Shawn Stevenson: Welcome to The Model Health Show, this is fitness and nutrition expert, Shawn Stevenson, and I'm so grateful for you tuning in with me today. Recently, we just crossed our 500th episode of The Model Health Show, and I wanted to keep this celebration going and provide something really special for you on this episode. I wanted to create something that you can always go back to just plug in, click play and just get an immersion of inspiration, and what I want to do is also share with you eight of the most powerful moments of the Model Health Show for me personally, doing this work and the thousands upon thousands of hours invested into the show and invested into improving the health and wellness of our society. These moments right here are particularly powerful, very, very special for me personally, but I believe that these messages, which you're going to pick up here and how we put this together is going to be a continued source of inspiration that you can always go and tap back into. So today, I have eight powerful messages from eight powerhouse individuals and to kick things off, first and foremost is the amazing Lisa Nichols.

Now, Lisa Nichols is one of the foremost experts in the world in personal development, she is a world-renowned speaker, New York Times best-selling author, and just such a wealth of inspiration, and for me personally, in The Model Health Show history, this episode and this moment is so powerful because it speaks to some of the craziness that can happen behind the scenes, it isn't just about the countless hours of research, the hours of recording and all of the post-production, but it's the stuff that happens beforehand and locking times in and getting interviews recorded and actually, Lisa was supposed to be on the show earlier than this particular moment, but something came up, some craziness, but to make up for it, she told me she's going to fly into St. Louis and make it happen. Whereas before it was going to be a remote thing, the show was big at the time, but not to the gargantuan, King Kong, "They got nothing on me," level yet. So for Lisa Nichols, world-renowned Lisa Nichols to say that she's going to fly in just for me just to make up for the pivot that had to be made, I couldn't believe it, it was amazing.

It was such a gift, so much so that I even brought some family to the studio to be able to meet her, and it was just such an incredible experience. And so this moment, one of the most special moments in the history of The Model Health Show, 500 episodes, thousands upon thousands of hours of research and recording, and it was hard to pick these eight, but I really feel that these are going to blow you away. And this message, as you're going to hear from Lisa Nichols, she's going to share with you an important truth about happiness, Well we'll check out this clip from the one and only Lisa Nichols.

LISA NICHOLS: We wait for a moment in time, something has to happen in order for us to be happy. And to me, happy isn't something that you go and find. You can't Google download happy. Happy grows from you, happy grows from a moment, and happiness isn't something you arrive at, and it's a destination that you stay at. Happiness is something that you seek to evoke, and emanate, and grow, and experience, and touch as much as possible, and you're willing to leave it to revisit it. Happiness comes in freedom. Whenever something is rigid and it has to stay, then you just left happiness because now you have to stay in happiness.

Happiness is a place that you move in and out of, it expands and it contracts with you. Happiness is something that you can measure. I always say I'm as happy when I look at my child, I'm as happy as his saddest day sometimes because he's my heart outside of me. And so and then I detach from that, I let him define his happiness, and I watch. But there's never a moment where I'm not connected to my child. And so if he's going through dark part, there's a part of me that is always with him. And happiness is not something that someone else can get you. Happiness is not something your wife can give you, happiness is something your wife can celebrate and elevate with you, your children can celebrate and elevate with you. Happiness is something that you sit and you look at, you touch, you breathe.

Happiness is something you take a step away from, and you look over there and say, "What makes me happy?" I just spent 32 days in Barcelona. And I went to Barcelona to put my life in three buckets. To put my life in, the first bucket was, "This makes me really happy and I want to live like I choose it." You know how you can get to a place where things are coasting? I don't want to coast. If I'm madly in love with the time that I spend with my grandmother, then I want to be madly in love with it when I see my grandma. So last night before getting on the plane and coming to you, I was in the living room dancing with my grandmother. I put on some of her favorite songs and I just danced with her in the living room because that just brings a sense of joy that I can't explain. I can't explain what dancing with my grandmother does for me.

And the second bucket, so the first bucket is to choose what I want in my life, what I love in my life, and then to re-choose it powerfully and to let it be seen in evidence of how I show up with it, that I chose it, and I choose it versus just coasting. The second bucket that I put my life in Barcelona was, "I choose this but it needs modification." It needs modification. Like I love it but it needs modification 'cause I'm tolerating some things in this experience that I would be happier if I didn't tolerate. But I want it, I just need modifications, I need some things to shift, I need some experiences in this experience to shift, and then the third bucket was, I choose to release it. That our time is complete. The experience of living in overwhelmed, the experience of saying yes when I want to say no, the experience of wanting to be liked and loved by everybody. The experience of opening my doors to everyone who do knocks on the door and says I need to come in, the owning my 'no' so that my 'yes' can become more valuable.

The experience of some people in my life, that our season is complete. Like I put my entire life in three areas. I choose you. I choose you, and I want to live like I chose you. I choose you, but I need to adjust this experience so it can feel better for the both of us. At least for me. I don’t know how you do it, but I need it to feel better. And then I choose to release this. Behaviors, thoughts, actions, and people. So I spent 32 days in Barcelona having that experience so that I can keep revisiting happy, and stay in, and live, and not expecting happiness to always be there as prevalent as those moments when I'm dancing with my grandmother. And to allow it to be fluid and flexible in my life, and to allow happiness to move away from me at times so I can honor it and own it more.

We won't ever find perfection and it's a false hope that always leaves you lacking something. But if you can find and discover how to perfectly work with your imperfection. And what I've done, in some days are better than most and other days not, is I've learned how to dance inside my imperfections.

Shawn Stevenson: That was the incredible Lisa Nichols, we got so much more in store for you, I really hope that you enjoyed that. Next up, this is a very, very special moment for me here as well, somebody who I've learned a ton from over the years, I was listening to this person's lectures 15 years ago as I was working in my clinical practice and really just learning from him literally changed my life. It flipped a switch and shifted my entire perspective about what health really is, where it originates, and the power that we have over our own health and well-being, and even how we influence the world around us. And the person I'm talking about is Dr. Bruce Lipton, renowned cell biologist, and he is the person who really impressed upon popular culture, the term, and the science around epigenetics more so than any other researcher. And so we have him to thank for that.

