So you become your environment. I really believe that to be true. And I became mine. So I started doing drugs. I started selling drugs. I started becoming addicted to video games and sugar and food. And I was feeling feeling a whole with food and things that would numb me and give me some sort of dopamine hit. And things never changed for me until I was 24 years old back in 2008. I was a 250 pound obese man at that point. Yes, I was physically obese and I was in pain all the time. I was inflamed. I was overweight. But I was also mentally obese. I was mentally bankrupt. And I had all these toxic thoughts. I was depressed. I was going through a really bad time in my life where I was going through a bad breakup at that age. And I wanted to give up because I was tired of hurting every day. I was tired of crying. I was tired of being a pain. I saw no purpose. I saw nothing that was bright in my future. I saw only the darkness. And I fed into that darkness by focusing on the bad things that were happening to me. And when I realized that they weren't happening to me, they were happening for me, everything sort of changed for me. But it wasn't like it happened in a over night with like a switch. It was a whole bunch of steps that led up to that. So number one, I tried to take my life. I really, I explored suicide. And it was that bad that I just kept thinking about my mother. So it stopped me from pursuing that because I didn't want my mom to suffer if I took my life. So that was the only thing that held me back from doing that. And at that time, my best friend handed me a book. He said, I know you're going through a lot of difficult times right now. I could tell you're hurting. You might want to read this book. I think it'll make a big difference for you. So I ended up reading the book that my friend gave me. And I was never a reader, but I was desperate. So I read the book was called The Slide Edge by an author named Jeff Olson. And the book is great. It's not like that's the one book that will change everybody's life. But the book taught me about something really important and taught me about your daily habits and how your daily habits accumulate and compound over time to get your results in life. So I started to think, wow, I'm not in this position being unhealthy, unhappy and miserable, because it was something that happened in the last week or two weeks or two months. It was because of a con a combination of all these bad behaviors over years that compounded to me looking this way and feeling this way. So if my behaviors compounded in a negative way, maybe I could compound my behaviors in a positive way. So I just started to make some simple changes every day, started to move my body, started to eat real food, started that one book got me into different books like Dr. Wayne Dyer, who's a favorite of mine. I remember I remember listening or reading his books back then. And he said many, many brilliant things. One of the things that woke me up was he said, if other people are the cause of your problems, you would have to hire a psychiatrist for the rest of the world in order for you to get better. I was like, wow, that is so true, because I was blaming everybody for my problems. But I'm not going to hire a psychiatrist for the world. That's not realistic. It's really me that needs to change. He said also, when you squeeze an orange, what comes out is orange juice. Why? Because that's what's inside the orange. So when life squeezes you and you have pressure and challenges, what comes out is what's inside of you, your thoughts, your feelings and actions. So I said, Oh, if I, what's coming out now is a lot of negativity and hate and depression, because that's what has been inside of me. But if I change which inside of me, what will come out will be love, abundance, gratitude, and the words that where's the opportunity here. So I started to get really clear on my thoughts, started to get really clear on my emotions and my feelings. And I distinguished between reacting to something and responding to something. When you react, you're the victim, you're just not thinking your subconscious mind is running the show. When you're responding, you're aware and you're letting you're choosing a smarter choice and a smarter thought decision and action. So these started to all just make sense to me. And I started to combine that with eating, healthy and eating clean. And nine months after that decision to take responsibility, which was the first step here, I went from 250 pounds to 170 pounds. So I lost 80 pounds of fat. I went from 34% body fat all the way to down to 6% at my lowest. And you know, one of my biggest goals back then was a was a physical six pack because I never had that growing up. Not that is that that is synonymous with good health. It was just the goal for me back then. But the most important thing that I achieved was a mental six pack and what I did for my mental health and how food directly impacts your mood. And that's what got me started. Ever since then, I've been lit up because I changed my health and my life. And I wanted this for other people. And that was about 15 years ago. And now I feel like I am living by design, you know, that that is my purpose that the pain to purpose to promise is what happened for me. And like you said, Kate, for many of us out there, this is their story. They had to go through the challenge because then the opportunity was presented to them. So for your audience listening, if you're going through a challenge right now, if you're going through something that's really difficult to deal with, there's a lot of opportunity there. I was rock bottom and everybody has their variation and version of rock bottom, but there is a beautiful thing about being rock bottom. Because once you get out of it, the opposite direction of rock bottom is infinite. I mean, there's so much you can do as long as you get out of that rock bottom space. And I really believe it starts with taking responsibility. And then you just make small little tweaks like I did. I was saying one tweak a week, one tweak a week. And then I would master that tweak and then change the tweak. Right. So that's how I started and my purpose nowadays. Oh,

