert  27:35

Yeah, there’s a few of the top things that probably most people should be taking mostly because of our, our environment, and the the poor soil and just, you know, the toxins and all these different things, I keep it very simple with my top recommendations. Before I even get to those, I will say that if you’re not currently eating most meals at home, if you’re not if you’re not paying attention to if you’re eating a standard American diet, don’t even look at some don’t look at supplements, right? Don’t Don’t even spend the mental energy of the money just get get food and get get at home get eating right, or at least get eating better quality or like Do whatever you need to do to get closer to that real food, whole food spectrum. Okay, so that’s, that’s what I’ll say about that. Now, if you are there, and you’re looking to optimize and and or you’re looking to really pursue some goals, then I would say probably the top few that I would put for almost everyone is some kind of omega three so like Cod, liver oil, fish oil, etc. Like that. And that’s the whole topic itself. There’s a lot of junk on the market, there’s good stuff, there’s average stuff, there’s really great stuff so it does require some research and then magnesium is definitely a huge one because I’ve noticed that even if you’re eating a very clean and especially appropriate diet, it’s just something that is depleted because our environment and the soil and all these different things and so magnesium is something that it seems like almost everybody’s deficient. So I take I take as many magnesium as I can I have one that’s like five different magnesium then I have a couple like a citrate and a couple other ones that I that I balanced because they all have different.

 

Doug Lotz  29:07

Yeah, and that can really help with sleep and anxiety. You know?

 

Colin Stuckert  29:09

Yeah, take them at night generally. Yeah. And then getting outside 30 minutes a day is a supplement right minimum with no sunglasses. And for those of people that can’t do that, or don’t do that taking like a d3 Katie or something like that would be good. It just has kind of a way to make sure your levels are a little bit higher, right because again, it’s it’s crazy, but the most the most profound thing in our environment before we started living in homes, was the sun right? It feels everything. It feels all life on planet earth yet we literally cower inside afraid and try to put chemicals all over face because we’re afraid of it. It’s literal insanity. So that’s why like we get to help stuff a daily 30 minute walk outside with ideally maybe not a shirt off shirt on or like bathing suit or whatever, like sun exposure eyes and skin and a 30 minutes of moving can be like a game changer. For people, and if you have any mood issues whatsoever, or you start with depression or anything like that, and you’re not getting out in the sun and moving, oh my gosh, like talk about what an easy fix right to at least mitigate those symptoms a lot. And so those are really the big ones I would say. And then you can get into others that are more specific. Yeah, I just have to keep it simple, eat a lot of real food. And then maybe you consider like a mineral panel or getting some blood work done and things like that, you can kind of see where you have some deficiencies, maybe. And then you can optimize for those a little bit. But I always prefer optimizing for food. So eat more sardines or eat more oysters, or like more salmon, like things like that, and then use the supplements as really just an anchor to keep your healthy habit routine going. Right. I like to think of him as just like a way to keep your habits going.

 

Doug Lotz  30:50

And I agree that I feel like most people are probably almost even not at the point of optimization, they’re more at the point of corrective action.

 

Colin Stuckert  30:57

They just have to get the toxic the big environmental toxicities in their environment. like they’ve cut that out. And for most people, food is the number one thing. Yeah.

 

Doug Lotz  31:05

Yeah, yeah, can be tough. I mean, I know people are always on the go. And they’re like, trying to do things and the expectations are super eye for what everybody’s got to be doing. So, you know, it’s definitely hard. But, you know, I’ve found, while at least through the pandemic, and I’ve talked to a couple other guests about this, suddenly I cook. Now I’m like, well, it doesn’t have to be that complicated. No, it does not. Like you can literally just, you know, just cook some meat and veggies. Like, you actually find that you’re pretty happy. You know, it’s really doesn’t take long at all, it probably takes more time to get in your car and like go or figure out which takeout you’re gonna get that night or not actually. Yep. So, you know, it doesn’t have to take a lot of time. I think he’s the other point. So yeah, bringing things over to fitness to say, I guess, you know, being a former crossfitter or current crossfitter. I don’t know what’s your what’s your current workout plan look like?