Now, during this age of COVID-19, with all that was going on and really the misuse of science and scientific tunnel vision taking place in such a massive amount of polarization, there was no person that I wanted to talk to more than Bruce Lipton. He was the number one person that I wanted to seek counsel from and to bring on for you to learn from and hear from during that time. In this special clip, and for me, it's still a moment of inspiration because it helped to put some context. It helped to put some description to just something that was happening, that's still happening, because when we start to understand something, it starts to lose its power over us, when we start to understand how things work, we can start to dissolve the fear in this boogie man idea. And to really bring things to light in a sense, once we can take a peek behind the curtain and see what's happening in our own minds in relationship to things.

So one of the things that he's going to be talking about in this very special clip is how fear and anxiety factually lead to higher rates of sickness and death. He's going to talk about how this process actually is working to again, shed some light on it. And the reason that I wanted to put this in these special moments in the history of the show is because we're living in this time, it's a very strange age that we're living in, and this issue right here, I knew it, I felt it deep, deep in my heart that the lack of context, that the lack of education, that the lack of empowerment in this circumstance that we're experiencing right now was going to be something at least a far worse health outcomes, and the reason I'm saying this is that today, now, we have facts on this and we're I'm going to do an episode coming up here soon, where we dive into this deeper, but I wanted to give you a little bit of a highlight of it here.

So when we’re talking about can fear and anxiety actually lead to higher rates of sickness and death? Well, a study that was just published this month, as of this recording, by the CDC reviewing COVID-19 hospitalizations and severe illness among 540,667 people over the course of a year. In this study, again, published by the CDC, they found that the strongest risk factor for death in association with COVID-19, number one was obesity, which we already know, we've already documented, it's well established, but number two, the second strongest risk factor for death from COVID-19, number two was anxiety and fear-related disorders. It writes itself. I can't even make this stuff up. Fear is killing people. And now we have the data on this.

So again, this was published by the CDC, this was published by the CDC. We'll do an in-depth discussion of this and some of the other science that we have access to now, some of the more recent unfolding of events, but I just wanted to plant the seed to understand that this isn't just hearsay, which you're about to hear from Dr. Bruce Lipton, it's not just hearsay. This isn't just based on some hypothetical view of things, this is viewed through the lens of biology. And how fear and anxiety can lead to far worse health outcomes that can make us more susceptible to viral infections, that can lead us to be more susceptible to poor outcomes when we're exposed to pathogens, and also can lead to worse health outcomes from a myriad of different acute illnesses, but also chronic illnesses, we have to be able to manage our fear and our belief, our perspective about things that are happening in the world around us.

Because truly, again, the CDC publishing this study, this is about 540,000 hospitalized patients, and finding that the strongest risk factor for death in regards to COVID-19, number one was obesity, number two anxiety, and fear-related disorders. And the truth is the media and the so-called public health officials have been complicit in the abhorrent fear campaign that we've been exposed to without any balance. Without any context, it's only been pushing that fear button down and not giving any context, not talking about the victories and celebrating the health that's taken place, and not celebrating the fact that well over 99% of folks who are exposed to this particular virus have survived not to say that it's not a tremendous problem/strain on our communities, but there's no context, it's only fear, there's no good news. It's left out of the equation. And we are better than this. We have to be provided with things that give us some sense of empowerment, that provide us with things that we can do, rather than just sit and be in complicit fear and wait for us to die or to become very, very sick.

That is the pre-imminent message, the dominant message, and enough is enough. If seeing that the second leading risk factor for death in relationship to COVID-19 is fear-related disorders and anxiety, and knowing that our media and public health officials are complicit in feeding this fear narrative and literally adding to this taking lives. If we really want to be honest about it, by ignoring the role that fear inducement in our society plays, they know it, they know it, the science exists, we've got mountains of it, we know that this is the case, but what I'm so passionate about is sharing this message from Dr. Bruce Lipton to articulate. This is prior to getting this new study, what is happening? What was going to happen? We could see it from a mile away. We could see it coming. But now we have the opportunity to do something about it. Alright, so next up here, celebrating 500 episodes of The Model Health Show, eight of the most special moments, and having the opportunity to have Bruce Lipton in my life and to provide an opportunity to bring his education and his experience to the forefront during a time like this is just very, very special to me. So I hope you enjoy this, check out this clip from the amazing Dr. Bruce Lipton.

DR. BRUCE LIPTON: Well, let's come down to a fact of science, so we get this clear. Less than 1%, less than 1% of disease is connected to genes. So I say, where the hell is all the disease coming from and it goes, "It's coming from stress." And I say, "What's stress?" Now, this is really important because stress is anything that gets in the way of your destination. I want to have this, I want to go there or whatever, and then something gets in the way, that provokes stress. And I go, "So why is it relevant?" Because stress is the cause of disease of 90% of the people. And then I say, "Why is that relevant?" Again, that's not genetic, that's a perception. I am stressed because I believe I'm stressed, and therefore my cells are going to respond to my stress, whether it's real or not, the cells can't see it, they only are based on what I believe.

Why do we recognize stress for? And I go, "Because we're being threatened." That's what stress means. Something is threatening you. Let's go back thousands of years and I say, "What was the stress?" I say, "Saber-toothed tiger." I go, "Oh, okay." I say, "Well, what happens when the saber-toothed tiger is chasing you?" I say, "You got to run like hell." I say, "Well, what organs in your body do you use to deal with stress?" I go, "Arms and legs to escape." So I say, now, here comes the next point, well, if I'm going to need those organs to escape from the tiger, then here's the most important thing. I need to give them energy, because, without energy, muscles aren't going to work. So I say, "What provides energy?" I say, "Blood." So I go, "Oh, why is it relevant?" Here it comes, when I perceive a stress, stress hormones' function is to provide as much blood to my arms and legs as I can get, 'cause I need all of that energy to run away from the tiger. So I say, "Well, where is it getting the blood from?" I say, "Well, the heart's pumping the blood." Yeah, but it's pumping it all over the body. So I say, "Well, when the blood is in my gut, what is the function of the organs? Lungs, gut, and all those organs in there." And I say, "Maintenance of the body, health of the body, fixing the body and all that." And I say, "Well, if you're running away from a saber-toothed tiger, do you think it's good to invest in taking care of your body at this point?"

