In this episode Matt Gagnon discusses his journey from corporate burnout to living a fulfilling life aligned with his core values. The conversation delves into the benefits of personalized morning routines, the importance of actions over words, and how early rising can enhance personal fulfillment and productivity. Additionally, Matt shares insights on overcoming adversity, harnessing simple habits for mental and physical well-being, and balancing work with personal growth. Highlights include Matt’s experiences at the Gathering Summit, his philosophy on resilience, and the impactful story of delivering a TED talk during the COVID-19 pandemic. This episode offers practical advice on living intentionally, maintaining a healthy mindset, and embracing the challenges that lead to extraordinary living.
Episode Highlights:
06:09 The Power of Atomic Mornings
07:55 The Importance of Morning Routines
30:25 The Sugar Crash Cycle
31:14 Finding Your Muse
40:02 Overcoming Adversity
43:31 The TED Talk Journey
Matt Gagnon spent 15 years entrenched in the corporate grind, sacrificing family time and personal milestones, including a decade without Thanksgiving celebrations. After facing burnout and health challenges, he left his six-figure job in 2015, determined to reclaim his life and serve others. Overcoming fears and limited beliefs, Matt rebuilt his world, becoming an international coach, TEDx speaker, and author. He empowers clients to align their lives with their values, showing them it’s never too late to create a fulfilling comeback story. Matt believes that with courage and boundaries, anyone can achieve both a thriving life and an epic career.
Connect with him here: mattgagnon1
Episode Transcript:
00:45
Acta Non Verba is a Latin phrase that means actions, not words. If you want to know what somebody truly believes, don’t listen to their words. Instead, observe their actions. I’m Marcus Aurelius Anderson, and my guest today truly embodies that phrase. My good friend, Matt Gagnon, knows all about what it takes to win. From burnout to breakthrough, he’s lived it all. After 15 years in the corporate grind, missing out on life’s most precious moments, he took a leap of faith and transformed his life.
01:12
Now he’s the founder of Atomic Mornings, which is blowing up. He’s a TEDx speaker. He’s a certified professional coach helping others rediscover their true selves and live a line with their core values. And as I said, before we hit record, he’s also the only man that I’ve actually allowed on stage with me to present. Because there are some people, if you get them on a stage, the thing that they want to do is try to use it as an opportunity to pitch, to sell, to not respect the people that are there. And that’s not what Matt does. Matt lives it.
01:42
does it, understands what it takes. Matt Gagnon. Follow him on LinkedIn, send him a connection request. This guy is an incredible speaker. As I said, I wouldn’t have had him on the stage if he wasn’t. And as a matter of fact, you’re speaking at the Gathering Summit in Canada, which is a huge, huge honor. Tell everybody about what the summit is and what this means to you. Yeah, thank you. The summit is actually, it’s one of Forbes top.
02:10
ranked business summits in the world and it’s held in Banff, Alberta, Canada. And I’ve been going, this will be year five for me to go to this thing. I love doing a TED Talk. It was a huge honor for me. This is just like even bigger for me because the people I’ve met at this thing have been like a new chosen family for me. The speakers that go to this thing, you’re seeing some of the top CMOs and executives.
02:36
of some of the biggest brands on the planet go to this, but not only they speak of this, they stay at it for the whole event. They listen to their peers speak. They don’t just jump on the plane and leave. It’s amazing for this to see these people. But what I love the most about it is it’s not some big fluff story. It’s not a bunch of… Also, it’s not like a bunch of social media influencers. These are people who are time tested and proved like battlefield. Like they’ve done the work. They’ve been hired. They’ve been fired.
03:06
Like they’ve worked for multiple companies. I mean, some of them come back and spoken next year and they’re working for somebody else now, but that’s the way the business is, you know, in some of those positions. And every decision they make is either one that’s gonna be huge for their career or get them fired. You know, and that’s what being a CMO can be like in a lot of companies, it’s different. But what I love though is just they come and they share intimate stories.
03:32
and vulnerable stories about their own lives, their own careers, and the company too. They’re not there to try and make their company look perfect or themselves. And that’s why they invite just they invite really good people. They invite people from companies that have great cultures, great cult like followings. And so the founder of this is was one of my very first clients with Atomic Mornings. And I’ve been a huge fan of going to this thing to be invited this year to speak about
04:00
you know, routines and self-care. It’s just, I can’t wait to serve this audience of people. Because if it helps them, the trickle down is just gonna be huge to how it serves everybody else in their life. Yeah, there have been some big heavy hitters there. So you being on that same stage is a huge testament to who you are, what you stand for. For those that don’t know, I’ve known Matt since 2017. One of the LinkedIn connections that I actually resonated with immediately because…
04:28
instead of trying to post three times a day with a bunch of bullshit, superfluous stuff to try to get a call to action. And I have two spots left now. Um, yeah, we’re making the throw up phase because that’s what a lot of people are doing with all social media. And we got on a call and just connected immediately. And the thing was, and we still see now, even back then the answer was more and more and more.
04:57
push, push, push. And you and I have been in positions enough, not only as that person who’s trying to look for more and more and more and push, push, push, but also helping those people that have been in those positions where they’re like, I don’t know if I can do more. I don’t know what there is anymore to push. Or they bust their ass for a decade to make something happen. They get this huge accomplishment and they achieve it. Now they go, that’s it.
05:26
like it’s so anticlimactic and now they’re like, well, this is what I thought it was gonna be, or I thought this accomplishment would make me into the person that I wanna be and heal these inadequacies and fill these gaps. And yet they’re still the same broken, imperfect person that they were, which is fine, we all are. But I think that they think that by giving up everything, it will somehow make what the sacrifice that they’re doing worth it.
05:55
When in actuality, it does not. Yeah, I couldn’t agree more with you. So I’m just honored to be here, brother. It’s been a hell of a ride. Yeah, it has. Seriously, hearing that intro, man, just really, thank you. Thank you. Thank you for being here and doing the work. The speaking, like I said, you came up and you did an incredible keynote for my group at Do The Work in 2019. I will be doing some more live events eventually once I get this book and this apparel where it needs to be. Having said that.
