On today’s episode Robert Sikes returns to share how studying people in the past can give you great business insight today. We also dive into the importance of having a thick skin in business and why he’s looking forward to the future.
Robert Sikes (@ketosavage) is the Keto Savage, Founder of the Keto Brick, and accomplished Keto Bodybuilder. Robert hosts the Keto Savage Podcast , the popular Keto Savage youtube channel with vlogs, cooking demos, and he also coaches clients through online coaching to improve their health, performance, and body composition.
Episode Transcript:
00:26
In this episode of Acta Non Verba, you hear part two of my interview with the keto savage himself, Robert Sikes, founder and creator of Keto Brick and Live Savage. In part one.
00:56
We talked about the benefits of the ketogenic diet and how it is the entrepreneur’s secret weapon, the importance of blending work and health, and the process that Robert went through to build his company. You can hear part one on episode 34 of Okta Non-Verba. In part two, we talk about which entrepreneurs and warriors that Robert would love to have a conversation with, how studying people from the past can give great business insights into today, and the importance of having a thick skin in business and life.
01:26
Please enjoy. If there was an entrepreneur that you could have dinner with, have conversation with, living or dead, who would that be? I would really like to have dinner with Jordan Peterson. I feel like I would learn a lot from that conversation. I’ve been listening to a lot of his content recently. Smart. Actually for the past couple of years. I really like his view on many different things in life. I don’t know if he would be considered an entrepreneur so much as just a spokesperson, philosopher. I mean, anybody in general, whether entrepreneur or just, you know, free thinkers.
01:54
I appreciate people that have an interesting take on life. And I truly always held the belief that you can learn something from everyone that improves your quality of life. So this is honestly why I love podcasting because anytime I have a new podcast guest on it’s an opportunity for me to learn something that I didn’t previously know. So yeah, he would be a really good person to sit down and have dinner with. There’s so many people in my life. There’s so many people that I’m excited. I mean, I’ve got a podcast with Mark Bell this week. Nice.
02:23
have a conversation with him. He’s coming onto my show and I’m coming on his show and we’ll be able to just pick each other’s brains. So it’ll be good. Mark Smileybell, he’s a big deal people. If you guys don’t know who he is, look him up and you’ll get to hear the podcast with Kido Savage and him being on his as well. So if there was a warrior from the past who’s passed away or a tactician historically that you would want to have dinner with or have coffee with, who would that be? And I should have prepped for these questions. I know. I got to keep you on your toes, brother. I know you keep me on my toes for sure.
02:53
Ah, let’s see here. Something from the past that’s a warrior. I would really appreciate having a good conversation with Alexander the Great. Like what drove him to go to the lengths that he went to conquer all that he did. I mean, there’s a special kind of person that really has that style of ambition. Like most people would just be happy conquering their town to go for the entire world. I mean, that’s, that’s pretty impressive out there. So I’d love to sit down and pick his brain as to where his motivation stemmed from.
03:22
Have you got to read a lot about him? Uh, not a ton. I mean, you’ve probably much more well read around Alexander the great than I am, but I’ve listened to a lot of Dan Carlin’s hardcore history podcast and just kind of going down that rabbit hole. Brilliant, brilliant podcast, by the way. But I appreciate a lot of the things that Alexander the great had done. There’s a lot of things that probably made him a terrible person in the history books as well, but I appreciate the ambition that would have to be there for some person.
03:49
who want to go to the lengths that he went to, to do what he had done. So I would find that to be an interesting conversation. Yeah, there’s the quest and the desire for gold or for territory, but eventually that gets quelled once you’ve covered enough continents. And like you said, where he has this belief since childhood that he was destined for great things that his father, Philip, had created this vision and that he wanted to exceed that. And then of course, Dan Carlin has all the, if you guys aren’t listening to Hardcore History with Dan Carlin.
04:19
or even his new version of common sense. You need to do that because he goes deep, he knows the material and then he really weaves together the psychology and the beliefs and the idiosyncrasies of that individual’s personality and then sees how it comes to fruition in history. And as you pointed out, history is written by the victor. So there may be some people that may not have been as impressed by him, but yet his end result is undeniable. So I think there’s something that’s powerful.