I go, "What a waste of time. If the tiger catches you, to hell with the body, it's not going to exist anyway." So here's number one. When stress is perceived, stress hormones released into the body cause the blood vessels in the gut to squeeze shut. I go, "Why?" Because when they squeeze shut the blood is pushed to the outside. Arms and legs, okay? So I say, "Yeah, but net consequence, you shut down the blood vessels in the gut and you shut down the maintenance and health of the body." I say, "Yeah, but for how long?" How long does it take to get away from that tiger, 10 minutes, 15 minutes? You're away from the tiger, stress is gone. Everything's back in condition again. So number one, stress shuts down blood flow to the gut because it's going to make sure the blood goes preferentially to the arms and legs. Number two, and this is critical now, the immune system uses a tremendous amount of energy, most people when they get really sick, don't even have the energy to get out of bed.

So I say, "Well, let's say I have a bacterial infection and a saber-toothed tiger is chasing me, how should I split my energy?" Again, how will the bacterial infection if the saber-toothed tiger catches you, the infection doesn't mean anything anymore, it's the tiger's problem. So I go, "Okay, so what does it mean?" Fact, stress hormones shut off the immune system to conserve energy, to run away from the tiger. And I go, "Wow, so stress hormones shut it down." I go, "So much so." Listen, medical doctors use stress hormones therapeutically, meaning if they want to transplant an organ from person A into person B, and you put the foreign organ into the recipient, the immune system of the recipient's going to say that's foreign, and try and destroy it. And I say, "Well, what good is the operation if I just take the organ and put it into somebody else and the immune system messes with it?" And I go, "This is why medical doctors give, patients who are going to receive a transplant, they give them stress hormones because when they give them the stress hormones and then do the transplant, the recipient's immune system is not going to be working and it will sustain the transplant.

How effective of shutting off the immune system? It's used therapeutically to shut off the immune system, you can't move forwards and backward at the same time, you can't be open and closed at the same time. So basically it says, if you're in a stress mode, you've shut your system down. And I say, "So why is it relevant?" I go, "Look at today's world, every time you turn on TV, be afraid, be very afraid. Go hide in your house." And I go, "Wow, that was scary as hell." I say, "Why is it relevant?" I am getting stress hormones dripping into my system every time I watch that damn TV, I'm getting stress hormones when I read a paper, go and surf the Internet. I go, "And what is that doing for you?" And I say, "It is compromising your health." I go, "Oh." I say that's where disease comes from, not from the genes, but you shut yourself down, and then as I said, you become less intelligent then what do you do? Defer to the boss. Who's the one that's going to protect me? Whatever they say, I'm going to do. Why? I'm not thinking, I was just going to do what they think 'cause they know, I don't know.

Then I go, "Oh my god, have we just screwed the world big time." I go, "Why?" Because the planet is on 24/7 stress. Any compromises to your health have compromised your immune system. 40% of US citizens have 2.7 chronic diseases, 2.7, one chronic disease, 60% of Americans have. But 40% of the Americans have 2.7. I go, "So why is it relevant? They're compromised before the damn virus even showed up." And I go, "Well, why is that relevant?" Because when the virus shows up, are they weakened because the virus is so strong? Or are they weakened because their immune system is under stress? And I go, "That's the one." And I said, "But you blame the virus and then everybody is now afraid. Healthy people are afraid. Well, you got them scared to death." I say, "What's the result of that?" You've messed with their immune system, you've already compromised their immune system because their stress hormones function shut off the immune system. The more you scare them, the worst the consequence of the COVID is.

Quantum physics is the most valid science on this planet. It's the one that's been tested the most and verified to be more truthful than any other science. I go, "So what?" Because what's the first principle of quantum physics? The mind is the creator of our life experiences, and it says your consciousness is creating your life. I go, "Why is that relevant?" Because if you change your consciousness, you can change your life, it's like you don't have to wait for life to change from the outside, it's you on the inside. And so we have been systematically disempowered, you have been manipulated by a belief system, and then belief controls genetics, and belief controls your biology, and if you start with a negative belief, you only end up with a negative biology. It's the only way it happens.

Shawn Stevenson: Next up is somebody who is truly one of my greatest mentors. I've learned so much from him over the years, and constant source of inspiration really helped me to modulate things and to take on a new perspective, even about the turbulence that we're experiencing right now in our lives, just around the world. And also it's a very special moment because he was the first person to be a guest on the show at the new studio at Model Health studios, and to have him as the inaugural guest and just to set the tone for things just really is such a gift. And the crazy thing is, again, behind the scenes, it wasn't supposed to be him, we had something else on the calendar, but things just lined up divinely for him to be here to open things up. And so, in this powerful message, Dr. Michael Beckwith, bestselling author, world-renowned speaker, and educator, thought leader, is going to be sharing with you how these turbulent times are offering us a great opportunity to create something better. Check out this message from Dr. Michael Bernard Beckwith.

DR. MICHEAL BECKWITH: What I see is that we're in the middle of a great awakening, and you're seeing the crumbling of the old paradigm, and you're seeing the emergence of what's happening new both in the same space and the same time. In Newtonian physics, that can't exist, you can't have two objects in the same space and time. But in quantum reality, you can have everything in the same space at the same time but they’re vibrating at different levels. So you have the old paradigm, fear, fear, fear, fear, worry, worry, worry, worry, lack, limitation scarcity, not enough, not enough job, not enough this, not enough that, that's not real, that's made up, you know? And so what's happening is, as a crumbling of the old, where people are going to be forced to really get a sense of who they are and stop leaning on external things like governments and politicians and things of that particular nature, I tell people, the only authority you have is the authority of your own conviction. That's the authority. You can't outsource your authority to someone out there.