06:25
Atomic mornings, that thing has been a game changer for a lot of people. And I think the thing that makes it so efficient is its simplicity. Yeah, thanks for saying that, because I’ve always been the extreme guy in my entire life. And I’ve always been told like, hey, you know, you need to slow down more. Like I think that phrase was used my entire life. Like you just need to slow down more. And the problem with that phrase is no one ever tells you what that means. Like no one ever says like,
06:54
What the fuck does that actually mean? Like slow down. What do you tell me? Give me some direction on it. They wouldn’t, you just need to slow down. Usually what that meant was they just, like well I’m a little envious of how you’re achieving results is typically what that meant. And you should slow down so it doesn’t make the rest of us look inadequate and stupid. And there’s some truth to that. And the other truth is too is like yeah, I did need to know how to slow down a little bit but no one gave me that direction and I had to learn on my own to burn out and figure out like all right, I need to take a different approach.
07:23
But Atomic Mornings was simple. The whole idea of it was like, and it never was meant to be a program ever. It was just meant for me because I was tired of feeling anxious every day. I was tired of feeling like a prisoner to my calendar. And I was like, something’s gotta change. I was tired of like waking up at the last second, tired of feeling like I didn’t have enough time. I was just tired of feeling like I wasn’t enough.
07:47
That’s ridiculous to work so hard every week and feel like you’re still not enough. And like, nobody should feel that. That’s ridiculous. So I was like, you know, maybe I should just try mornings out. I always said I was a night burst, but I never gave mornings a fair chance. Unless I had a flight. That was it. But like if I did, like when I sat and I thought back to a really simpler time in life, which is where I love to take most people I serve, I was like, let’s go back to a simple time. And it was like when I was 15.
08:16
15 or 16. I was still kind of like a chubby kid. I just finished my freshman year of high school. Still awkward. But I was at like, you know, we had a little place by a pond in the summer and I decided to get up at 430 every morning that summer. I just got up and I walked the jog around the pond. It was five miles, you know, and I did that every morning and I drank a gallon of water.
08:44
I did some bounding and sprinting drills afterwards, did some light weights that I had. Yeah, I got shredded that summer. And the thing was, it was non-negotiable. I did it every morning, I loved it. And then I started running that part. Like I could run that thing hard, it was great. And yeah, I remember I didn’t go to the ocean with family one day, because it was gonna interfere with my morning routine. And they were like, okay. But God, I felt great. I went back, I was in the best shape.
09:12
I was in such peace up here. And then that was the only summer I ever did that. You know, and it took me some time to remember that. So yeah, this whole approach was like, I’m just gonna get up and I’m not gonna write down a list of all this shit I’m gonna do. All the things that I just said I did, it took me time to develop that. But the whole goal was just to wake up and just do that pond, you know, that was it. And all the things that came with were amazing. But yeah, I decided to film it at the last second. I was like, I’m gonna record this thing. I did a daily 30 day.
09:42
video documentary about it. And, and yeah, the whole goal is just the beginning was I decided 430 again. And that was my decision. You don’t have anyone who tells you have to wake up at 5am to be successful as an asshole. Like you just have to wake up when it’s works for you. Like figure out how much time you want for yourself to be alone by yourself every morning. That’s when you wake up, you know, so if your family’s up at eight, and you want three hours yourself and great and maybe five is your time, you know, but
10:12
430 was mine because I just for some reason that number clicked for me. I like the idea it was still dark outside. I like seeing that transition from seeing the sun, you know, the moon going down and the sun coming up. I like that stillness, that eerie, quiet feeling. And I also knew that 430, it was very few of us awake. By five, that was when some people started waking up. I like that stillness. And so I did that. And my goal in the beginning was to just do nothing.
10:41
Like I had no goal. Like I was just gonna celebrate being awake. Like just to get some wins going, you know? And then yeah, you let it build organically. But the whole thing is like, you’re not waking up early to work more. Like you, hell no, you’re not gonna get on email. Like that’s not happening. Like you’re gonna do all the things that you dream about doing every day. Like if you said, if I just woke up or like work out more, all the things that you say you would love to do, which you never do, no.
11:10
Because when people just say like, yeah, no, like, you know, I’m, I’m, I’m, I really want to work out more. And it’s like, well, what have you done to make time for that? Well, I haven’t. I said, well, then what you really want to do is talk about working out more. You actually don’t want to work out more. If you did, you take action, right? That’s what this whole thing’s about taking action. So it was about finally letting people stop having the shame of just talking about wanting to do things, but never doing it. And always feeling.
11:40
upset with themselves and finally putting some action behind it. Debunking all these myths that they don’t have time for things. People don’t have time for things. They just don’t want to make time. I was like, you have time for this shit. You just don’t want to wake up early, baby. That was the whole thing. That’s self-talk too. The biggest thing is most adults don’t want to go to bed early. They throw tantrums like children, I don’t want to go to bed. Why? Well, I don’t want to miss out on life. I’m like, what are you doing that’s so…
12:09
It’s so profound at night, watching Netflix, like, dicking around on your phone. Yeah, like eating crap. Like, I know what you’re doing. Like, I was there too. Like, there’s nothing. Like, you’re not missing out on life. You’re actually just up late thinking about the life you wish you could have. Like, that’s it. So you get up in the morning, you’d actually enjoy it. Like, you know, you stay up late and your productivity, all the projects you said you’re gonna do at night.
12:39
Like you don’t, you’re tired. And so you start to decline as the night gets longer and longer and you start eating bags, your body says we should sleep and you’re saying, no, let’s not. So it says, let’s eat carbs and sugars. And you feel like shit, you go to bed and you sleep like crap and you didn’t do any of the work that you said you were going to do. Instead, you wake up early and you just build momentum and your productivity goes up versus crashing. And so that’s, that’s where it’s at. Like there’s no secret to this. It’s just.