that's beautiful Ben. Well, I'm sorry for that difficult season that you went through. And I'm really grateful to you. Funny because our topic of conversation is gratitude, but I really am grateful to you for for sharing so honestly and so bonerably and openly with us because I think it's so important for us to cure these conversations of challenges of hardship of realizing, you know, I'm not where I want to be. And I'm going to start taking ownership, taking responsibility, as you say, and moving forward from there and how beautiful that, you know, your thought of your mom is what really tethered you here. And I can only imagine how proud she must be to see everything you've accomplished and done since then in these 15 years. And it actually reminds me of my rock bottom looked really different, but I had a really bad season of burnout. And I remember sitting on my couch when we lived in Illinois and just crying, I was just so stressed, I didn't know like, I just didn't know how to feel better. And I remember my husband sitting next to me and brought me my back and saying like, I wish I could fix this for you, but I can't. And for me, that was when you talk about responsibility, that was my moment of like, Oh, like, I am old the only person who can change the situation. And I have to start taking this kind of radical responsibility from my experience of life. And so I identify with so many different parts of your story in terms of that idea that nothing changes, if nothing changes. And so how can we implement these small, sustainable, I love that shift a week, right, these small, sustainable shifts over time. And they really do accumulate, right? Like you said, you were given that book, you were given a slight edge, and you weren't even a big reader. And now for anyone who's listening to this in the audio version behind Ben or hundreds of books, and he's an author four times over, right? And so the power of these small changes really do compound over time. And when you talk about, you know, the idea of this orange or this lemon being squeezed, and what comes out is what's inside the reason I really want to talk to you today is that you're an expert on this area of gratitude. And we love to talk about gratitude here on the Live by Design podcast. And I have this really firm belief that gratitude and cultivating joy and implementing habits in our day today is how we really we find that that presence and that peace in our day to day life, even while we're making progress in the direction of our dreams, I never want to lose out on my day to day experience of life, right? Because the way you live your day is how you live your life. Like I want to be really present for it, even while I'm making progress towards those things that I'm working towards and hope to achieve one day. And I feel like gratitude is such a huge part of that. So can you share with us a little bit about just what does gratitude mean to you as we get started and how would you even define it for us or somebody who's listening and is like, well, what is that? What does that even mean? Really? What would be like a working definition you would share with us?

Yeah, it's a great question. And I love that we're focusing on on the gratitude. And I call it vitamin G because I believe it acts like a vitamin and a supplement in terms of what it does to put the body in an anti-inflammatory state. So if I were to define it, there's different definitions out there, but my definition would be it's the quickest way, it's the quickest gateway to your heart when you're in a state of gratitude, it opens up your heart to appreciate what's in your life. And there's always something to appreciate, always, always, always, I mean, the fact that your heart is beating that is something to be grateful for because the chances of even being born into this world is 400 trillion to one. And the fact that you're alive is like that is something to be grateful for in itself. And then we could just look around and say, I'm grateful for this mic that I'm using to talk to Kate, I'm grateful to be able to share my story with Kate's audience. And you're wonderful questions and you're a wonderful attitude and grateful for my dog. Even though he broke a little while ago, it's like there's so many things we could be grateful for. And some people here, I don't think your audience would fall into this category because you talk about this, but some people might hear about gratitude or vitamin G. And I actually seen it on social media, like I'll make a video, give you an example, I'll make a video that is 60 seconds long. It's a real. And I'll talk about, Hey, I want to talk about my favorite supplement in the world's anti inflammatory helps with brain fog, helps with inflammation probably can help you lose weight. And then I'll talk about all the benefits. And I'll say it's vitamin G. And then at the end, I'll say it's gratitude. This is what gratitude gets you. And then most most people love to hear that. And they're like, Oh, I was trying to look for vitamin G on Amazon, but I can't find it because it's actually gratitude. But some people are like, Oh, that's stupid. That's not going to work. Right. So the people who think it's stupid, they don't understand that it's a universal law. This is something you can argue laws or something that are set in stone. Like for gravity, for example, is a not a universal law, but it's a world earth law. So for example, you might not believe in gratitude, but I could grab something and drop it in front of you. And even though you don't believe