Those people work for you, you don't work for them, they work for you. And so your attention has to be on what kind of life you want to live and how that can assist you to live that life. Now, if you don't have a vision, then they're going to tell you what your vision is. If you don't have your own possibility for your own life, and you're going to listen to these people and they're going to run your life, you see? So the idea is that we're in a great awakening, everything is shifting, the world of phenomena is moving really fast and there's an emergency taking place. There's people becoming more sovereign, people taking their authority back, people that are saying, "Hell no." I mean, it's very similar to the vibration during the Vietnam War, when people woke up and say, "Whoa, wait a minute, we're going to go kill these people we don't know? Why are we doing this?" And nobody could give an answer, you know what I mean?

So it's a stream of consciousness that's happening. And again, you don't see it 'cause it's not on the news. But there's many people that are coming to an understanding that their own authority is here, it's their connection to the universe, not connection to a party republican, democrat, independent, it's connected to something else. And I think that's a precursor to something breaking down to something else emerging. We have our inner authority connected to the presence, we begin to have a vision to the kind of world we want to live in, we start to walk in that direction. Again, the reporters are reporting from the old paradigm, we're seeking to report from something new that's emerging. That means you have to see the invisible in order to do the impossible. The highest frequency always wins. That's a law. The highest frequency is more powerful than the lower frequency of thought that emerges from a field of fear, worry, control, domination, manipulation, has less power than a thought that's emerging from a field of love.

Shawn Stevenson: Next up in this compilation of eight of my favorite moments from 500 episodes of the Model Health Show, I got to stress again, this was incredibly difficult to pick, these eight moments, but this is another one that just stands out. You know how certain things, it's just a vibe, it's a vibe. You remember that moment and you feel it, you feel your biochemistry, you can hear certain sounds, certain smells like your senses are there, it's just a whole vibe, that memory is so strong. And for me, one of the most stand-out memories was going to and recording at Ed Mylett's place, and Ed Mylett is an absolute game-changer. He's one of the greatest speakers on planet Earth. He's also a best-selling author, and his level of success and where he comes from to his level of success, he's also extremely abundant in success and wealth and relationships, and his life is just really, really magical.

And I got to see that first hand, going to his place, is like overlook... I've never seen things like this. It's like overlooking, the beach is like this fantasy island vibe to it, just like, it's amazing, it's amazing to see, but also to see that these things are attainable through being a great human being. These things are attainable through operating from your heart and Ed Mylett is all heart, but he's also strategy and insight and practicality, and that's what I really love about this, and I love about this moment. I'm so grateful to be able to share this message with you from the one and only Ed Mylett.

ED MYLETT: I grew up not a very self-confident person, and so you have to have high self-confidence. Any world-class athlete, you and I both know, their self-confidence level is through the roof, and when they go on a slump, when they're not performing well, what's going on? They've lost their confidence. They didn't lose the ability to shoot or hit a ball or hit a golf ball, they've lost their confidence, they've lost their swag. So where does confidence come from? Like, I knew I had to become more confident. Confidence comes from this, 'cause the disease of lack of confidence is you're obsessed with everybody else thinks about you. What are they going to think? What are they going to think? What are they going to think? That's the symptom. The disease is you're worried about your reputation with everybody else 'cause you don't have a good one with you. If your reputation with self is exemplary, you're not concerned about your reputation with others.

So self-confidence comes from one simple thing, it comes from keeping the promises you make to yourself, that's it. If you begin to consistently keep the promises you make to you, you will begin to stack up on that self-confidence. And so I set up my life where I started to keep promises I made to me, whether that was what time I got up in the morning, what I put in my mouth to eat when I trained and worked out. I can't control outcomes, but I can control activity. So in my business life, I'm going to make 15 phone calls a day, I'd make my 15 and I'd be conscious of saying, "I did what I said I was going to do, I did what I said I was going to do." And through that process, over a period of time, every day, every hour that went by, I kept keeping more and more promises to me, I began to trust me, my self-confidence level transformed. That was number one.

The second thing was my identity, you'll never exceed in your life what you think you're worth. Everyone talks about this, but you'll never exceed your identity, any time in your life, and your identity is your self-worth, what you believe you deserve. Okay, now, self-worth and identity is like a thermostat, it sits on the wall of your life, it sets the entire temperature for your life. So in every area you have a spiritual thermostat, a financial, a business, a physical one, a wellness one. So if that thermostat is set at, let's say financially at 80 degrees, it's set at 80 degrees, no matter what you do, you already experienced it. If you start to heat your life up, you start having abundance come into it, and you're doing activities that are better, but you haven't changed your identity, you will find a way to cool your life right back down to where your identity is eventually, you'll make a bad investment decision, a car will break down. It'll all seem unconscious, but you will get back to 80 degrees of money.

The reverse is also true. You start to go broke, your car gets repoed, the water gets turned off, you find a way to heat it back up and get it back to 80 degrees again. So the key in life is to have self-confidence and change that thermostat level of what you think you're worth. You could be in the best business model with the best opportunity, the best products, the best everything, and you will not exceed 80 degrees of identity if that's your identity in your life. Happiness has an identity, faith has an identity. And so the key thing is, how do you shift that identity? And that identity then is shifted through a couple things, but the biggest one is associations. The biggest way we change your identity, if let's say you hung around a guy worth a couple hundred million dollars, if I'm a 150 degree financially and you're an 80 degree through proximity over time, I will heat you up somewhere in between the two of us. If your faith, if you struggle with your faith or your relationships, but you surround yourself with people that have great faith or great marriages, through association, yours improve.

