SuccessQuest Podcast

Jacob and Kalob discuss how we can make simple choices to become physically successful. Being physically successful is important because it is the foundation of everything else we do. Learn some simple things you can implement today to start your quest for physical success.

Pros of being Physically balanced/successful

• Physical success is the foundation for all the other areas of success. 
• Being able to play with family and friends
• Live longer
• Your brain works better, you think more clearly, you enjoy your day, you release natural chemicals that give you literal happiness. 
  

Consequences of not being physically balanced/successful

• Greater chance of physical illness, Stroke, heart disease, cancer, 
• America’s obesity problem CDC.gov
• Leading causes of death in the WORLD Our World in Data
  

Different areas of physical Success

1. Balanced Diet

• "Eat food, not too much, mostly plants." - Michael Pollan
• Tips:
• Clean out the junk food from your house. 
• Go Shopping with the intention of buying healthier food. 
• Eat smaller portions. Even if you’re eating the same things, eat less of it. 
• Drink lots of water. 
• Exercise (when I exercise I’m not as hungry... )
  

2. Exercise

• Just move a little more. You don’t have to completely change your life in one day. You don’t need to start a full fledged workout plan… instead, do something active instead of watching another show on Netflix or scrolling through facebook.

3. Sleep

• How much sleep do we need?
• Newborns (0-3 months): Sleep range narrowed to 14-17 hours each day
• Infants (4-11 months): Sleep range widened two hours to 12-15 hours
• Toddlers (1-2 years): Sleep range widened by one hour to 11-14 hours
• Preschoolers (3-5): Sleep range widened by one hour to 10-13 hours
• School age children (6-13): Sleep range widened by one hour to 9-11
• Teenagers (14-17): Sleep range widened by one hour to 8-10 hours 
• Younger adults (18-25): Sleep range is 7-9 hours
• Adults (26-64): Sleep range did not change and remains 7-9 hours
• Older adults (65+): Sleep range is 7-8 hours

• Tips:
• Stick to a sleep schedule, even on weekends.
• Practice a relaxing bedtime ritual.
• Exercise daily.
• Evaluate your bedroom to ensure ideal temperature, sound and light.
• Sleep on a comfortable mattress and pillows.
• Beware of hidden sleep stealers, like alcohol and caffeine.
• Turn off electronics before bed.
  

The above sleep information comes from The National Sleep Foundation.

Jacob Links:

• Jacob’s Website
• Jacob’s LinkedIn
• Jacob's Twitter: @jacob_m_harmon
  

Kalob Links:

• Kalob’s LinkedIn
  

SuccessQuest Links:

• Website
• Blog
• Facebook
• LinkedIn
• Twitter: @MySuccessQuest
  

Kalob: Hey there, and welcome back to another episode of SuccessQuest. I'm Kalob Valle

Jacob: and this is Jacob Harmon

Kalob: and on today's episode. We're going to dive into one of the six successes of. Physical success last time we talked a lot about changing the way we perceive success today. We just want to talk about one of those subcategories that we talked about last time physical success. What! It's gonna be crazy? It's gonna be really fun. We have a lot of info to cover. Let's start off with Jacob. 

Jacob: Well before we get going on all the different tips and tricks for physical success. I just want to make one thing clear. We're going to be talking about a lot of things in this episode. Don't let it overwhelm you. Choose one thing and work on that one thing like we talked about last time. It's about improving. It's about getting better. We don't need to be perfect in any of these areas. We just need to be working towards progress. And so choose one thing from this episode that you want to try and work on it. Then once you've mastered that come back listen again and choose another thing, but don't let this overwhelm you.

Kalob:  Yes, I totally agree. Let's kick this thing off talking about. What it means, you know, what does it mean to be physically successful in your eyes think about to take 5 Seconds right now to think what would it mean for you to be one day truly physically successful. Are you thinking about having the bodybuilder body going to the gym every day for four to five hours eating nothing but protein and way all the time like is that the physical success dream? Or is it something much simpler at SuccessQuest We believe that it's simple you know we believe that like Jacob was just saying it's just about improving. Everywhere you can you know it's not about necessarily feeling bad because you're not going to the gym like some other people are all the time and having huge muscles and having six pack abs it's not about that it's about being healthy more than it is having all those things and showing off you know kind of and you know what some people are really into that and that's totally fine but you can be physically successful without having any of it but first I kind of want to go into why would you want to be physically successful? Okay, because we know that people focus on being financially successful, but why do you want to work on improving yourself physically? Well, I think there are a lot of Pros to being physically successful and a lot of bad consequences that can come from not taking care of of yourself and your health and your well-being. Jacob want to just go into some of those Pros. 