04:49
Kwan a Parker, one of the last reigning Comanche war chiefs. I mean, from a white mother to, you know, Indian chief father, and to be in a timeframe in which you know your world is coming to an end, yet you have the mental fortitude and resilience to try and fight tooth and nail to maintain the integrity of your history, the integrity of your people. That to me is a compelling story as well. We talk about books and all these.
05:16
entrepreneurial books and self-improvement books, but sometimes the best book you can do is just an autobiography of somebody reading about Winston Churchill and all the things that he went through, as opposed to just getting soundbites from what he did in history to see what his life was like prior to that, to see what his day architecture was like, to see how important naps were for him to have breakthroughs. All these things give you a better idea of what really made that person who they were and sometimes how they’re successful, even in spite of some of the things that they do, whether it be an ego or some sort of…
05:46
self-sabotage or addiction or adultery, whatever the case may be. But it shows us all that these are flawed humans, but yet even with those flaws, they can still succeed if you’re consistent, if you have the right team around you, and if you’re pushing yourself towards this vision with this Alexander the Great kind of intensity. Speaking of biographies, I think, you know, like I said, I’ve read so many business books. I think if my time would have been better spent just reading autobiographies and learning more about people that have seen success.
06:16
and what made them tick. I feel like there’s a lot more value to be gained there. And if nothing else, you gain so much more perspective. Like if you don’t read about the history, you don’t read about where you’ve come from, then your reality is this little bitty bubble that you’ve had experiences with. And when you’re living in this bubble that’s your own life, your own reality, then your opportunity for reaching any higher greatness is incredibly diminished. Whereas if you reach back in history and you study the people that have done things,
06:45
similar to what you’re wanting to do or very dissimilar from what you’re wanting to do, but just simply gain perspective from it. Your appreciation for life, both the good and the bad, is heightened exponentially, and that’s gonna shape your day-to-day decisions, and you’re gonna be a much wiser individual for it. I agree. That’s always the goal is to absorb truth irrespective of source and put it towards your vision, because so many people, they may hear a truth that is so obvious.
07:12
But yet if a person from a different side of the political arena or religion or whatever the belief system is, they’ll sort of fill the baby out with the bathwater when in actuality, even if you don’t agree with what this person said, if you become blinded out of truth, now you can’t help somebody else who may need that knowledge or maybe you can’t apply it to yourself. And that’s ego, that’s your arrogance, that’s your cognitive bias that’s really kind of bouncing around in your head. If your goal is just to try to help as many people as you can.
07:40
or become the best version of yourselves that you can, that knowledge doesn’t care about your opinion. So you have to ask yourself, if this is true and I’m not applying it, then I’m actually shooting myself in the foot, or like I said, potentially somebody else. That’s the way I look at it. There’s times when it’s a piece of information that may not help me specifically. Bruce Lee’s protege, Guru Dena Nsanto, he’s my G Condo instructor, as you know, and he was talking about these different disarms for the blade. And he’s like, these first two disarms will work really well for you.
08:10
These next two disarms may not work for you. And these other four will never work for you, Marcus. He’s like, but you have to know all of them because there are going to be different people that you teach. That may be built differently than you are. That it may work better for a person who’s maybe more simple, maybe a person who’s stronger, maybe a person who has longer limbs, maybe a person who is taller or shorter, whatever it is. So it’s important for you to know all these things. Also the converse is if there are these eight different ways to disarm the weapon.
08:38
I have to be aware of that because now if I’m swinging the blade and I’m only familiar with two, those other six could ambush me if I’m not aware of it. So that knowledge is important and this becomes that 360 knowledge of what’s going on. So just like entrepreneurship, just like nutrition, just like with that self-knowledge, we have to be willing to see it from not only 3,000 feet above, but 3,000 moments from now and 3,000 moments in the past to have that clear, true 360 vision of what’s going on in this moment.
09:07
Yeah. And there’s so many opportunities to really test whether or not you’re doing that. Like 2020 with all the political chaos was a perfect testing ground. I see so many people, you know, rally behind their sides and totally distance themselves from any conflicting viewpoints. And I definitely have, you know, my stance on things based off of my upbringing, what I’ve been able to notice and see in my day to day life and just those around me. But I truly tried to maintain this air of just open mindedness and willingness to learn.