 

Colin Stuckert  32:03

It’s more rackable twice a week, walking daily. That’s fun. Especially with the kids always going out walking, and then lifting, probably every day, at least a little bit. And then trying to do at least like two heavier days a week. You know, all the basic stuff. Squat deadlift, press, you know, pull ups, bring stuff, nothing complicated. I’m in it for longevity. And you like you when you’re active, and you’re eating clean. Like when you’re in the kitchen, you know, everything you do in the gym, or exercise wise, it’s just like a bonus, right? Because really, for most people, they just want to look fit, and you look fit by what you eat, or don’t eat, right. And then because like, everybody’s got ABS under under their belly right there. Like that’s what keeps your legs, your torso to move, right? You have ABS trust me, you have them hidden under layers of fat, right? So nutrition is the most important thing. Getting outside daily moving daily, and just making habit to move and walk in like park at the end of the parking lot. Take the stairs. Like every time I travel, people are waiting for the escalator in line. I’m thinking myself like, Oh my gosh, take the stairs, like a little mini workout like they’re free. No. So take the path of most resistance in your physical life. And, and then when it comes to cooking, take the path of least resistance. So use like batch cooking, you know, crock pot, slow oven, the oven is actually amazing. Most of you have no idea how amazing is you just put stuff in a pan and use enough salt and then it’ll cook and then when you see color that equals flavor. You take it out and it’s good, right? Like it’s.

 

Doug Lotz  33:30

Like, oh my god, I feel like preheated or something it’s gonna take I know, it’s like a lot less work, I guess involved than if you’re standing there over the stove. Like, you know, poking. Yeah, exactly. Yeah. Now I’m even I’m a fitness app guy. And I still will tell everybody like, yeah, nutrition and just food is gonna be or like, get food first. I mean, it’s gonna be Yeah, the exercise is definitely important for heart health, for mental health for a lot of reasons. But, you know, when it comes to just like weight management, and you know, that that’s definitely first stop was food. Yeah, so, I mean, we also I, like, you know, getting out of the kids, you know, playing sports, like that sort of thing. That’s, yeah, that’s gonna be you’re gonna get cardio in even just having a good time. I mean, I know that some people will say like, Okay, well, I got to be regimented about and get X number of hours and, you know, minutes or whatever. But you know, every little bit that you can get out and get doing something, especially if you’re having fun doing it. So, like, we just launched on cardio, you catch me lunch, walk and jog with your dog because we like we’re like, okay, you’re going out for a walk with your dog. Like, you’re outside. You got a nice little half hour window, you’re doing something so like, let’s do something fun there. And like try to engage people and get people moving in those times that maybe they wouldn’t have, you know, it’s like just a little bit more and you can really get a decent workout and so, things like that to just start optimize your time and have fun while doing it. I think it’s great. So, yes, I agree. So We have a few minutes left, I just wanted to ask about your your podcast better human. So do you have a crib notes version on how to be a better human? You can share with us in a minute or less.

 