in it, you see that it exists. Well, that's how laws work. And vitamin G gratitude is a universal law. The law goes as such, what you feed energy to expands. So when you practice gratitude and you appreciate things, what you appreciate appreciates, meaning you see more things to be grateful for. And there's a, there's a, there's a scientific reason behind this. There's a part of the brain. It's the size of your pinky. And it's in your brain stem. It's called the reticular activating system. And here's how it works. Let's say, Kate, I wanted to buy a new car. And let's say it's like an Audi. I wanted to buy a new Audi and it's an SUV Audi and I wanted to get a red SUV Audi. So, you know, for a few weeks, I go on the internet and I go on auto trader, I go to the Audi website, I'm doing a lot of research and putting a lot of energy into this red Audi. What are the price points? Should I buy it new? Should I lease it? And then I make the decision to drive to the dealership and I buy this beautiful red Audi. And now I'm driving home from the dealership in my red Audi. And I noticed that, you know, at the red light that I'm stopped at, there's another red Audi same car, just like mine. And I think, Oh, that's a coincidence. But for weeks, I see the same car that I bought all over the place. Now, the question is this, did everybody else buy a red Audi now that I bought one? Because they thought, I'm cool. I'm gonna get one too. Or were the red outies always there? But now I see them because I've activated that reticular activating system. Well, of course, it's the latter because that's what that part of the brain does. It's the selective seeking part of your brain. So how does this relate to gratitude? Let's talk about the opposite of gratitude. Resentment, hate, anger. When you focus on that, like I did when I was depressed and suicidal, you get more resentfulness, you get more things to be resentful for you, you get more hate, you get more anger, because that's what your RAS is going to focus on. But when you make this shift to gratitude, now the obstacles turned into opportunities. And now it's not happening to you. Like I said, it's happening for you. And like you said, with your burnout story, like same thing, like where's the opportunity here? Like you take responsibility. So gratitude's amazing. And there's research to show what it does. Dr. Joe Despensa, he's done vitamin G workshops. He calls him gratitude workshops. I call him vitamin G workshops, but he's taking participants and measured their blood levels like their IgA levels, which is important for the immune system. He's measured their brain chemistry. And he's seen when they practice gratitude, 1200 chemical reactions take place instantaneously to put their body and their brain in this healing state. I mean, it is super, super powerful. And one more note on the gratitude thing, our thoughts are very powerful. We become what we think about. We get what we think about most of the time. A lot of people say, I want this, I want that, I want, I need this. But you don't get what you want in life, you get what you are and what you are your thoughts. And the average person has about 60,000 thoughts per day. And they determine that out of those 60,000 thoughts, 90% of those thoughts are the same thoughts from yesterday. And 85% of those thoughts are negative thoughts, stinking thinking, I call it. And look, if you're thinking this, stinking your dreams are shrinking. I always say that. So if you have 60,000 thoughts per day, and we know through research, like Dr. Bruce Lipton is a world renowned cell biologist, that your thoughts have the ability to communicate with your DNA nucleus and tell your DNA nucleus to produce a protein good or bad. That means if it's a negative thought, it's an inflammatory protein, if it's a grateful thought, it's an anti inflammatory protein. So if that's the case, and that is the case, that means we have 60,000 opportunities every single day to put the body in an anti inflammatory state. And it's free. Okay, so those are some many reasons why I love vitamin G.

And I love that then because there are so many times I think we hold ourselves back from starting that thing that we know we have that inkling, I call it like a heart tug. We've just been learning about intuition over in the LBD collective and women talking about these little heart tugs and sometimes we hold ourselves back because we're like, okay, my heart tug is that I want to start a daily practice of going for a really mindful walk. Okay, well, then I need the headphones and the fancy sneakers and the wicking socks and you know, the nice sports brown, all these da da da da da da da da. And we hold ourselves back because we're like, okay, well, I have to get perfect before I can start when in reality, probably have a pair of shoes that you can wear. You probably have an outfit you can just put on and go for a one mile walk and be really mindful with yourself and really present with yourself, right? Like you can just go do it. And so often we make things harder than they need to be. And I think that's one of the really beautiful things about a gratitude practice is like you just said, it is free. And you can start right away. This isn't something like you I'm guaranteed you have a journal sitting around that you could use, right? Or you can open up a note in your phone. There are any number of ways that we can make this harder than it needs to be. And there's also like a very easy way to just get started. So for the person that Ben who's listening and they're like, okay, vitamin G sounds amazing. And you've taken out of this this woo woo world and you've made it really concrete for us. Where do we get started? And especially for the person who has a little bit of trouble practicing gratitude, what would be your suggestions or even your words of encouragement for that person?