09:37
throughout all of the political chaos of 2020 and the virus and just all that is crazy right now in the world. And I feel like I’m so much better for it because we’re all humans, all right? We’re all humans. There may be some negative intentions and motivations and whatnot for sure, but I like to think of us in a optimistic light as opposed to just viewing the world through this lens of negativity. And if we’re all trying to be optimistic in that regard.
10:03
then I feel like I owe it to my fellow human, regardless of their viewpoints, to hear their side. And so many people are not even willing to hear an opposing viewpoint. And to me, that’s just weakness on their part. And honestly, there’s just an uncertainty or a lack of confidence in who they are. Because if I’m truly confident in who I am, then I should be more than willing to hear any opposing side to just back up my own confidence of my viewpoint. But if I’m not even willing to hear their side, then to me, that’s just a lack of confidence masquerading as being overly confident.
10:33
Yeah, it’s intellectual cowardice at best. I agree. We talked about a truth that ended up unraveling into something that wasn’t true later on in your entrepreneurial journey. What was something at the beginning that for you seemed to be obviously false and yet turned out to become something that was much more true for you as you progressed? I don’t know. I think at the onset, I had this skewed perception of what it was to be in business, because initially it was all about.
11:02
making money. I equated making money with business. And yes, that’s a very important part of it. But that is not it in its entirety. I mean, all the money in the world is worthless if you’re not proud of how you’ve achieved that success or that wealth. So I feel like in the beginning, I had this idea that it was more so about just the monetary transfer of money. But now it’s like, okay, there’s so much more to it in the sense that regardless of the monetary cashflow.
11:29
I have to be proud of what I’m doing on a daily basis. And I have to build a company that other people are proud to support because so much of my company success stems from, like you said, the community. I mean, they are my oxygen and I owe it to every single one of them as an individual, not just a number of transaction to give them my best. And I try and do that with every single day that passes. I mean, people will email with a question and I’ll take the time to respond back. I leave no inquiries unanswered because they’re the reason I am where I am.
11:58
So really looking at, I mean, I think I knew at the onset that people and relationships were very important, but I didn’t realize the extent to which they were important. I mean, it is literally the bedrock for which everything is built. And I feel like if you go into it with that type of mentality at the onset, then you’ll not take for granted every little interaction that you make with the people that are your bedrock. And I feel like that is paramount for sure. So by, initially you thought that it was the monetary gain that was the value,
12:27
The true value was the foundation, the people, the relationships, and that self-knowledge. I think that those people that we interact with and that we learn from and that we keep close to us, that’s why it’s so important because they keep reflecting onto us not only our weaknesses but our strengths. They reveal to us these things, especially like you said, if you’re not having a great day because sometimes the entrepreneurial journey is a roller coaster. And when you have that one person that sends you a text or says, hey man, that was great or loved your last video or your last podcast or whatever it was.
12:57
Sometimes, especially from a person that you respect, that’s enough to kind of give you that little click that you need, you’re like, okay, yeah. Like we don’t need to have everybody patents in the back, but at the same time, it’s nice if it comes. And if you have the right people around you, they’ll know when to kick in the ass. And they’ll know when you slap you on the shoulder and say, hey man, that was awesome, let’s keep going. You gotta get thick skin too, because the counter side to that is there’s a bunch of trolls out there. And when you do rely so heavily on people and relationships, you really, you know, tune in to whatever is said.
13:26
And there are people out there, sad to say, that just go out of their way to bring negativity to the world. And, you know, when Chris and I first started, we were working, running the candle both ends and, you know, we’re answering all these messages and people like we’d sell out in minutes and cause we were making them all by hand and it was just the two of us. And then people would be pissed off because they didn’t get any, cause they they didn’t jump on it within the three minutes that they were in stock. And then they would let us know through some pretty hateful social posts that they’re not happy with how we run in the company.
13:56
that we don’t know what we’re doing. I mean, it happens all the time, less so now than it did in the very beginning because we’ve been able to scale and grow. But learning to develop that thick skin and knowing who you are and having that self-awareness, knowing what your intentions are, when you are confident in that, it allows you to not put near as much weight in the words of hateful people because they are out there. There’s a dichotomy that exists there though, because sometimes people are being hateful, but some of what they’re saying is backed with some truth.