Jacob: Yeah last week we talked about how your body is your vehicle, right? It is what you use to accomplish everything else in your life. So taking care of your body is important if I mean if you're unhealthy or if you're sick or in the end right if you die. You can't be successful in any of the other areas. So this is kind of the foundation of success being healthy allows you to be successful in other areas, and we've made a small list here of some of the pros that come from being successful and one of those is being able to play with your family and friends. I love running around with my little daughter. She's almost to now I wouldn't be able to do that if. If I couldn't move if I couldn't walk and run right you also are going to live longer. If you're healthy, you're going to have a longer life which gives you more time to work on these things that we're talking about in SuccessQuest if you're physically more healthy your brain is going to work better. You're gonna be able to think more clearly you're going to be able to learn new Concepts better and you're also gonna. Be happier when you're healthy your brain is actually releasing chemicals that make you happier and more. Joyful who doesn't want that.

Kalob: I love that. There are so many Pros. I'm sure you guys at home are thinking about the pros right now. There's so many everyone knows it we grew up knowing that we had to drink a specific amount of water every day. And we had the food pyramid. We know what that's like we know we need to get exercise days p and school it's important, but I feel like a lot of people. Don't really focus on the little things that they can be doing everyday. They just be a little bit more healthy and I just want to talk really briefly now about the consequences of not being healthy, especially in America. We have some of the worst. Healthiness in the world. I don't even know if that's how you say it. Honestly, you can correct me at home. If you want. I don't even care. We're so bad here in America and everyone knows this. We have the highest obesity rate in the world and I actually want to go over something. I found check this out guys check this out. This is on cdc.gov about obesity and it's some data that they pulled the prevalence of obesity 40%. And affects about 94 million of us adults. This is in 2015 2016 and we're just getting worse. Honestly, we have so many people who are so unhealthy. I mean and I love McDonald's every now and then but man there are some people who are just taking it to the next level. Let's talk about some of the reasons why you don't want to be obese, okay? One obesity-related conditions including heart disease stroke type 2 diabetes and we know this but check this out another website our world in data dot org. This talks about the world and the the annual number of deaths caused in in 2016 2017 and so on in 2016. 17-point 65 million people died of cardiovascular diseases which is insane that's twice as much as the next leading cause of death in the world and the next leading cause of death in the world is cancer, which is actually also related to diet and exercise. I had no idea about this, but now that we're looking it up. It's incredible how much our diet and exercise actually. The longevity of our lives and the third thing is half less than half of the cancer. So cancer and cardiovascular diseases combined are more than every other leading cause of death in the world combined like they're both of those things destroy every other statistic. It's incredible. Guys being healthy is really important living a long time to be there with your family and friends is important being able to play with your daughter your son to go to your son's soccer game. It does those are important things in life. You don't want to miss that because that brings you Joy exercise is hard. Yeah, it's not easy when we're not Pros. We're not going to the gym every day, but. Doing little things can take you long way. And as long as you can do those small simple things with your family like that that will bring you Joy and in your brain that scientifically it's proven that exercise will have a chemical reaction in your brain and you'll actually literally be given happiness dopamine. It's fantastic. So let's go into the different areas of physical success how we can be. More successful physically. 

Jacob: So the first thing that we can do to be more successful physically is to have a balanced diet, right? Everyone says diet and exercise. That's that's the way to lose weight. That's the way to be healthy and it's true Michael Pollan who is a famous author and dietitian. He actually wrote the book in defense of food and eaters Manifesto and. He has a recommendation for us and he really distills it down to one sentence. He says eat food not too much mostly plants. I think we can all learn a lot from that really. So we all need to eat food, but I think one of the big problems is that a lot of us just eat too much. I know I have this problem. I see food and I just have to eat it, right. I always grew up in my family where we just didn't leave extra food on the plate. Right if it was there. We ate it and oftentimes when we get together for family reunions. We do the same thing. There's a bunch of food out on the table, and we're just snacking the entire time. And so that's something we need to be careful about. We need to not eat excessively and this isn't even talking about what kind of food we eat. It's just talking about the quantity, right? So we need to. Eat food, but not too much and then the next part is mostly plants. So focusing on eating the healthy things and that doesn't mean you can't have an ice cream every once in awhile or a cookie or something like that, but it does mean that you need to focus on having most of your diet be nutritious.