Yeah, wonderful question. The best way to start with vitamin G, a vitamin G practice would be right before bed. And I say that because right before bed is when the subconscious mind is most impressionable, you're essentially feeding it good or bad, but it's going to manifest into your reality that you're going to go to bed and you're going to process it and then it'll determine kind of like the actions and the thoughts you think the next day. So right before bed, a simple thing to do is grab a journal like you said or a piece of paper. It doesn't have to be a journal if you have a piece of paper that's fine. And write down 10 things that happen that day that you're grateful for. And like I said earlier, there's so many things to be grateful for. The fact that you're breathing is something to be grateful for. So 10 things you're grateful for. And if you have trouble reaching 10, start with five and then go to bed. Right. And the key though is to not treat it like a checklist. I used to do this myself. 10 things done. It's good to bed. 10 things done. It's good to bed. The key is to feel it, to feel the gratitude. So you might want to spend 30 seconds or so on each grateful moment. Like, for example, Kate, tonight I'm going to write. I am very grateful that I was invited to your podcast and you allowed me to share with your community. I got to share my story. I got to share about the power of vitamin G. I got to be introduced to a new audience that you've developed and cultivated. And I know that you protect that audience and you trust me to come in here and share with your audience. So I'm grateful for that. And I'm going to sit there and feel that gratitude like we're back into this conversation. So feeling the gratitude is important. Now, if you're having trouble feeling it and you're having trouble practicing gratitude, which can happen, I've seen that before. One of the best things you can do is to I know that might sound a little wild, but to remove a person or a thing from your life mentally, for example, I, you could do different ways. There are more extreme ways to do this. But if there's somebody in your life, let's say your mom, right, I'm very grateful for my mom. But let's say I was having trouble feeling grateful for my mom, then I would mentally go to a place where my mom was not around anymore. And it might sound like a dark place, but knowing that she actually is around, I'm going to be more grateful knowing that she is around right now. So I'm going to feel grateful for the fact that she is around. I could call right now, she'll pick up the phone, I could text her. So you might want to subtract some and it doesn't have to be a person, it could be a thing. Like, for example, I just moved from an apartment building in a nice area that had a beautiful view. And I was always grateful sitting out in my balcony and like drinking my coffee and doing my self development every morning there. I was always grateful. But once I knew I was moving, I had about 45 days knowing that I was going to move. I was more grateful because I knew it was going to be taken away from me. Right. So sometimes we get a mentally or even actually take things away from us for us to experience that gratitude. And that for those who are struggling to appreciate gratitude would be a way that I would do it.

That's beautiful, Ben. You know, it's funny because I have a real time example of that right now as we're recording this episode will drop in the fall, but we're recording over the summer. And I have about four weeks until both my boys start school full time for the first time ever because they were kids. Yeah. So my youngest was born. I decided to stay home full time with my boys. And when my youngest was 10 months old, COVID started. And he has a little bit of a kidney issue from when he was born. So we're very cautious. And so for a really long time, they've been home with me. And then, you know, we had some separation anxiety. So all that to say, we did a homeschooling preschool situation. And so these look, I have been my buddies for about four and a half years. And in just about a month's time, they're both going to be in school full time. And I'm so excited for them and all that they're going to learn and experience. And it really is the subtraction of them from my day all the time is making me really cherish these moments. And so today, my oldest was like, Mom, can you put me up in that tree in the backyard? I like to sit in and and will you read your book to me? He loves for me to just read whatever I'm reading out loud to him. And I'm like, yeah, sure kid, that sounds awesome. And he just sat in the tree and was like playing with the crab apples while I read a book to him. And it's just a special moment that we got to have. And and because I know that soon he won't be as accessible to me in terms of his time. I appreciate it even more. And even while I'm in that moment, I have that that pause of, oh, this is going to be one of the things I'm grateful for tonight because I have a nightly grads you've practiced too. And there's something really beautiful about being able to go through your day and and pick these moments and say like, Oh yeah, that coffee on my balcony with the view. I know it's going away and it makes me appreciate it even more or the special moment of, you know, reading with my son, you know, it's it might not be as accessible soon. And so I'm appreciating it even more. And so then I'm really grateful to you for explaining that and kind of troubleshooting gratitude for us in terms of that subtraction method is new to me in those terms. But it makes so much sense. And so for for Ben, for the person who's listening, and they're like, okay, yeah, I like, I feel and I understand and appreciate the benefits of vitamin G and they're ready to get started. But they just need that final word of encouragement. What is it that you would encourage them with today? Yeah,