13:09
You’re reallocating your time. You’re not losing time. You’re not missing out on life. You’re just taking, it’s the same damn 24 hours in a day. You’re just taking time at night. You’re reallocating it into the morning. Look, if you want to watch Netflix in the morning, go for it. But like, you’ll find that your energy will increase, at least as the morning goes on and you’ll feel better. But yeah, and not everybody has to have this same workout routine. Not everybody has to have like the same things they do in the morning. It’s custom, it’s for you.
13:39
Right. You want to read, you want a journal, you want to crochet, I don’t give a shit. Like, let’s find out what lights you up. Like, what’s the thing that you’re missing in your life? So that’s it. I will tell you the most consistent thing that has served every single person I’ve worked with, including myself, was the morning walk. The walk. Something. Didn’t have to be a run, just a walk. Like, every single person, it’s amazing. They all valued the walk. And the sooner they did it, the better. You know?
14:09
and just getting outside and even encouraging them. I encouraged all of them to not listen to music or a podcast during it. So just go out and walk. Listen. Don’t put any other input into your head other than what’s around you. And they found that the walk just became like this non-negotiable thing. Because when they sacrifice the walk for something else they said they had to do, it never served them. It drained the tank.
14:39
So, it’s like, well then why would you sacrifice a thing that makes you your best? Like, that’s stupid. Don’t do that. So, a lot of eye-opening experiences with this. I’ve learned a lot of stuff just from the emotional and vulnerability side of this and also just from the technical and scientific side of it through sleep studies and everything else that helps validate those things. So I can dive into that anytime. But yeah, that’s the long answer to all of this.
15:07
Oh, I love it. It’s very simple. It’s very simple. Let me let me give you a, let me keep it. I think also that because people, especially now they want to fetishize a morning routine, they put all these overcomplications in it and they want to do all these things. It’s like, honestly, if you’re listening to us right now, you already have a morning routine. Routine just means what do you do consistently? But if your morning routine means that you hit snooze five times.
15:33
and you drag your ass out of bed at the last second and you’re sucking on coffee and eating like some sugary bullshit breakfast on the way to work in hopes that you’ll get to your cubicle in time, then that’s your routine. But what are you doing? You’re literally setting yourself up for failure. Is it the best routine? No, but you’re not taking enough ownership and accountability to say, again, like you’re saying. And when I was bartending, I was a night person, but I had to learn.
16:02
Listen, if I’m going to bed at four, getting up at noon, while that’s not ideal, it’s still what my routine is. So if I got up at 1130, I magically had an extra half hour that I wouldn’t normally have. And in half an hour, you can do one thing for half an hour. You can do two things for 15 minutes. Like you said, you can go for a walk. Then you can journal, you can meditate, you can pray, you can do whatever you want to do, but all that shit that you claim that you were going to do, if you had time again, if.
16:32
If everything’s a priority, then nothing’s a priority. And we find that when we prioritize things that are not really priorities, all of a sudden we feel anxious. All of a sudden we feel like we shouldn’t enough. The hour that you get in the morning is worth three hours afternoon. Oh yeah, yeah, you nailed it. It’s just about intentional living, you know? And that’s the thing, like, I always have people work on their planners at night.
16:59
get their day ready, you know, like get everything out of your head and put it in your planner. Like I’ve used everything from the full focus planner by Michael Hyatt. It’s pretty hardcore. I like that one a lot. There’s a passion planner, which is a little fun too. But either way, using a planner and just writing your stuff down, what’s going to be your tomorrow, what you’re going to be intentional about personally and professionally gets you ahead of the game versus you writing your planner the morning of like you’re already kind of behind the ball a little bit. Like if you can wake up and already know
17:28
what your day’s gonna look like. That’s huge. And plus, you’re gonna sleep better. Because you go to bed and you’re starting to think about tomorrow looks like, it sounds a lot crazier in your head than it will on paper. So you write it down on paper and you’ll notice the insanity in your head’s like three things. And I love having people be intentional about like, it’s not just about the big things, but what’s the stuff that takes up this crazy, nagging real estate in your head of like.
17:54
The person you’ve been thinking about texting for the past three months, you keep saying, I should really text that person, but you don’t. It’s not like it’s a huge thing in your calendar. What if you just did that thing? It’s nagging you every day. So tackle that too. So always try and find these things. And the simplicity is huge too. I’m like, look, just because your planner’s got 17 lines on it doesn’t mean you need to fill all 17 lines. Don’t do that. You set yourself up for a loss. Do the shit that you know you’re capable of doing. If you can do more, great. But…
18:23
You gotta make time for your self care or else you’re gonna just burn out to pieces. And I’ve done it so many different times. But again, the simplicity behind it all is like, let things organically start to grow. Like let yourself get hungry to work out more. Let yourself get hungry to eat better. Because if it builds up and you want it, like that’s when you have sustainable results. And the whole purpose of like how I changed this for myself was I asked the questions of what kept me in bed, what kept me up late at night.
18:52
And that’s what the answer was to sustainable change. If I understood that staying in bed longer was because I was anxious and I was trying to delay the expectations of the day, you know, from weighing me down, I stayed under the blankets. That was it. If I stayed up late at night, it was just because I didn’t want the next day to happen. So I just delayed that. Like, doesn’t make sense, but it did. You know, and so once you understand the emotional pieces behind it, that’s sustainable change.
19:21
You know, and so because I want this to be something that is a lifetime thing. So when we’re done working together, you’ve got this, you know, you maybe you’ll come back and you’ll do an oil change and we’ll tune up, you know, and do it again. You know, whatever. Some people like the fellowship of it every morning and that kind of morning coaching, that’s great. But like either way, I want it to be sustainable. It’s just like having a personal trainer, except with a personal trainer, it’s more sustainable if they can help you do the emotional side of why you stop working out. You know, why?