14:25
So being able to have enough self-warners to be able to thread that needle between that dichotomy and understand if you should act upon what they’re saying or discredit it is very, very key. I agree. And a lot of these people that are lashing out, again, if you were to sit down with them and have a conversation face to face, they’re probably in a lot of pain, they’re probably projecting, they’re probably throwing grenades, not only at you or I, but pretty much anybody that has any kind of account, they’re probably doing that. And then that’s their way of dealing with whatever they’re going through. And again,
14:55
The lot of spooze always come from the cheapest seats. I don’t have the time to throw a rock at every dog that barks at me. So we just keep moving forward. But again, it is the nature of the beast and a lot of people, it’s almost like a child, even if it’s bad attention, they would like to have attention. And like you said, you have to figure out, you know, we have a cognitive weight limit, so to speak, to where once I go to this point, it’s like, I don’t have the capacity to do that. So do I waste no energy on this person who isn’t going to listen to what I’m saying anyway?
15:25
Or do I try to serve the people that are truly in line with what I’m doing and that my message resonates with them? Because in the end, that’s the way that we have to look at it. And that keeps us very honest. And again, that helps us kind of strip away the essential things and focus on what’s really the priority. Yeah. And to stem off of that, another thing that you hear tossed around a lot in business is like the whole fake it till you make it philosophy, which I’m completely opposed to now, but so many people getting into the space assume that that is what you have to do. I think honesty and transparency always trumps.
15:54
the fake until you make a philosophy. And when you’re grinding, when you’re hustling, when you’re knowing the trajectory that you’re wanting to take in life, that you shouldn’t have time to take a step backwards and be negative. I mean, it’s just like, I don’t care. Like it’s just not worth my while. Cause time is the finite resource and it’s not worth my time to be an ass to anybody. I mean, that’s accomplishing nothing. And a lot of people unfortunately feel it’s, you know, any publicity is good publicity. And that may be true to an extent. I mean, you may get more exposure for sure, but
16:22
Like again, it’s all about integrity for me. It’s all about what can I hang my head on at the end of the day? And if it sacrifices my integrity and it’s not worth my time, no matter how much extra money it brings in. And there’s something to be said also, like you said, when you put your head on the pillow at night and you’re like, you know, reflecting on what you did and the money you made, the way you made it is much more important at the end of the day than the amount that you have in your bank account, because that amount can come or go in a heartbeat, but your integrity is something that could always be with us if we act with that sort of ethos in our lives.
16:51
100% man, if you allow yourself to sacrifice that for a moment, you’re exponentially more likely to do it again and again and again, until you become a shell of the person that you could be. So I’ve always lived by the ethos that, you know, no matter what, no matter how hard that conversation is, no matter how trying that obstacle is, no matter how much money I’m gonna lose in the moment, I will never sacrifice my integrity and indecision. So I feel like as long as I have that as my base, I’m gonna be sold.
17:20
Yeah, the way that we conduct ourselves in the face of adversity is an indication of how we will do everything else in our lives from business to relationships to, again, being honest with ourselves. You talked about being organic and real, especially if you’re trying to build a business. That is the only thing that’s sustainable. You can’t live this persona or live a lie or be this character that you’re not. I understand that when people come and talk to you or shake your hand after you speak or are impressed to meet you.
17:49
There’s going to be a certain amount of people that are starstruck, but in the end you’re still the same person. It’s not like it changes. It’s not like this is keto savage when he’s talking to people on the podcast. And then there’s the other guy that in his personal life, that’s completely opposite of that. It’s not as if you’re living a lie in the process. Yeah. If I never put a mask on that, I never have to take it off, man. And I feel like that’s the way to live my life for sure. I mean, we’ve had several people in town these past couple of weeks, interviewing in person and you know, they’ve all said that I’m the exact same.
18:17
away from the camera as I am on the camera on the YouTube videos and whatnot. I feel like that’s good. You know, like I want to exceed expectations when people meet me in person, as opposed to being let down. So many people are let down by their YouTube celebrities and whatnot. And it’s just, I just don’t ever want to play that game. It’s not worth my while. No, I agree. Robert, if you woke up tomorrow, paralyzed from the neck down, what do you wish you would have accomplished with your life that you haven’t yet?