So the biggest way I change my identity is through who I hung around. Hanging around lastly is also, I don't have to physically be around you. I can read your book. I can read a book from you on health, on sleep, and when I read that book, you're not just reading pages, I'm pretending as if I'm with you, I'm associating with you. And so, a lot of my identity shifts came from books I read and things I listen to, and people that were alive in my life at the same time. That's how I changed it.

Shawn Stevenson: I hope that you're enjoying this compilation. Again, this is something that you can refer back to often if you want to just pop on, something to get you in the zone, to get you inspired, and just to remind you of how powerful you are, whether you are getting your mind right for your day, whether you are getting your mind right for some exercise and you're tuning in for that purpose, or whether you're just kicking back, sipping on a little something, something. That's what it's all about, being able to tap into that inspiration and speaking on sipping on a little something, something, that's a part of my day where I like to tune into a little bit of inspiration, or I might dive into a little bit of research it's while I'm sipping on that Java. And for years, I was a little bit anti-coffee because of an experience that I had when I was a kid, just a little tyke, I had a sip of my grandmother's Folgers and I literally thought my grandmother and grandfather were insane. I thought there was something wrong with these old people and they're drinking this nasty black water so they must be broken, their taste buds must be broken. And so I swore off the Java at that point.

But the data, it just kept being overwhelming, getting presented to me on some of these benefits like this. This study was featured in the journal, Psychopharmacology, and it uncovered that drinking coffee has some remarkable benefits on mental performance. The research has found that drinking coffee led to enhanced performance on cognitive vigilance tasks. So these activities include things like multi-tasking and tasks that involve deep concentration as well, so being able to switch as well, so different parts of the brain, different types of activities, coffee was able to fortify and enhance those cognitive benefits. And also, few people realize that regularly drinking coffee has been shown to actually extend lifespan and also help to prevent cognitive decline and reduced the risk of developing Alzheimer's and Parkinson's disease. And this data is coming from the journal, Practical Neurology.

But here's the key, when I decided, okay, I've got enough data here, where am I getting this from? I also wanted to marry this with something that I was much more acclimated to, which was this whole class of medicinal mushrooms like Reishi, chaga, lion's mane, cordyceps, shiitake, all these things that I've been researching and experimenting with for many, many years, and I found out we've got an organic coffee that's blended with these powerful medicinal mushrooms, okay, I'll give it a shot. And I fell in love. And so what I'm talking about is the organic coffee from Four Sigmatic, that's f-o-u-r-s-i-g-m-a-t-i-c.com/model, you're going to get 10% off their incredible mushroom coffee blends, and it just tastes like a nice, robust organic coffee, and you're also getting those added benefits of things like lion's mane. Lion's mane is a well-documented, well-researched medicinal mushroom that has proven capacity to stimulate something called neurogenesis, or the creation of new brain cells and also very profound neuroprotective effects and protecting your brain cells from intrusions, which today, all kinds of stuff is trying to intrude on our brain; the excessive levels of stress, the toxicants in our environment, the list goes on and on.

We need that neural protection, that's what we find in things like lion's mane. And chaga, chaga's in that blend too. In both blends, actually; the cordyceps formula coffee and the lion's mane formula coffee. Chaga, just go to Dr. Google and type in chaga and cancer. Just have a look. Chaga is also one of the most dense antioxidant sources of anything ever discovered. It is insane, very powerful stuff, thousands of years of documented use with chaga, it's amazing. So go again to foursigmatic.com/model, pick yourself up some of their organic mushroom coffee blends. They also have an incredible mushroom hot cocoa, they have the elixirs themselves, if you happen to not be a fan of coffee, which I don't know, the benefits are pretty remarkable. They also have the elixirs themselves. So cordyceps, lion's mane, you can get them as a elixir. And also for me, when I'm having my morning vibe with my organic coffee or tea or elixir, I also have it with high-quality fats specifically, I'm looking at cognitive performance. That's what I want to start my day, I want my brain to be on, and for that, researchers at Yale University published data purporting that medium-chain triglycerides, MCT oil, can readily cross the blood-brain barrier, improve cognitive function, and be directly utilized by our brain cells.

So one of the things that has that special permission slip to make its way into the brain and directly feed our brain cells, and also it has been found to help prevent cognitive decline. A remarkable study and this was published in the Annals of the New York Academy of Sciences, found that the consumption of MCTs directly led to improved cognitive function in mild to moderate forms of Alzheimer's disease and cognitive impairment. So not only can it make our brains better, it can also help to prevent cognitive decline. So really, really powerful stuff. Great one, two combo to have some emulsified MCT oil with organic coffee or tea, and where I get my MCT oil that I have on a daily basis is from onnit.com, that's O-N-N-I-T.com/model. They've got emulsified MCT oil, which is like a coffee creamer, and they've got the original MCT oil as well. These are my combos. Every day this is how I'm starting my day, getting my brain fueled and getting my brain in that position to be able to execute and perform at the highest level. So again, go to onnit.com/model, you get 10% off their incredible MCT oils, and now we're going to move on to the next one of my eight favorite moments in 500 episodes of The Model Health Show.

Again, it was incredibly hard to decide these, but some of these moments just stood out so much and my heart is just overwhelmed with gratitude, and these moments are just really anchored in, and I can feel the feelings of being there in these moments. Next up is an incredible time that I had having, arguably the greatest trainer on planet Earth who trained Michael Jordan, Kobe Bryant, Dwyane Wade, the list goes on and on. Arguably, some of the greatest athletes in the history of sport. And leaning on him for his expertise and his insight, not just about the human body and performance, but about the mindset of being a champion again and again. And I'm talking about Tim Grover, and so having that the opportunity to actually have Tim over to my place and to film and to have my son Jorden there, my oldest son, Jorden, to be there, who is playing college football right now and to glean those insights, and for Tim to take the time and to acknowledge Jordan and to fill his cup, to fill his spirit, to give him some of his incredible wisdom. It's just priceless. I'm so grateful for this, it's such a great gift.