Kalob: It's funny to looking outward into other different countries because our are. America we struggled the most with this portion size. Yeah, just like you're saying it's quantity that maybe we need to look at more than we than just changing our diet out right? I have my brother-in-law. He just went on a trip to Germany and Europe and he was out there and there were no fat people. No one was obese. It's crazy and then he when he ordered food. He was so upset because it never filled them. He wasn't used to this small portion size and I was like, you know what that has to have something to do with physical success being a smaller portion sizes here in America. Everything is large. So totally agree with that. I think that's great advice exercise. Exercise is one of the things that we need to do to be physically successful. This doesn't necessarily mean being super strict with when you go to the gym and how long you have to stay there for and eating protein shakes. Although that can be helpful. Honestly. Just moving. If you look at you're going to have to look up YouTube videos on getting fit being physically fit. A lot of them will just tell you to start moving get up and move just walk go walk do some stretches those things will change your life take on the a little time in the morning right before you go to work or when you come home to do a little stretch get your blood pumping and go on a little walk those things are proven to help people and they're so simple they're so small. And if you find you you have a little bit more time and you want to do a little bit more than just walking and stuff you want to really kind of boost your fitness exercise yeah go and go to the gym you know or stay at home do push-ups squats these are there so many simple methods and techniques you can put in place and Implement that will change your life drastically 

Jacob: and I think this goes back to Improvement progression. If you're currently doing nothing start doing something even if that just means instead of watching another show of Netflix. I'm going to go for a walk. I mean, that's something if you're already have an exercise schedule improve on it, see how you can make it a little more rigorous or see how you can spend a little more time exercising each day. Once again, it's all about becoming better. It's all about going one step further than you are now. 

Kalob: We don't all have to be perfect. We don't all have to have a incredible crazy exercise plan, but we can all improve we were talking about how some people have the excuse like I don't got time to exercise. Well, I don't even know what that accent came from honestly, but um, there is always time. Did you know the average person's on spends on Facebook and social media? They they scroll through 300 feet per day of. Stuff on Facebook that's includes crazy. That's so much like 300 feet. Do you realize how much space that is? We spend a lot of our time on social media. We spend a lot of our time. I'm video games watching TV and in all honesty. There's always time. There's always time and if you find that you're actually really busy with things during the day wake up 10 minutes early. That's not that big of a deal if ten minutes is what it would take to make you feel that much better in your day. Don't you think it'd be worth it 10 minutes. I heard this quote and it's an amazing quote. It's that we will suffer in this life one of two things for sure.  The first is the Pains of regret or the Pains of discipline. One of those two things for sure their whole lives and you can apply this to anything you will either when you're 90 or 80 or 70 whenever you get really old you will experience a day where you just sit down and you probably experienced this right now. We sit down you regret and you're like man, I wish I would have I wish this I wish that those are painful, you know regret is horrible, but. The Pains of discipline also suck getting up a little bit earlier taking the time to stretch taking the time to walk doing those things is it you have to be disciplined to do it but it's a small process and it's easy it's easy it really is you just have to set your mind to it and I know right now you're listening to me right now you can do it if you really truly want to take a step forward and physical success in your life. We want to challenge you right now tomorrow you I want you to wake up 10 minutes earlier and just stretch or go on a walk or when you get home from work. Go on a walk do something small that you haven't done before and I promise it's going to make a difference in your life because it has for so many thousands of hundreds of thousands of other people already. It's been proven to help people. So take us up on that offer and let us know if it actually helped you in some way. We would love to hear from. 

Jacob: Absolutely. The next thing we want to talk about is sleep. Kalob was just talking about waking up 10 minutes earlier and that's fine. But you still need to get your sleep. So it's actually really interesting how much of an effect sleep has on us. The average adult is supposed to get seven to nine hours of sleep. Wow, I know that I don't get that. I need to get more sleep. But the the other interesting thing is that it has to be consistent. The research shows that you should go to bed about the same time every night and wake up at about the same time every day in that includes the weekends. We want to be healthy. We should create a sleep routine. Where were sleeping the same amount of time every night at the same times. 