18:40
That sounds pretty similar to your story, man. I probably would read your book again and make that the first decision I do. But what would I not want to live without? The question is important because it helps us see that even if our physicality is taken from us, there’s other things that we can still do, but you’re like a young, powerful man. What is something that you still want to accomplish in your life before the decay of time starts to take our bones? Man, I’ll tell you, Crystal.
19:08
has changed my tune with a lot of things. I’m excited to do a follow up conversation with you after you’ve been married for a little while because I feel like it’s just, I don’t know, it’s just interesting, man. But Crystal’s own desires in life, like her pinnacle has been to be a mother and raise successful children. And I’ve never really thought of that to the extent that I have now since I’ve been married. My goal and aspiration would be to raise children that…
19:35
maintain their integrity. Now I’m excited, man. I feel like it’ll be great. I feel like my relationship with my father is amazing. You know, I’ll be able to take a lot of what I’ve learned from him and just seeing how he’s parented me and applied to how I would my own kids. But I feel like it’s all about leaving a legacy. And I feel like when you bring kids in the world, and I probably have a much better understanding of this when I actually do have kids, but I feel like that is a very tangible way to leave a legacy, especially if you give them the love and the skillsets.
20:04
to prepare them for life and set them off on the right foot. And I feel like that is something that I am not skilled in yet. That is something that I have not proven to myself that I can do well yet. So it’s a challenge and I feel like the adversity and the challenge is always something that appeals to me. So I feel like that is something that I’m looking forward to. But yeah, to answer your question of something what I would want to do before I woke up and was paralyzed, being able to end my life knowing that I have prepared
20:34
somebody to live a better life than I had lived would be a very fulfilling thing for sure. I think if that is the ultimate, like you said, that’s the manifestation of a living legacy, so to speak. And the world that is approaching us in the next 20 or 30 years, you know, there’s going to be a lot of uncertainty and adversity in it. But as you and I both know that within adversity is plenty of opportunity, if we’re willing to see it. So for everybody that’s doom and gloom and says there’s a lot of adversity around us, I agree. But to me,
21:03
All I see is the opportunity that that holds. So you being a father, you and Crystal having a fantastic family, I can’t see how that a bunch of keto savages running around now and see how that could be a bad thing in today’s day and age. That’s the goal, man. I hope it’s a positive thing in the world. Have a whole tribe of them. Yeah. What’s the biggest misconception when it comes to being successful as an entrepreneur or as a competitor or as a warrior in any capacity?
21:32
I feel like the work-life balance is a big misconception. I’ve always said that balance is kind of bullshit. You know, people, they try and compartmentalize every different aspect of their life and they put them in these quadrants and they don’t let them touch. And I feel like when you do that, you’re just shooting yourself in the foot with your own ability to truly excel at any one of those aspects of your life. But if you craft a life that is all symbiotic in nature, so that if one thing’s improving,
22:00
All the other things are improving as well simultaneously. Your ability to perform at a high rate is going to be exponentially enhanced. So I’ve tried to build my life around that philosophy. The business that I’ve built’s given me a lot of flexibility. It’s all in line with my passions. It’s created a day-to-day environment that is conducive to my overall health and wellbeing and my wife’s overall health and wellbeing, which is gonna be conducive to our future kids’ health and wellbeing. I’m not going to be…
22:28
the guy that’s 80 years old and has zero quality of life because he’s stuck to a walker because he pissed away his youth to build a business and acquire a bunch of wealth that he can no longer enjoy. Like it’s, it’s all about crafting a life that’s symbiotic in nature. I feel like in doing that, I’m going to set myself up for success for the long haul. And I think that’s the key, man. That that’s the main thing. Like people look at people that are high performers functioning in the world at a very elite level. And they just assume that they have no.
22:58
balance because it’s all one thing. I feel like if you craft a life in a very intentional manner and you sit down and you ask yourself, okay, what is my ideal day? And then you reverse engineer from that and build your life accordingly, your fulfillment and ability to achieve great success and perform at an elite level is going to be much more likely. That’s a perfect example of that alignment that we always talk about where you talk about pillars, I talk about, you know, circles, how they all kind of overlap as this Venn diagram of our existence, but
23:27
So many people have these beliefs or these ideals that are not aligned. So they may have something that’s way over and left feels something that’s way the other end of it over here. And in order for them to get to these places that they feel that they’re gonna feel satisfaction, it’s so far removed and there’s so much energy and time and space to get there. But when all of these beliefs, like you said, they’re symbiotic and they are aligned, it allows you to just drive forward, moving towards this thing and now.