I know love, you know, your share was just perfect. This is exactly it. You know, when you know something is going to be gone, you tend to appreciate it more unfortunately, we in this our society, we allow things to happen. Meaning we are more reactive than proactive is what I'm trying to say. So it's so much better to be proactive than reactive. Einstein said, intellectual solve problems, geniuses prevent them. So we want to be preventative here and be proactive, not reactive. But you know, if you're still having trouble doing it, I would just say it's free, give it a shot, it doesn't take much time. You might want to start with one thing that you're grateful for, just spend 30 seconds with one thing you're grateful for. And it's like a muscle. The more you do it, the more the stronger you're going to get that muscle is going to get. So maybe you go from one thing, one tweak a week, right? Maybe every night, one thing every night for one week, and then you add a second thing. That's your second tweak. And then your third thing. And then you're going to find that you want to practice gratitude as much as possible, because you can do it whenever you want. There's no upper limits of vitamin G, and overdose on it. There's no toxicity limit. You can do it all the time. You know, when I walk my dog out here with my fiance, I'm constantly in a state of gratitude. I'm looking at the trees, I'm looking at my safe neighborhood. I'm grateful for that. So you're going to find that you're going to just your r s is going to be just picking up all these things that you're grateful for. So starts with one thing, though, start tonight with one thing, and just go from there and build that muscle. And then over time, you'll really, really what you're doing is reprogramming your brain, you're remilating your brain. And now your r s is going to be working for you versus against you.

Oh, Ben, I love that. And to bring this very full circle at the beginning of our conversation, you talked about your highest values and how 15 years ago, the values that you had were not serving you. And so you had mentioned things like love and abundance and gratitude. And so now that you're a decade and a half into this journey, what are those highest values? Is it love and abundance and gratitude? What is it that if your orange were squeezed, so to speak, what are the, what's the juice now for you? What is that that highest value look like and feel like? Yeah,

great question. Yeah, love, it's love. When you know, going back to Wayne Dower, he said, love is my gift to the world, right? I feel the same way as he did. It's love. You know, like, for example, if I, you know, I'm on social media and I think social media could be great if you use the right way, but I get negative comments. It's just part of the part of the game, right? But when I get negative comments, my response, not reaction, my response is to show that person love. They must be in a very difficult place to hate somebody they don't know or say something negative that they don't even know they don't know me and they're saying something negative. So they I send them love. And sometimes I even message that like, hey, you must be going through a difficult time sending you love or hey, I'm praying for you. Sometimes I'll say it, sometimes I'll think it, but it's love really when life squeezes me, it's love. It's thinking about, okay, where's the opportunity here? Where's the lesson? Why is it happening for me? What can I do about? Where can I take responsibility? What can I learn from this? And I really believe when you have that sort of mindset and it doesn't happen over time and I work on it constantly. But I really believe when you have that sort of mentality that you are responsible and nobody else is responsible for the things you want to do, it takes you out of that victim mindset and you stop being the victim of your history and you immediately start to become the victor of your destiny. I really believe that and those thoughts play a big role into it. I remember a gentleman that I studied as well named Dr. John DeMartini. He always used to say and he still does. He's alive. He says, your inner most dominant thoughts become your outer most tangible reality. It's such an incredible quote because it is so true. So for me, I've done so much to reprogram my RAS and my brain that my thoughts are positive, right? Most of the time, sometimes, you know, I could fall, we all fall into it, but it's not about the problem about falling into a negative mindset. It's how long are you going to stay there until you actually take responsibility and get out of that place. And that is what I believe. It's the stimulus that happens in the gap between you feeling like a victim versus getting out of that victim mindset. If you could shorten that gap, you're going to find yourself happier and healthier.