19:51
You know what happens when you hit crisis? You know, like that’s what makes workouts sustain. Anyone can kick your ass and you can white knuckle through it if you meet them every day. But like, can you learn how to be accountable on your own? Like, can you figure that out? Like, can you figure out how to take care of yourself without somebody there? Like, and there’s nothing wrong with accountability. It’s great. It’s awesome to have, but like, look, when you’re down, when you’re really like up against the wall and you’ve got crisis going on and there isn’t somebody there to kick your ass, can you count on yourself?
20:21
Will you be there? Can you rise up? Will you understand what’s really going on in your head? What’s true and what’s not? That’s the big thing. So when you have somebody to help you figure out what your limiting beliefs are, what all that bullshit is in your head, and you can get to the point where you can hear that stuff and think, that’s a fucking lie that I’m hearing in my head right now. And I don’t have to believe in that, and that’s why I’m gonna stick to doing what I do. I don’t need somebody to tell me to. It’s great to have someone in my corner, but it’s good to know that, like, hey, look.
20:52
There’s no one around and it’s just you. You’re going to be all right. Yeah. I think also that that internal dialogue is key. And as you’re mentioning, we can literally program that in any given time. If we so choose, we can literally have like a team, a dream team in our mind that is customized and you can choose anybody that you want. It can be God, Gengelen, it you not to quit. It can be Gandhi or Marcus Aurelius or anybody that’s like telling you in that moment, dude, this is where you need to be.
21:21
The other part of it is this understanding that when people see adversity or hardship, a lot of times they say they want to use like a motivational quote to like push them through it, but that’s artificial and it’s unsustainable. There’s also that part of them that wants to see it and then they get into this tailspin. But I’d like to point out that there’s a third option, which is you can acknowledge that it’s there and be aware of it and still choose to say, listen.
21:51
This doesn’t matter. I’m walking beyond you. I’m walking past you. I’m not engaging you. I’m just circumventing you. Not in a way that, I live in Oklahoma, so there’s tornadoes during tornado season. Am I, do I live in fear of them? No. Am I aware of them? Sure. And if something happens and I need to take cover, I will. But I’m not gonna live my life in fear because of the potential of this one thing that even though it’s more likely in this part of the country, it’s still very low.
22:19
that it’s going to actually happen. And if it does, I have a contingency set up. So I’m good. Exactly. You nailed it. Most people don’t have the contingency. Most people don’t want to open it up and really take a good hard look at it and say, okay, well, what are no bullshit? What are the realities? What do I have? Yeah. The part that you nailed though is like you can acknowledge the voice that you gain knowledge and stuff. That’s that’s actually real strength. You know, other than this bullshit of like, I don’t have those voices. I don’t hear that stuff. Like, yeah, you’re lying.
22:48
Like ignore it. The shits there. It’s there. It’s real power to look it in the face They have time for you and keep moving like That’s real strength and look the voices that we hear of that stuff that you weren’t born with that No one’s born to doubt themselves like you inherited that stuff. Unfortunately from well-intentioned adults from assholes You know from traumatic situations you inherited these voices that said you can’t do certain things You know, it just comes from a broken part of you
23:17
That’s it. It’s still a part of you. I mean, you can hate the voice if you want to, but it’s still part of you. That voice is born from fear and brokenness. It thinks it’s trying to protect you. It’s terrible. It’s a very unqualified leader in your head. It shouldn’t be. But some of us, most of us at some point in time, myself included, have allowed that voice to be in charge and to run the show. They hired this voice to be their CEO or a very prominent figure in their internal board of directors.
23:46
and they have done a horrible job. They’ve never meant you harm though. They just wanna prevent it. They wanna try and prevent being hurt, taking advantage of and being embarrassed. Let’s not be too big of a, too successful in life because then we’re a target for getting hurt and falling, but let’s not die either. So they just wanna keep you right there and keep you alive, nice and safe and boring.
24:13
Yeah, you could choose to hate it if you want, but it’s still a part of you. You can just be like, not today. I don’t know. And I usually tend to tell him, I’m like, look, I’ve got this. I run the show. Thanks for your feedback. But look, Carl, we’re gonna keep going. Even if you can, I work with the clients, I serve them, name this voice, give them a name. Because it’s way less intimidating and way less powerful when you name the thing and you can just put it in its place. But again, it is a part of you that’s built from fear and brokenness.
24:42
and hate it all you want, it’s still part of you. So there’s no need to hate it. Just acknowledge it, move onward. That’s it. Be aware of it, but don’t let it influence you. It has no consequence if we don’t give it consequence. Exactly. That’s the key. I think also that with these routines, like the morning routine, like you said, with the walk, my wife and I are very much in that mode where for us, we’re both entrepreneurs. So it forces us to get, like, look at the deck. What’s your day like? What’s going on here?
25:12
She’ll put stuff on my calendar. So it just kind of shows up and I’m like, Oh, I guess I’m taking my wife to dinner tonight or, you know, we’re doing this thing, but it’s nice to be able to do that. And then like you said, when you’re outside, you get in sunlight, you’re moving, you’re getting cardio. Again, you mentioned the physiology, the entire hormonal cascade that you initiate from just doing that singular thing of going for a walk. I remember you saying when we were talking a long time ago that he used to drink like 10 Red Bulls a day or something crazy.
25:42
- Oh my God. And what are you doing? You’re chasing that same hormonal adaptation and stimulus that you would get from just going for a walk in the morning without nuking your adrenal glands and the rest of your central nervous system. Well, to be fair, it was also with 60 milligrams of Adderall. There’s that part. But it was sugar-free Red Bull because I was the guy, the calories and the carbs.
26:08
I just supplemented with more chemicals. But what I didn’t know was I didn’t know I was narcoleptic either. So I had narcolepsy. And so I was combating that because if I didn’t have all that energy, then I wouldn’t be valuable. So instead, I blew out my adrenals and developed more illness from that. So it’s amazing how much you can heal for some really simple shit. And I can’t bitch about being sick because I have…
26:38
an ungodly list of very rare illnesses that I just seem to love to collect. But they’re not excuses, they’re superpowers that I’ve learned to overcome through really simple shit. Not looking for magic pills. It’s a cocktail of stacking the deck here of like really basic shit. You can’t bitch about your illness or your circumstances if you eat shit, if you don’t sleep, you know, if you’re not making time to take care of yourself and move your damn body, do some fitness.