Colin Stuckert  35:13

That’s actually quite you know that. So being a first principles thinker, I love lists of like, the core big ideas, you know, and the internet is actually like hyper niche people go and they want like a very specific thing, right, you know, brand like Joe Rogan, you can talk about whatever you want, right? So it’s like, I sometimes struggle with this from a content perspective. But I mean, the reality is, with every single thing we’ve talked about, whether it’s mindset, whether it’s nutrition, whether it’s fitness, even just happiness in life, like, there’s probably five to eight things like a very short list for each one. But that’s all you need to do. And those are the things that you already know, right? Yet you convinced yourself, you need to be like some expert, or go super deep into these things. And so then you don’t do it at all. But the reality is, it’s like that makes zero sense. This is weird mental gymnastics that people make play about this type of stuff. It’s like get outside, get moving, eat food at home as much as possible. Now, you’re not gonna be perfect, right? play with your kids, play sports, if that’s what you like to do. If you’d like to run, run, if you don’t, don’t if you want to swim, swim, etc. Like, figure out what works for you. And then be in the moment, you know, stop. Next thing, if you want to incorporate some meditation, great, I did it for a while back in the day, and I don’t really do it as much anymore. Other than if I find myself getting stressed, I’ll kind of like, I’ll do like a breath meditation or something like that. Or like in the shower, I’ll count to 60. In my head. I’ll be like a transcendental like 60, like one, one to two or something like that. It’s like, that is not some crazy thing that you have to do or some regimented, perfect thing. And people have this idea that they have to be perfect. Or they have to do it the way the experts do it or whatever, or there’s no benefit. And that’s the complete and utter fallacy. And that’s what’s so good about being first principles thinker, because it’s like, Is it better to do one minute of meditation? or zero minutes of meditation? Right? Okay, cool. Same thing with with, is it better to eat one extra meal at home? That I would have eaten that at? You know, restaurant or fast food? Right? Yes. Okay. So I can win by just continually reminding myself that this one decision, I have to do something or not do something, right. Is is? I mean, that’s all you have you all you have is the moment all you have is this decision right now. Not yesterday, not tomorrow, whatever. So stop obsessing over those get in the moment. And just every decision, you have just like, what’s the better decision here? What’s a better decision? And and what you will do over time is like maybe the first six months you won’t be great. So you have like a, you have like a 50%. Or I don’t know, maybe a 25%, where you ask yourself that question, you take the better action, but 20% is still better than no, no action, right? And then over six months, you have a 5050, where every time you ask yourself, okay, what’s the best food decision here? What’s the best fitness decision? What’s like, should I go to sleep now or not? Right? Every time you start, ask yourself those questions, you’ll get a 5050, then you’ll get to like a 6040. And then 7030. And then over time, you can get this place where I would say for me, it’s probably like 85% of time, I’m making the right decision. And that literally takes four takes care of like it’s the 8020 principle, it takes care of like 90% of my health, longevity, happiness, etc. You know, and so it’s not about perfection. It’s about getting as close to that 8020 as possible, and then just stay consistent with that around there. And like that, and for most people, that’s all they need. Right? Yeah. Great.

 

Doug Lotz  38:32

So how can listeners out there connect with you?

 

Colin Stuckert  38:36

They can find me on Twitter and Instagram. And the best way is probably on the newsletter, Better Human newsletter, I send that every weekend. And that has a lot of stuff and much content in there. That’s over colin.coach. And you know, if you want to reach me, send me a DM I don’t really answer email anymore. I mean, I still answer email. I’m trying to actually get rid of email. It’s like my new thing I’m trying to get rid of, you know.

 

Doug Lotz  38:54

Because I personally hate emails.

 

Colin Stuckert  38:57

Here’s a good teachable moment. The way to think about this, like, again, email is through analogy. If you’re in business, you have email, right? It’s kind of like, because other people have it. But I started thinking about like, okay, all the email I’ve ever received in my life. What value has brought me right? And then how much time is it taken me? And I’m telling you, the scale is so tipped in the wrong direction. And then what and then if I really analyze it and have the data, this is what I would suspect. So the people let’s say they reached out to me, the biggest risk of not having email is you will miss those opportunities. Well, guess what? They can DM me on Instagram or Twitter because I’m active there. So the people that really want to get a hold of me can get a hold of me, you can ask a friend that I see my sister who’s on Twitter, or like, we’re in the age of the internet, you can find someone if you really need to get ahold of them. So I feel like not having email actually then provides no value. Right? Because all it does is it’s a timestamp and I get it some businesses need it or whatever. But like the more we can get out of email and like use slack and Asana or the other things like that and have like one place I just think that I think eventually I’m not gonna have email so.

 

Doug Lotz  39:56

Yeah, cool. My thoughts on that. Good luck in the quest Closer if I join you at some point, yeah. All right. Great. Well, thank you so much for joining us that this was a ton of fun. Thank you. Yeah. And thank you everyone out there for listening. You know, remember you can follow us follow CardioCast on Instagram at CardioCast app, of course, you know, subscribe, like, follow this podcast, give us a review. I’d love to hear what you think. And yet, thanks so much for joining us. And, yeah, have a wonderful week, everyone. Take care. Hey, everyone, if you like the CardioCast CoolDown, please don’t forget to leave us a review wherever you’re listening. You can also connect with us on Instagram at CardioCast App, and check out our website, CardioCast App and check out our app on the App Store or Play Store. See you next week.