23:56
Everything is sort of in route. You can pick it up as you go, as opposed to having to stop reinvent the wheel or realize that once you’re there, this isn’t what I wanted. It’s like, that’s okay. This is just data. I learned that now I pivot and now I keep moving in the direction where everything is already aligned, as opposed to thinking that I have to reinvent the wheel or I have to again, do something that somebody else feels that I should do. Or I should, you know, get, get a real job or whatever people say.
24:23
when they don’t understand what the entrepreneurial journey is, or even what the warrior’s journey is. I joined the military at 38 for me, I can’t tell you how many people thought that I was crazy. And they were all right. But it’s what I needed. It was my decision. I had to fall down on that. And had I not done that, then you and I probably wouldn’t even be having this conversation. Yeah, totally, man. Life is a funny thing. I mean, it ebbs and flows. There’s like energy, intensity, passion. It’s all cyclical. Like it’s never 100% all the time.
24:53
in any one format. So being able to craft a life around something that is sustainable, but it’s continually moving you in the right direction is fulfilling in itself, but it’s just much more efficient. I mean, if you get a goal that you’ll want to reach, if you craft your life around it in a way that you’re getting closer to that goal during periods of utmost intensity, but also during periods of much lower intensity, but you’re still moving towards that goal, you’re gonna be all the better for it. And I feel like…
25:20
So many people don’t have the self-awareness to know what they want. So they’re reaching for an unnamed goal to begin with, but then they structure life in a way that is very, you know, not conducive to moving closer to that goal, but rather constantly pulling them in different directions. I feel like that is paving the way for misery and regret. And the last thing I want to do is be on my deathbed filled with any regrets. I mean, if I was to die right now, I would feel, I mean, there’s different things I would want to do, but I would not die with regret. And I’m proud to say that.
25:50
Well, and also people just going in a vague direction with this idea of being happy or being successful. Again, that begs the question, do you even know when you’re going to have that? And then what would having that do for you? And those sort of questions help you understand that one, what you’re asking for may be so vague that it’s impossible to know if you’re going to have it. So their default answer is to push harder. And we know a lot of entrepreneurs that are like that. So by doing that, that gives them at least an opportunity to sort of narrow the field, narrow their vision. And again, align that.
26:19
with things that are symbiotic as you were saying to give them that chance to reach that happiness because if more money is always the answer, then you’re never going to sleep and you’re never going to be happy and there’s never going to be enough money. And frankly, at the end of the day, that money is just a number on a piece of paper, what’s on a computer screen. Yeah. And it has nothing to do with the relationship that you have with your wife or your soon to be children or whenever you have children or whatever the case may be. So understanding was truly important as opposed to…
26:48
chasing these illusions is the big key. There in this space, there’s also this place where it’s almost like a shadow as Carl Jung would say, or sort of a darkness within us. And it lives in all of us. Do you acknowledge it? Do you try to channel it to work for you? Do you try to act like it’s not there? Do you try to stifle and choke it down? What do you do to cope with it? I love Carl Jung’s take on this. Like I absolutely love it. And I feel like there’s a dark.
27:17
side of me for sure. A hundred percent. And I don’t discredit that. I don’t deny that. I embrace it. It’s surfaced and manifested itself in different ways throughout my life. As I’ve gained more perspective. I mean, there was a period in my life where I was incredibly depressed, suicidal, and I had suffered from incredibly bad OCD, obsessive compulsive disorder, like Howard Hughes level OCD, where like, it was just, it was freaking weird, man. But I was able to channel that and that was.