27:06
If you surround yourself with people who are poisonous and toxic, then yeah, you’re going to be sick. So don’t bitch about it. If you’re not willing to do the simple stuff in life. Yes, medicine is important. I believe in that too. I’m a pretty balanced guy. So yeah, I believe in having some medicine. I believe in faith. I believe in my fitness and personal self care. You know, have a witch doctor, whatever. Like I’ll stack the deck with everything, you know, but it works. And that’s why if I do take medicine for something, I have done.
27:36
everything in my power to make that stuff work for me too. Like I’m taking care of myself. I’m not expecting this pill to do all the work for me. It’s going to be an aid in it and hopefully I can get away from it and never need it again. You know, and that’s the goal. But I’ve overcome some illnesses. My doctor said this is you’re at a level of overcoming this. That’s not possible. You know, and so and for mornings, I’ll tell you what, like I have something called Addison’s disease. It’s an adrenal insufficiency. My body doesn’t even make enough.
28:05
adrenaline or cortisol. It doesn’t like it’s not supposed to. If I go in a fight or flight, it puts me at risk of going into shock and coma. You know, like it’s serious and it’s a lifelong thing. But you know, my doctor’s like, you shouldn’t be able to wake up before noon based on how your cortisol levels are not there. I’m like, I do. He’s like, how is it? I just, I got, I have goals. I don’t know. I have shit to do, you know, and I find a way.
28:33
but I could be a victim to those circumstances, but I don’t believe in that. So I stack the deck and I do all these things. You know, these, they’re really these just like five supply lines that I truly believe in. There’s so many things I can’t control in life, but I can control my sleep, my fitness, my nutrition, you know, my prayer and stillness time and the people I surround myself with. Those five things. If you’re not focusing on protecting those five supply lines, you’re gonna fall apart and crumble.
29:03
True. Sleep is the biggest one. Sleep is the most underrated and biggest one. Because if you don’t sleep, you’re going to fall to shit. If you don’t sleep, you’re going to eat crap because your body is going to try and find some way to give you energy that you’re depleting it of. If you start eating crap and you feel like crap, you’re not going to want to work out. You’re going to be more depressed. You’re not going to want to make time. You’re going to try and work out more. You’re going to try and work more instead to feel good about yourself.
29:31
So you won’t make time for any stillness or any time of reflection. And you’re definitely not gonna surround yourself with good people or anybody at all. So, and honestly, surrounding yourself with positive people is probably the second most underrated supply line. It’s amazing how many people choose to keep toxic people in their lives, because they feel like they have to. And it feels familiar. Don’t do it. Yeah. Yeah, they like the familiar. The safety of it. Yeah, the safety is like the devil they know. To them, that’s safer than this.
30:01
the devil they don’t know, which ironically that devil is actually opportunity if they would just step into it and not be afraid. Exactly. I also love that you pointed out the sleep component because I’m a low carb guy and I know that you very much are sensitive about what you put in your body as well. And I’ve noticed when you look at the physiology, when we don’t sleep well, again, we wake up fatigue. So what does our body want? Something that’s going to give it immediate boost, which the fastest thing in today’s culture is sugar.
30:31
and a lot of stuff that’s not really going to be great for us. So we crave those things. So for fatigue, that’s what we crave. And then the blood sugar goes up. And then as soon as we’re about nine 30, 10 at the office, now it crashes. And now it’s like, I need that coffee at lunch. And then they’re probably eating more stuff that’s not great for them. So then again, you had the lonely afternoon. So literally, if you look at your day and you look at your productivity, again, you maybe have three hours where you’re really locked in.
31:00
But again, if you get that one hour in the morning and attack it, you’re literally doing an entire day’s worth of sleepwalking kind of work. So why not just get it done now? Why not attack it with everything you have? Yeah. There was a, an entrepreneur out there when I was at Steven Pressfield’s writing retreat. And he was talking about the muse, talking about this, this thing that we’re trying to tap into, to be able to be the vessel, to bring something beautiful onto paper or create a movement or a company or a business or a product.
31:30
or a service, and he was saying how the music was his passion. And this is in, you know, the Malibu area in LA, he says, but the problem is he needs to take care of his family. So real estate is what he’s going into now to be able to do that. And he asked Steve, he says, is there a way for me to evoke the muse within myself regarding this real estate stuff? And Steven Prestl, 81 years old, is just like, do you…
32:00
feel that fire? Does that get you going? He said, well, no. And Steve’s like, well, then you can’t, you’re not going to be able to evoke the muse. And you could see this guy was like, pretty disheartened. And Steve said, but hear me out. He said, I bet if you got up in the morning and attacked this with everything you have for one or two hours, you could still chase your dream. You may even become more efficient and realize that you don’t need all this artistic process for four hours.
32:31
it two hours worth of actual powerful stuff done. And guess what? When you have the deadline, right? Parkinson’s law, the amount of like work that we have will expand just to the time that we allow it. So without a deadline, time means nothing. If you attack this thing for two hours in the morning, when there’s stillness, now, if you feel like you have to grind for 10 hours on real estate, you can, because the most important thing is already done. So now you don’t feel like you have to compromise. You don’t have to feel like.
32:58
These competing priorities are now always about somebody else or something else outside of you. Yeah. And that helps us realign with who we are, what we really want, what really matters to us and what gives us that fulfillment. Because early on, what are we looking at? Money, success, all these different metrics. But eventually we get to a certain point where it’s like, these things are important. We have to be able to pay for our bills. I get it. But eventually it’s like, well, if I made
33:26
If I push myself, I made an extra 100K last year, but I gave up my relationships with the people that mattered to me the most to do so, is that really worth it? Yeah, no, and I’m done celebrating high performers and executives who are killing at work, but yeah, their families hate them, they’re out of shape. Just personal life is a disaster. Like, there’s nothing to celebrate. Anyone can crush one thing in life. Good for you.