Kalob: You know, it's interesting. I'm thinking about that now because. I definitely don't get that sleep obviously but now thinking about why I don't get that sleep is different because I'm sure they're everyone who's listening right now you're probably listening thinking man there's no way seven to nine hours of sleep as a parent as a college student with the work that I have there's no way like how could we ever achieve that but I'm actually thinking right now to my life because I was thinking the same thing I was like seven to nine hours of sleep I can't guarantee that with a kid no impossible especially with a newborn I can't even but um. But maybe it is possible because I'm looking at my schedule now. I'm thinking wow. I do spend a lot of time on social media like right when I should be going to bed is when I'm trying to relax doing something else when I should be sleeping. So really this is an interesting discussion. It's the sleep is important. You've got to find time for sleep. How is your life structured right now for sleep? What are you doing? That's taking precedence over your sleep over your physical success. Is it any of the things we've already talked about before is it staying laid up with your friends and doing something crazy and which could be fun and every now and then why not but is it taking away from you so much that it's affecting you through the week. And you've got to consider those things you need to think about yourself, especially in this area physical success because no one else is going to be thinking about a for you I mean, we're thinking about it right here for you, but we can't do anything about it for you. And that's what we want to get figure out what you're doing right now that's impeding you that's taking precedence or priority over your sleep. I want to talk about how simple this can be how easy and simple it can be. To make a healthy decision. My wife is amazing. Should I totally married up she is incredible. I don't even know what she saw in me. Honestly. I don't know how we're married. I tricked her into something was crazy at the beginning of the year. We always we've been married for. Almost three years now which is crazy but every year New Year's we always make a goal poster or and we always like to talk about the goals we have for the rest of the year and this year she has the goal so for healthiness and for staying fish you wants to do those things but it's hard for her she decided all she's going to do every week is make one healthy choice. Just one Healthy Choice. That's so simple. I don't know how it could be more simple one Healthy Choice a week and she literally comes home at least once a week and she tells me man at work today. They brought doughnuts. I wanted that doughnuts so bad, but I decided not to that was my healthy choice for the week. And then she lets her let does whatever else she wants to for the rest of the week, but she just makes that one choice and I think that's so inspiring. All you have to do is make one Healthy Choice a week. Really and you can choose what you're going to focus on like she kept saying at the very beginning you don't have to let all of these things overwhelm you at one time exercise and sleep and a balanced diet and figuring out all those because that's that's that's too much but if you decide to make one Healthy Choice every week that could probably drastically change your life.

Jacob: Absolutely and I'll be the first to tell you guys we're not perfect at this. I need to lose a little weight. I mean, I'll be honest with you. I definitely need to lose a little weight and last week I decided to go for a run in the morning and I'll tell you that was one of the best days of the week. I felt better. I felt more energy. I was working better more efficiently. I got more done in the day.

And I'll tell you what it took 15 minutes out of my day. That's it. I woke up. I went for a run. I took a shower which I would have done anyways, 15 minutes and it completely changed that day. Unfortunately, I didn't run the rest of the week. But the good news is I have that comparison now and I'll tell you right here right now. To the SuccessQuest Community. I am going to pledge I'm gonna exercise every day for the next week and I'll let you know how it goes on our next podcast. 

Kalob: That's awesome. That's actually really cool. I would pledge the same thing, but I'm really bad at that stuff. Um, but you know what, I think. I'm just going to eat and it's funny because you running a week. That's awesome. That's really cool. That's more than I've done in the last month honestly, and I'm a skinny little dude, but even though I'm a skinny little dude, I'm not very healthy. Like I know that like I go out to eat all the time and I get I'm so and I talk with my wife about all the time like we're so disappointed in some of our choices sometimes but. I think it is important that we just take those small steps to do one thing healthier every week and yeah Jacob go for a man every day. That's freaking awesome. You know, I I want to say I pledge to do the same thing, but I will pledge to do one thing that are this week, which will probably be just not eating at McDonald's when I really want to honestly because it's cheap man so good. Guys, seriously, it can be so easy to progress and physical success take today you right now after listening to this podcast to make a conscious choice of doing one thing better this week next week improving in this way, whether it's changing your diet slightly exercising a little bit more finding more time to sleep prioritizing. And if you do so you're going to find some that. It helps a lot in your daily life your relationships at work and overall because just like Jacob was saying before it's the foundation. If you're not physically successful. It's very difficult to be successful in all the other areas because that that comes first. 

Jacob: And hey, let us know how it goes set a goal do it and then send us an email. Comment on our on our Facebook page send us a message. We love to hear from the audience and you can actually reach us at podcast@MySuccessQuest.com. So go ahead and send us any great stories that you guys have accomplished. We'd love to feature them here on the podcast and like always go ahead and subscribe share this podcast with your friends if it's helped you if anything We Said Today helped you in any way. Share with your friends. Why not? I mean help them out.

Kalob: If we've been a positive influence in your day. You better share us because that means it's going to be a positive influence in someone else's day. And that's that's really all we want to do is build this community be a positive influence and you guys you guys are great. Thank you so much for listening to this podcast have a successful day. Whoo.

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