And the beautiful part is that we all get access to this, we all get to have this exposure that heretofore, there was a time when these types of conversations, you didn't get access to this. There wasn't a way that this was possible unless you were in the room. Now today with this medium, that's why I'm so passionate about this work, and I'm just getting warmed up to provide access and exposure to these types of conversations, these types of insights from some of the greatest people to ever do it. We just can't put a price tag on that, but we have to say yes, we have to take advantage, and not just hear the stuff, but take that and to put that into action in the real world. Use that energy and imbue it and then share it with creating a life that we're here to live. So in this clip, Tim is going to be sharing why pressure is a privilege, and why we have to build ourselves up in order to handle the high-pressure moments in life to the best of our abilities. Check out this clip from the amazing Tim Grover.

TIM GROVER: The one game no one talks about in Utah that describes winning and pressure to a T is game number six in his last championship run. For the last 42 seconds of the game, they're down three points, 42 seconds left, not a single other bulls player touched the ball. Not one, not one. He came down, he scored, went back on defense, stole the ball, came down again, scored again. Not one other bulls player touched the ball. Pressure is a privilege, that means you believe in yourself and somebody else believes in you, and you can't win unless you believe in yourself. You cannot win at your health, you cannot win at business, you cannot win as a father, as a mother, as a son, as a daughter, if you expect somebody else to believe in you more than you believe in yourself. I always like to use the guests as an example, when you decided to make this jump way back when all those people around you did not believe in you, if you didn't believe in yourself, you'd still be sitting in Missouri.

Shawn Stevenson: That's a fact, that's a fact.

TIM GROVER: That's a fact. And even your wife had the courage enough to say, "Hey listen, I didn't believe in you either. I didn't believe in you either," and everybody else is looking for everybody else to believe in them, they want to believe in their dreams, they want them to believe in their wins. They got their own dreams, they got their wins. It's your job to bring those things to life, it's your work, it's your dedication, it's your sacrifice, it's your language of winning means to you. If you produce results over and over again, you have a higher level of confidence, and if you have a higher level of confidence and your results are measurable, every individual I know that's produced measurable results has an ego. It's necessary. It's not a bad thing. Now, you have those other individuals, that's a healthy ego. You have those other individuals that have never accomplished anything, and that love to talk, they love to diminish everybody else's success because of their lack of success, or they're faking success, they're faking winning. That's where it's a bad ego. If your results produce, you can define it as confidence, you can define it as an ego, but those are the individuals that do this over and over again. It's healthy to have that. It's just like when you talk about egos, I like to also talk about being selfish.

Selfish gets a bad rap. Also, it's not selfish, it's the word itself that gets a bad rap. What is wrong about taking care of yourself? What is wrong by creating time for yourself? If we call it me time, everybody says, "Oh, that's a healthy thing." But if you tell somebody, "Hey, I need an hour to myself," like, "Oh, you're so selfish." Okay, why do you have to go and work out every single day, because the more time I take for myself, the more confident I will be, the better my ego will be able to help other individuals, the better I will be able to take care of everybody else around.

If everything you did for self was considered selfish, you wouldn't work out, you wouldn't meditate, you wouldn't say no, you would eat what everybody puts in front of you, you wouldn't do the extra things that you need to stay healthy. In order to help everybody else, in order to bring, to help other people with their wins, in order to let them see success, in order to for them to do what they want to do, you got to do it yourself first, you got to do it yourself, and there's nothing wrong with taking care of self. Kobe always used to say, "Man, he's so obsessed." Well, how can you be number one? How can you have that number one health podcasts out there if you weren't obsessed, and everybody says obsession is a bad word. Obsession isn't a bad word, it's how you use that obsession, that makes it an advantage or disadvantage.

Shawn Stevenson: I hope that you're enjoying this compilation of eight of the most powerful moments in 500 episodes of the Model Health Show. These eight moments were hard to decide on but very, very powerful, they just stand out, so grateful to be able to share these moments with you and to share this next guest in this moment. Somebody again, that I've been learning from for many, many years, and I was first introduced to him through a movie called What The Bleep Do We Know? What The Bleep Do We Know? Really looking at quantum physics, but taking that language and putting it into a way that's understandable for everyday folks and to understand how powerful we are to affect change in our bodies, but also the world around us, and it just blew my mind watching this film and this person stood out so much, something that he said that I still to this day, 10 years later, repeat the certain phrase that he says in the film in my meditation. I kind of change the wording a little bit, but it was that powerful for me, and now to have him here in my life and to be able to bring him forward on the show, on The Model Health Show for even more people to get access to his wisdom, just such a powerful gift.

So I was so grateful to experience this moment, it is one of my all-time favorite moments here in 500 episodes of The Model Health Show, and in this clip from Dr. Joe Dispenza, best-selling author, neuroscientist, absolute world changer, he's going to be talking about cultivating your mind for greatness and creating the life that you deserve. Check out this clip from Dr. Joe Dispenza.

DR. JOE DISPENZA: So getting people to that point where they make up their mind and they make up their mind enough to begin to just think, "There's got to be a better way, there's got to be something else." That awakening process typically happens when people reach their lowest denominator when they hit rock bottom because then they can see themselves through the eyes of somebody else. You feel so altered, you're not returning any text, you feel so altered, you don't want to go to dinner with your buddies, you feel so altered, you don't want to watch your favorite TV show, you're just disconnected. And that's when you start observing yourself, but my message is, why wait for that. When you can learn to change and pain and suffering, or you can learn to change and join inspiration. If you're waking up every morning being defined by a vision of the future instead of the memories of the past, and you get up and you're inspired from an elevated self. Now instead of a limited self, you could observe the old self from an elevated state instead of that diminished state and people are doing that, so they are aware of those thoughts and yes, it takes effort and if it was easy, everybody would be doing it.