33:56
You’re killing it. But are you? I think I’m not gonna celebrate that. And that’s not a culture I want to support and embrace either. I don’t want my son growing up seeing that. For me, no, I had to change my ways. And he’s seen me change many times. And I’ve been up and down. I’ve caught myself. This is a massive atomic morning discovery. Men, I’ve been cured of all stuff ever since. No, I’ve had plenty of ups and downs. It has been a fucking journey.
34:23
You know, and but the thing is, I got a lot of tools in my tool belt on how to help me thrive through that. And probably the smartest thing I have is my ability to like, make sure I get help when I need it. I know when I am not capable of doing something in my own strength. That’s pretty clear. Like I’ve realized that I know when to tap out and submit say I need help, you know, and I’ve done that several times in life, you know, and so yeah.
34:49
with mornings or when it was with, you know, sometimes I needed a coach, you know, I’ve got to, I’ve had a therapist forever. Like I do the work, you know, I do the work. I stack the deck, you know, my mornings are great. Yeah. I have a therapist every week too. I work with, I have a coach, you know, I have people in my corner. I have a personal board of directors, you know, and I surround myself with good people. I got sober 18 months ago. I realized like alcohol didn’t need to be in my life either. It’s like, this is stupid.
35:18
Like there’s no return on investment with this at all. This is stupid. You know, I don’t need it in my life. I’ve already got some illnesses that it’s counterproductive to do this. Mike, get rid of it. I could throw a tantrum and say, I don’t want to. I want to be in charge. I don’t even need to. No, it’s stupid. I stopped saying that I deserve this stuff. You know, I don’t. Like what I deserve is to be healthy. I deserve to be like, feel like I deserve to be able to serve other people and get back to the world.
35:49
You know, I deserve to take care of myself, because the world wants the best of you, not what’s left of you. And if you think that you grinding all the time is you giving to other people, no, you’re just giving scraps of yourself. You know, that’s garbage. So don’t fool yourself with that. Like take care, it’s the greatest gift you can give the world is to take care of yourself. Honestly, if you take care of yourself, it’s the ultimate gift you can give everybody. Because if you’re taking care of yourself and your health, you know, I don’t mean that in a selfish way.
36:17
I just mean like taking care of yourself. You can give the best of yourself. You know, people are gonna get the best of you. And that’s when like innovative ideas come out. You know, that’s when just game changing moments. That’s just when like really heartfelt moments happen between people when they see things, they act on and they help one another. Like it’s because you’re aware and you’re healthy. You can see more around you. You can see beyond your own damn self, you know? And so it’s okay. And it’s okay if you’re stuck in a rut right now too. It’s all right. Like everybody has down moments.
36:47
Are you willing to get out of it? Are you willing to go through a transition in life where it might feel a little lonely because you’re going to let go of the safety of the toxic life you might have been living? You’re going to be alone for a little bit, but you can have some people in your corner. It’ll be all right. So, yeah, I went through this with mornings. I’ve been through this with a lot of different things. But the simplicity of working on your mornings is huge. And the difference I’ve found that the approach I take with it than other morning people is
37:16
I really do focus on the emotional sides of it. I don’t want to just give you, here’s your program, do this. You know, like, anyone can do that. But again, if life hits, you know, shit hits the fan, are you going to know like how to work through that? Also, can you get through like the self-talk that would drive you nutty is I had one person who’s like, well, I’d like on the weekends to sleep in more and do it kind of as like a reward to myself. Like reward.
37:43
Why are you rewarding yourself with the one thing that you said you wanna stop doing? I guess dumbest shit I’ve ever heard. And then when I said it out loud, it made sense to him. Because when I do it for 30 days with people, I don’t let you change anything. I’m like, look, I’m working with you for 15 minutes every morning when you choose to wake up. I’ve got somebody else after you. So you can’t customize this thing. It has to be the same thing for 30 straight days. Weekends, everything. You’re up.
38:10
you know, and if you stay up too late the night before, I’m sorry, that sucks, you’re still gonna be up, you gotta take accountability for that. Because if you tell me like, oh, I was up super late, I still need my sleep, so I gotta sleep in, no, that’s now a new negotiation tool for you. And I’m like, no, you don’t get that. Like, you get up, you’re gonna, maybe you can schedule a nap later, that’s fine, I’m not, you know, go for it, but you’re not, gonna stay in a bed, get up, you’re paying for this.
38:38
Like, you know, and clearly if you think you can just skip a morning, you’re not, you’re not paying enough. So I’ll happily charge you more. But the whole thing is like, yeah, you got to take accountability. I did for those 30 days and like, look, you can go see the videos. They’re on my LinkedIn. It’s on one of my featured links the whole 30 day I did it for 31 is like a two to three minute video every morning of when I woke up. Good, the bad, the ugly. And then there was a write up I did with it. All of them are there. You can see the whole damn thing. I traveled during that time.
39:07
where I lost an hour from traveling time zones. I went through illness and some other stuff. I was still doing it though, you know, and I loved it. And what I noticed was is when I missed a morning, like afterwards, I really, I did miss it. I was like, shit, you know? So it wasn’t a treat to sleep in. Even on vacations, it’s not a treat to sleep in. It was a, if I traveled somewhere, I was gonna miss out on a different sunrise, you know? A different perspective, different mornings in different places.
39:36
different perspectives. It’s amazing what it offers. So yeah, this thing has saved my ass and creating routines and the simplicity of routines has really, it’s helped me beyond anything. I debunked the myth of I’m more creative at night because I’m always creative. I just have to make time for it. So yeah, I’m creative anytime I want. It doesn’t have to be at night. It’s bullshit. Also like when I…
40:04
I almost died of COVID in 2020. And routines is what gave me hope and gave me a sense of control. I mean, you know what it’s like to be in a hospital. You’ve been there. You know, a little more hardcore than COVID. But like, it was, you know, still like I could barely breathe and like I couldn’t move my body. Like, took 30 minutes to turn over. You know, one morning, like it was just horrible. But
40:33
I did know that my window faced east and I could see the sunrise. I had a huge window and I was like, oh cool, cool. They draw my blood anyways at like 5 a.m. so I made sure I stayed awake to just see it rise. That was cool. I asked the physical therapist guy who came in to just make sure I wasn’t a vegetable like if he could just put me in a chair. Could you put me in the recliner by the window?