27:46
during a period of my life, long before keto, but that’s when I started doing bodybuilding. And I channeled that into the bodybuilding. So with Obsessive Compulsive Disorder, it manifests itself differently with different people. But for me, it was like I had to do a certain number of things, a certain number of times in order to feel safe. And it’s really weird to talk about it. And most people that haven’t suffered from it won’t really understand it. But for me, I always felt that if I didn’t do something a certain number of times, a certain way,
28:16
some tragedy would befall my parents, my loved ones. So I would be in the gym and I would literally envision somebody holding a gun to my parents’ heads. And if you don’t give me everything you’ve got on the set, I’m putting a bullet between their eyes. And that sounds incredibly morbid, and it is, but that underlying belief and OCD system that was channeled through the sport of bodybuilding created the foundation that I have in that industry to this day. And I’ve been able to channel it in a much healthier way now. I don’t…
28:46
you know, have that envisioned at all times, thank goodness. But that was a period in my life where that darkness was much more on the surface of my day to day. And I feel like we all have that. And I feel like so many people deny that about themselves. Not that everyone’s got OCD or something like that, but everyone’s got this darkness within themselves. And that’s not necessarily a bad thing. It’s a bad thing if it’s overwhelms the positive, if it overwhelms the light in you. But if you’re able to recognize it,
29:14
and be honest with yourself and channel it and use it, it’s gonna only amplify the good that you can do as well. And I feel like Carl Jung’s take on that is spot on. And I feel like I’ve embraced that side of me to the point that it doesn’t rule my day-to-day actions, but it makes the actions that I do do throughout the day have a much deeper underlying perspective on life in general, which in turn has made them a more well-thought out, reasoned, you know, response to anything that the day-to-day brings my way.
29:43
incredible urgency and it helps you really want to cut away all the bullshit because the things that don’t matter shouldn’t even be in your field of vision at that point. And again, I went through darkness during my injury, suicidal thoughts, couldn’t even act on it because of my physicality. But even within that, there was that gift in the adversity because it helped me see that there was not necessarily a healthy dimension. But if I was in a place where I needed, like you said, to kind of click it up and have that higher level of intensity.
30:13
It was there if I’m willing to channel it. But if I never face it, if I never acknowledge his existence, then it’s as if I’m releasing this wild tiger out of the closet and now there’s no way for me to control it, but once I’m familiar with it, now I’m not afraid of it and I can actually sort of point it in the direction of what’s necessary. And again, it can be very destructive. It can be very corrosive. So we don’t want to live in that place all the time, but to say that it’s always going to be, you know, rainbows and butterflies.
30:43
know, you’re lying to yourself and the punch that knocks us out is the one that we don’t see coming. So we have to acknowledge these darknesses and to harken back to what I was talking about earlier about the defending ourselves against the blade. If I don’t acknowledge the darkness in me, it’s impossible for me to even conceptualize that another person may have that darkness within them depending on where they’re coming from, if they’re addicted to drugs, if they’re trauma, you know, whatever they’re going through. And by having that understanding, it allows me to better defend myself and
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and somebody else in the process as well. Yeah, man, that’s so key. And I feel like there’s a metaphor for life in there with on all fronts, for sure. I mean, people that live life, assuming that it is all sunshine and rainbows, when anything tragic comes their way, they’re absolutely debilitated. They’re non-functional. Whereas if you are living in a way that is very aware of that fact, that it’s gonna happen, that adversity exists, and you’re able to take that
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and run with it and make the most of it, then you are unstoppable. And I’d much rather be unstoppable than debilitating. I absolutely agree. Robert, I could talk to you for days and I know that I will at some point, but I want to be respectful of your time. Where can people find out more about what you’re doing about the Keto Savage podcast, about the keto bricks, about everything that you’re up to about live savage, all the things that you have going, where can we find out more about you?
32:08
Yeah. So I’m at Liv Savage on Instagram, keto savage.com is the website. I’m getting that fully renovated right now. I’m redoing that. But yeah, keto savage.com keto brick.com is the website for the bricks that you were talking about earlier. You Google any of those and you’ll find me. And thank you so much. I cannot wait for my next shipment of the bricks to come in and I cannot wait to talk to you in person sometime soon, my friend. Thank you for being on. And I always learn so much from you. It’s an honor. Amen. I really do truly appreciate you, brother. I mean, you’re somebody that I met.
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before I’d really seen any sense of success. And I remember there was, I forget what it was, but I had experienced some level of success and I didn’t know who to call. I didn’t know who to call and just simply share that moment with. So I called you. I mean, I remember that very vividly. I don’t remember what it was I had just done, but I remember that conversation that we had very vividly. And you’re a special person, man. I appreciate you. I don’t take our relationship for granted. Your family and mine, so anything I could ever do for you, let me know. I appreciate it, brother. The same goes here and I’ll talk to you soon.