But just because you have a thought doesn't necessarily mean it's true, and when you start looking and observing those thoughts, and I think you are like Gandalf, because Gandalf also said, "You may not pass," when he meant like, that's kind of severity, when it comes to how we make up our mind about things, that's the kind of energy or intention that begins to create the biggest volume of change in our life. And I have interviewed thousands of people in our work that have healed from really serious health conditions, and I would say about 90% of them, when I asked them, "So what happened?" The first thing they say all the time is, "I just made up my mind, I just made up my mind that I was going to do this," and they made a decision with such firm intention that the amplitude of that decision carried a level of energy that was greater than the hardwired programs in their brain and the emotional conditioning in their body, and the choice that they made caused their body to respond to a new mind. In fact, the choice they made became a moment that they would never forget.

It was an event, and the stronger the emotion they felt, the more they paid attention to the choice in a sense, they were remembering their future and the body emotionally was getting a sampling, a taste of the future, and they're lying to that future. And that's when the body's healing began, that's when the miracle started, right in that moment. That's how powerful we really are. Now, what if you did that every day, what if you made up your mind every single day you weren't going to get up from your meditation until you are that person you wanted to be. Game on now, 'cause you would have to do battle with all the things that are not consistent with it, and that's exactly how our brain works. So then, if you want to be wealthy, you can't feel lack, you want to be a master, you can't judge your co-worker, you want to be like somebody great in history, then you better execute peace in every area of your life, that's the law. So you take the prayer out on the road now, you take the prayer, you're the living example of a prayer that's where it matters the most, and that's when people start getting suspicious and say, "Shawn, man, did you change your medication, you're looking way too happy all of a sudden."

Well, you're not relying on anything outside of you to bring the joy, you're overcoming yourself every day, and people say to me, "Well, why do you do your meditations in the morning?" I always say, "Easy, because if I can overcome myself at the beginning of the day, the rest of the day is easy," 'cause that's the biggest mastery, is the self. And so people are waking up to that. And they enjoy the process, I've seen when they make those type of changes, the feedback that's happening in their lives, the synchronicities, the opportunities, the coincidences, you know, those serendipities, they're starting to happen, and they're going, "Wow, I am powerful. Hey, I am a creator, and nobody's excluded from the equation." That's what makes it so cool.

Shawn Stevenson: Next up in eight of my favorite moments in 500 episodes of The Model Health Show is a conversation that I had with somebody who, you know how you meet people, certain people you just know, "Oh, yeah, we're going to be friends forever." That's what happened when Shaun T came to my studio in St. Louis and Shaun T is a world-renowned fitness expert, he's the face behind some of the most popular fitness programs ever created. Alright, so we're talking about insanity, we're talking about hip-hop abs, and the list goes on and on and on, and just genuinely one of the greatest human beings that I've ever met. So such a great time having him, and it's one of those moments that just stand out, it is just a really cool thing. He flew into St. Louis and we just really clicked and something really amazing came from this that he still speaks about today, and I do as well, it's just a really powerful moment. And in this particular clip, he's going to be sharing with you some powerful insights on appreciating the different chapters of our lives and how to make sure the next chapters are amazing. Check out this message from the one and only Shaun T.

SHAUN T: You can form the most amazing relay race with just yourself, and so I take it to track and field terms. So I'll start out by saying this, perfection is temporary, change is constant. If you take Usain Bolt, the greatest sprinter of all time, hands down. When he finishes, when he wins that 100-meter gold medal, guess what? He has to reset and refocus for the 200, and then when he wins that he has to reset and refocus for the 4 by 100-meter dash, and guess what, four years later, when the Olympics came up again, he had to do it again, it's fine that you won last time, but how are you going to continue to win this time or how are you going to prep and go.

And so I use a positive example by winning gold medals because a lot of the times we talk about the negative thing, but in life, you can create your own relay race. If you go back, people say, "I never want to be that person again." Well, I'm actually sick of seeing the before and after pictures. I want to know what happened before the before picture, who's the person that made you get to the before picture because that's the strongest person you will ever know because that's the person that actually decided that you needed to make a change, that's the person who endured all the struggle, that's the person who was doing the binge eating or the stress eating. This person is the most amazing person you know, eight-year-old Shaunee, as my family calls me, is the most amazing person I know. I still talk to him to this day. He was the first leg of the relay race of my life, so don't give up on your old self, don't take your old self and say, I never want to be that person again, because you still are that person, you're an enhanced version of that person, and that is your biggest motivator.

So you know what, that's leg number one, and they've handed the baton off to the person that decided to make a change and that person handed the baton off to the person that now has that "after photo". But what are you going to do when you take that after photo, what is the real reason for taking the after photo because it's great to share with the world and share that moment in time, but that person has to continue the journey and pass the baton on to the person who's going to help you sustain those results. So if the person you are now, and just because you might be at your "goal-weight" is not more important than the person that was 40, 50, 100 pounds heavier. You're one person, you have one body, you have all work together to get where you are and you build strength along the way. Getting uncomfortable is superpower number one, because the minute you actually start any journey, you're putting yourself in an uncomfortable situation because you want to achieve something that you don't have. And the only way to achieve something that you don't have is to get uncomfortable, and so my challenge and question to you is, "How uncomfortable do you want to get?" Because the risk has to match the reward.

And so if you want to achieve great things that are passionate and that you're passionate about and that makes you thrive then the road to that type of success is going to be extremely uncomfortable every single day, and I say uncomfortable, uncomfortability for me is fun. I'll use this example, which might not be the best example, but confrontation. See, a lot of people are afraid of confrontation. And I talk a lot about relationships because I think interpersonal relationships drive a lot of our existence throughout the day, whether it's work or whatever. But I love confrontation because I can change confrontation into an amazing positive thing. Some people get sweaty palms when they have to approach somebody. My thing is, I know at the end of this conversation because I'm going to bring positivity to this conversation, that not only are we going to have a better relationship, but the things that we can do together will create greatness.