41:01
Cause I was like, I don’t want to be in that bed unless I’m sleeping, you know? So just put me in by the window. I could control that, you know? And then I could control what I ate. So I said, no more hospital food. Like I had all these people who were asking like, Hey, is there anything I can do? I also learned how to ask for help. So I said, yeah, actually you can. I was like, I could have door dash go to the hospital. They would do that. You could have it go to the, the, the lobby and the nurse would bring it up. So I was like, Hey, here’s a place that does like salmon.
41:31
and fresh food, like send that my way. And thank you. And so I ate healthier food. I could control that. I can control not watching the news. And like, I gave myself 15 minutes a day just to see what’s up, turn it off, gave myself music. I had my wife send me my clothes. And I had the, you know, I had to have the nurses help me put them on. But I like, I didn’t want to wear sick clothes. I didn’t want to wear the old gown and shit. I wanted to wear my regular clothes. I wanted to wear shoes.
42:00
They’re like, you can’t walk. I was like, so what? Mr. Rogers wears shoes indoors, I don’t want them to. I just wanted to have that feeling of like, I’m not sick, I’m going to get out of this thing. And so yeah, I had medicine being put into me too, but I wasn’t gonna just rely on it. I got work to do. Like I’m gonna do my part. And so, and the same thing, like I had two herniated discs in my cervical spine at the same time.
42:28
And like my arm is in pain, like I’m falling apart. And all I can think about is you. And I’m like, man, I need an MRI or something. I was like, I’m gonna, I need some, and I did. I had to fight for an MRI. I had to be an advocate for myself. And that’s when they discovered the discs in my neck. Cause I was like, man, I can’t fight two of these things. I know something’s wrong. You know? And so I fought for it and the doctor was like, well, it’s a pretty good idea that you did that. And I was like, you’re in trouble. I know. And that’s how I’m screaming.
42:58
Yeah, they told me like, all right, we’ve got some, some, some oxy for you. We’ve got morphine. And I was like, I only want morphine at night. I was like, don’t give me that stuff during the day. I was like, I don’t want to miss out on being sick. I was like, I’m supposed to be here for this. I want to be conscious for it. I got shit to learn from it. I got stuff to do. I mean, I documented the whole thing. So that’s what I do from day one. I got sick to not like I videoed all of it. I’ve only shared that myself. But like, but yeah, those routines, man.
43:28
what got me out of there. I really did. Well, and that also led you down this journey of finding a TED talk. Yeah, yeah, that’s right. I did it a month after I got out of the hospital. Yes. Tell us. Tell us about that. Yeah. Holy shit. Yeah, I mean, that was the COVID talks. That was supposed to happen in April of 2020, I think, something like that. But then March hit and the world shut down. And the talk was was delayed.
43:57
then delayed and then then canceled for good. And then resurrected. And then they decided to do something weird with it. They had never done before that they were gonna do it instead of doing it in Indiana at the college they were gonna be doing it at. They decided that every speaker would have it in their city and they would send a film crew. You can pick the location you do in your own city. And you can do it anywhere you wanted to. So some people did it in like a nice room or whatever.
44:25
I still needed to, like I’m a speaker, I need to be on a stage. Like I don’t want to be in a room. And so I found a venue that had a stage. They also, it’s like, actually it was the first place I saw like a music act, like a concert when I went to Austin and, uh, got that place lined up and, um, yeah, they were going to send a film crew, but then, yeah, I got really sick. And they said this thing was going to happen. Uh, they changed the date on it and it was going to happen. Like luckily it was like a month after I got out.
44:54
And I was in rough shape. And also then we had the snowpocalypse in Austin that happened just before too. So we lost, we had seven inches of snow that stayed for well over a week in Austin and not familiar snow in Texas, it destroys us. Like I’m from Maine, like we were seven inches, fine. But we don’t have salt or trucks or anything in Texas. It destroyed us. People died. Like it was really rough. I didn’t have water or power for like 10 days.
45:22
and combo those things. And we were in downtown Austin, like to see a city like that just crippled. Luckily I know how to survive. And I had those life skills already. That was huge to take care of the family. A lot of people didn’t. And so yeah, we were able to get through that while I’m still rebuilding my lungs. Cause I was on home oxygen therapy for a while too. Like I had tubes in my nose even when I was done. But getting to that Ted Talk was very humbling because
45:51
One, it’s weird because there’s only six people in front of you. You watch it and it’s like, oh, you’re on a stage. There’s only six people in front of me. It was COVID. You couldn’t have anybody there. So yeah, but there’s that. But like I was even though it wasn’t live, like it wasn’t like they were recording it. Ted was still trying to honor the process though. Oh, like it’s, you know, you get one take on this thing because they can’t edit, you know, there’s, they’re not going to do any editing. Like, so.
46:19
I had a problem. I couldn’t remember anything. I was pretty lucky that we were doing it in this format because I already have a brain injury from a history of concussions. This COVID thing really jacked me up. I couldn’t remember my own story anymore. This is something I’ve told all the time. It wasn’t even nerves. I was just spacing out. It was so hard and embarrassing that I was allowed to do more takes.
46:50
Then I did one and it still didn’t work out. It went over in time. I’ve never gone over in time either. It went too far over and they couldn’t even edit it to that point. And I felt so defeated by that. This was like a dream and I can’t remember my own damn thing. I’ve never experienced that before, ever. And we got to the end of it. We had to, time ran out. We had to give the venue back. And the organizer of it said, well,
47:19
You got us a venue for free so we can do the film crew the next day. They gave me a second chance, which was amazing. And I was pretty upset with myself about it. And while I was having like a minor pity party, like the, the organizer of it reached out and said, Hey, we took some time. We looked at your talk and we kind of like, we made a few changes to it. Might help you out a little bit. I was like, you did? All right. They read it back to me and then.