And I do want to say, I'm not perfect in any way, shape, or form. And when you read the book, you'll know that I made some mistakes, and even today, I still make mistakes, but I invite the mistakes and I invite the turmoil because life is a journey, not a destination. There are no mistakes, just chances we've taken. India Arie says that "Lay down your regrets 'cause all you have is now." So, what are you actually going to do right now? And I'll answer that for you, get as uncomfortable as possible, do something uncomfortable every single day of your life. When you do that, it will be almost like reading a book or taking a class or a college course, because not only are you learning about something amazing, but you're learning something that you'll be able to utilize in other conversations and take in all different areas of your life, not just, I'm better at math, but your math is great, or I'm better at science. But if you actually do something new and different and uncomfortable every single day, you're going to actually help someone else who might be struggling with the same thing. So invite the turmoil, just mix it with some good and at the end, that uncomfortable feeling is going to turn out to be the most amazing thing you've done.

Shawn Stevenson: Alright, we're at the final one of our eight powerful moments, eight of my favorite moments in 500 episodes of The Model Health Show, and this one is for you. There's a lot of reason that this one made the list, but this one is for you, it's an important message that you need to hear. Now, it's one of my favorite moments because I had the opportunity to see this performed, because this part is a performance that happened here on The Model Health Show, to see it firsthand and to see the incredible gift that us as humans that we have access to and see somebody who is expressing their gift, expressing their talent, but also in a way that is advantageous and empowering for all of us. What I'm talking about is the performance that we had from the amazing IN-Q. He's a best-selling author and world-renowned speaker, spoken word artist, and in this clip, he's going to be sharing this powerful piece with you as a reminder of the incredible superpowers that you have within you. Check this out from IN-Q.

IN-Q: When I think of superheroes, I think of superhumans. I think of Superman, Black Panther, and Wonder Woman. Usually, they have a cape or a mask to hide their face, they have x-ray vision and superhuman strength. Some can even breathe in outer space, they fly around a while, but they always come back to keep our cities safe. They're here to save humanity from itself. It's a metaphor for how we look outside ourselves for help, and while the fantasies are fun, I choose to look to me and you. Yeah, we love superheroes, but we have superpowers too. Ooh! I mean, it starts with being open to this moment. If you do, then you can own it. Besides, it'll be gone before you know it, so don't blow it. You owe it to this second of eternity to show up, embrace the possibilities and slow up. Take a breath, look around, see the sights, hear the sounds, feel the ground, notice how the gravity holds you down. You could be anywhere in the world and yet you're here. When you embrace it as your own, you can overcome any fear, and real courage is looking into the mirror. It's deciding what you want to do, then making it appear it's creating out of thin air.

You must be doing something right if you got scared. Otherwise, you wouldn't care. It's a process to get here to there. We're on the journey and we're learning, but building muscle means you're going to feel some burning so don't deny it, simplify it, try it, see if it can work for you. Change perspective to get a different view and don't forget, you got to laugh at the truth, 'cause sometimes a sense of humor is the only thing that pulls you through. It's medicine if you can let it in. An attitude of gratitude will bubble up from within, so even when the storm clouds block the blue from your sky, you'll remember that the sun is waiting for you on the other side. And having fun is something we must decide from the lows to the highs. It's all a part of the ride. I could throw my hands up or I could hold on for dear life, but I'd rather live once than have to go to hell twice. Compassion is my passion. Empathy is my gift, but my growth is incremental as my consciousness shifts, so I create from the abyss, turning my pain into gold. I'm an alchemist, an optimist, and an authentic soul. I believe that life is good, even when it hurts to see.

I believe in superpowers, and I believe in you and me. I believe in superheroes, but I don't look for them above, because they exist inside us all, and we save the day of love. Keep loving through your sadness. Keep loving through your fears. Keep loving through your anger. Keep loving from your tears. Keep loving through your failure. Keep loving through success. Keep loving through anxiety. Keep loving through distress. Keep loving through rejection. Keep loving through mistrust. Keep loving through the changes. Keep loving through the death. Keep loving through your movement. Keep loving through your breath. Keep loving until loving is the only thing that's left.

Shawn Stevenson: I hope that you enjoyed these eight moments of inspiration, and thank you so much for tuning in with me today. If you did, please share this out with your friends and family. Please share this out on social media, let everybody know what you thought about this episode for them to get plugged into some inspiration. And you can tag me, I'm @ShawnModel on Instagram and on Twitter, and on Facebook, I'm at The Model Health Show. I appreciate you so much. These are just some of the powerful moments in the past 500 episodes, we've got such a powerful catalog of empowerment and education that you have access to at your fingertips at any time. Alright, so remember that you can always refer back to and deepen that understanding, that empowerment at a different level, because even right now, you are an updated version of yourself.

And to go and to revisit something, you're looking at it through new eyes, you're listening to it through new ears, you are a new person every time you experience something. So it's not that you're necessarily revisiting something, you are having a new experience and you can be able to hear things that you might not have heard before, and this is something I did as a practice for many years prior to even starting The Model Health Show, is some of the messages that were transformative for me, I would listen to over and over and over again, I play them in my car, make it Automobile University, I would watch the lectures time and time again until it became a part of my cells, it got really integrated into who I am. And so I'm a big proponent of that, and also, please know that we are just scratching the surface on what we're going to accomplish. These first 500 episodes has been such a gift and an honor. And I'm so grateful to be a part of your life. We've got so much more in store, so make sure to be ready. I appreciate you so much for tuning in. Take care. Have an amazing day. I'll talk with you soon.

And for more after the show, make sure to head over to themodelhealthshow.com, that's where you can find all of the show notes, you could find transcriptions, videos for each episode, and if you got a comment, you can leave me a comment there as well, and please make sure to head over to iTunes and leave us a rating to let everybody know that the show is awesome, and I appreciate that so much, and take care, I promise to keep giving you more powerful, empowering great content to help you transform your life. Thanks for tuning in