47:47
I was like, that’s cool. And he said, we can do this thing tomorrow. And what I got a call also from the organizer, he says, I just bought a ticket, I’m flying out. Like, I wanna make sure this talk happens. This kid’s at, the person who runs it, these are colleges, so they’re usually run by kids actually. That’s what most people don’t know. They’re run by the students. And they have a facilitator that helps. Normally if it’s at a college, the students are running it. And so this kid’s like 21.
48:13
if that and he decides to fly out on his own dime because he believes that this story is powerful enough that people need to hear it. I was pretty blown away by that. So yeah, this kid shows up and we have and now I know why like we were supposed to have lunch together. We had a great talk. It helps him out a lot. It made sense. He said, because you have kind of this issue with your head, you’re allowed certain things to help you. I was like, I don’t like that. But sure.
48:41
So when we finally did it, we only needed one take. And there was one, they said, if you slip up once, just don’t move, just stay very still. And then we can edit, we can do one edit. We’re allowed one edit with you. I was like, all right, cool. And I only had one thing and it worked out. Like it landed in a shorter time period, which is great. I did the message that I wanted to do and I completed it. And it was very humbling because had it been the other way around, well.
49:08
I don’t know, I couldn’t tell you. If it had been on a stage and I hadn’t had COVID, probably I would have crushed it, sure. I still crushed it, I just did it differently. And I went through some crazy adversity. I could have gone down that path of just feeling so pissed off and upset with myself for failing, but I accepted the help and I accepted the circumstances and I found a way to bounce back. And it was, yes, incredibly humbling to not be able to remember your own story after all of that.
49:38
You know, it’s like, what the hell did I fight all so hard for? You know, but yeah, the talk wouldn’t be what it is if I, what I went through embodies the whole damn conversation. So I had to use all the damn tools that I was using in my talk just to do the damn talk, but that’s annoying as shit. The great thing is you’re supposed to grow and you’re supposed to be cured of all of these things and you never have to deal with them again. It’s horse shit. I know you’re human. And so.
50:08
Now that people know the background and they know the backstory and they know the origin story to the origin story, go listen to the Ted talk. It’s incredible. It will. Now that you see that you have, here’s what happens. Humility prevents humiliation and adversity only teaches the teachable. So the lesson is be humble or be crushed. Yes. And you literally took that to heart and I’m the same way you are. I I’m, it’s still hard for me to.
50:37
allow people to help me to accept when people reach out. And again, I understand all of the, I coach people is like, how do you think this person feels that you’ll, you know, help them all day, but if they’re trying to help you and you push them away, all of a sudden, no, I don’t need that. Again, I have to give myself that. I have to step back and say, listen, give yourself some grace, get out of your own head. You’re not that important. Not everything is about you and this person is trying to help you. So if you would do the same thing for them in a heartbeat,
51:07
to not allow them to do it is hypocrisy. Yeah. No, you’re absolutely right. And look, I’ve learned to accept the type of like a kind of person I am, and that’s, I will overcome anything. The worst thing to do is to count me out on anything. But I know that the type of person I am with that is I’m more of the Rocky style. I will get the shit beat out of me, beat the piss out of me to near death, like just broken and bleeding.
51:37
but I’ll get up every time I learned something from it. Like I was just, I know like I was made to be beaten and broken, but I can get up from it every time. I got something else inside me that fuels me, something bigger than me and I trust in that. And so that’s what fuels me because if I can get through any one of these experiences, I can use that experience to serve somebody else. And my gift is learning is to be able to articulate.
52:04
what that journey was like and to articulate clearly what those feelings are like in ways that will help people who’ve been through it before understand it and connect with it and give them their own words. Or people who don’t understand it at all will finally give them a chance to maybe comprehend what it’s like to be in that type of situation where they can show maybe an ounce of empathy now for somebody else in their life that’s going through that. Those are my gifts. My gifts are to be able to go through adversity.
52:31
and be able to use it to serve someone else? Because who the hell am I to hoard my experience and my learning from something like that and keep it to just me? And what the fuck is the point of that? Like, I need to share that stuff. And it’s not a pity party about, oh, who did I went through? No, it’s like, hey, this is also a time to put a mirror in front of you. You’re not alone. You get to be a lighthouse and attract other people your way that align with your journey, your values, your story, and say, hey, if you’re going through this, I’m over here, I’ve been through it too. We’re stronger together.
53:00
Let’s do this. Yeah. Adversity absolutely binds us or it rips us apart. The choices are. Yeah. The diversity rips us apart. It only rips the people apart in your life that need to go. There it is. That’s it. Adversity just trims the fat. Love it. That’s good. I like that. I love that. Fucking gold. I love that man.
53:29
It’s fantastic. I could talk to you for hours. I have, and I shall even more again, having said that to be respectful of both of our times moving forward, where can we send people? So send people to Matt Gagnon at LinkedIn, Matt M-A-T-T-G-A-G-N-O-N. One. Matt Gagnon one is the LinkedIn one. You can’t miss me. I’m like devastatingly handsome in the profile picture. I think I’m wearing a hat in this new one.
53:58
But yeah, I’m on there. You can’t miss me. I’m there and just find me. I’m happy to chat. Marcus, thank you too. Thank you. You’ve been there for me during the hardest times in life. And you’re the type of guy who will reach out and say, are you really okay? And I know that even if you’re busy and you would take a phone call, that would heart beat too. So you’ve been a brother to me.
54:27
And you’ve always been there during the toughest times. The best relationships in life are defined by crisis and how we work through crisis together. You’re one of those guys in crisis, you show up. And so that’s what defines the quality of human you are, is how you show up in crisis. And that my friend is why you’re a brother to me. I appreciate you man, love you. Love you too bro. Thank you for listening to this episode of Acta Non Verba.
