How Adam Sud Lost 100 Pounds, Kicked Adderall, Reversed His Diabetes & Found A Life

I love the everyman stories. Adam Sud isn't famous. He's not a world-class performer. And he's not schilling a book. He's just an average dude living a pretty normal life. But look deeper and you'll find a rather extraordinary story. The story of a guy who completely lost himself in the bleak darkness of drug and food addiction. Hopelessly hooked since high school on the superman rush provided by Adderall, Adam spent most of his twenties isolating and high — up all night playing video games and binging on fast food. The heavier he got, the more he isolated, until he stopped caring altogether. Life shrank to a cycle of getting high, finding more Adderall, and repressing his increased depression and anger with more and more fast food — a lifestyle that left him over 300lbs with Type-2 diabetes on a crash course with an early grave. Out of cash, unemployable and alienated from friends and family, Adam finally faced a choice: live on the street or reach out for help. After extended stays in rehab and sober living facilities Adam found sobriety, peace of mind and a new lease on life. Oh yeah — he also lost over 100 pounds, reversed his diabetes and repaired his physical health wholesale. How? By adopting an active, plant-based lifestyle. Today, Adam lives a conscious, purpose-driven life devoted to helping others achieve and maintain a holistic, healthy lifestyle. Not surprisingly, this is a conversation about drug addiction, sobriety and nutrition. But it's also a conversation about cross-addiction, low self-esteem and an important issue rarely discussed — body dysmorphia and eating disorders in men. I'm inspired by Adam's tale of everyman redemption and I think you will be too. I sincerely hope you enjoy the exchange. Peace + Plants, Rich Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Speaker names marked ? are inferred from speaking time and the show’s known hosts — they are not voice-verified.

• 0:00Rich Roll?

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• 0:44Rich Roll?

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• 1:04Speaker 01

  When I reversed my type 2 diabetes, it was when I saw the weight coming off that I felt self-worth for the first time, and I felt like there was somebody worth saving. And I had enough self-confidence to say, alright, you know what? I'm gonna drop the ego with my therapist and say, I don't know what to do. The way that I know how to live my life clearly isn't working as far as an emotional individual. Maybe I should just do what they're saying I should do and see what happens.

• 1:32Rich Roll?

  That's Adam Suud, and this is the Rich Roll Podcast.

• 1:50Rich Roll?

  Hey, what's up, everybody? How you guys doing? I'm Rich Roll. I am your host. This is my podcast, the podcast where I sit down with the outliers, the big forward thinkers across all categories of positive. Paradigm breaking, culture change. What's the aim? The aim is to help all of us simply unlock and unleash our best, most authentic selves. So, thank you so much for tuning into the show. Thanks for subscribing to the show on iTunes. Thanks for checking out my weekly newsletter and subscribing to that, for giving us a review on iTunes, and for always making sure to use the Amazon banner ad at richroll.com for all your Amazon purchases. Thank you so much. So, one of the things that I think kind of makes this show unique, that distinguishes

• 2:32Rich Roll?

  it from a lot of the other interview shows out there, is that every once in a while, I bring on somebody who I think could barely be characterized as an everyman. You know, I had Josh LaJanni on a couple of times, you remember him. You know, the story of somebody who is basically, you know, not a superhero, not some kind of world-class high performer, but just like an everyday, average person, having a human experience, who has faced and overcome some specific obstacles on the journey towards becoming more fully, more fully expressed. And so, today is one of those guys. Adam Sud, again, he's not a world-ranked athlete, he's not a renowned expert in any particular field, he doesn't have a book coming out, he's just a guy.

• 3:17Rich Roll?

  He's a dude. He's a human like everyone out there listening. But it just so happens that this human has a pretty amazing story, and I'm really looking forward to sharing it with you guys today. More on Adam in a minute, but first... All right, Adam Sud, today's everyman guest. So, I don't want to give away too much about this conversation and this guest, but I will say this. Adam is a really good guy, he's a very grounded guy, he's a young guy, but not too long ago, he was also a guy who was pushing over 300 pounds, type 2 diabetic, with a nasty, nasty drug addiction. His drug of choice was Adderall, which is a pretty interesting drug of choice, I have

• 4:02Rich Roll?

  to say. And this is a guy who was pretty much on a crash course with an early grave. But, he turned it around, he got sober, he lost the weight, he became an athlete, he became a holistic lifestyle coach, and a whole number of additional things. His life has blossomed. So, how did he do it? Well, you're just gonna have to listen in to the story and it's a pretty compelling story. He is quite a dynamic young man, but it's also a story that I hope you can emotionally tap into and perhaps relate to a little bit more intimately than some of the other guests, simply because Adam isn't some superhero or world-class performer or somebody with a massive social media following or anything like that.

• 4:46Rich Roll?

  Again, he's just an average guy who came up against some pretty severe obstacles in his life and found the wherewithal to get to the other side. And I think that in and of itself is just a really compelling, interesting, emotionally charged story that I'm excited to share with you guys today. This is a conversation about drug addiction and sobriety, of course, but it's also about cross addiction, food addiction, eating disorders, and in particular, what's unique about eating disorders in men, which is something that doesn't get talked about all that much. It's about low self-esteem, body image, self-image, body dysmorphia, and we have an interesting discussion about masculinity among many other things.

• 5:27Rich Roll?

  So, without further ado, let's step into the world of Adam Sood and find out what this guy's all about, shall we? Enjoy.

• 5:40Rich Roll?

  We're in my office right now. There's a fan overhead. Like, I've tried everything to try to figure out how to turn off the fans in here that kind of make like a relentless buzzing noise that makes me crazy. It's no problem. Just telling the audience, like, "Bear with us, I'm sorry about that." But anyway, man, you got a really cool story and I'm looking forward to kind of getting into it. There's so many inflection points, you know, points of commonality between, you know, your story's different than mine, but it's also very similar and it's pretty cool, man, what you've been able to, what you've been able to, you know, do with your life. Thank you very much, I appreciate it. Kudos on making the turnaround. Thank you. You know, so... Well, let's take it back. So you have a, you grew up, did you grow up out here?

• 6:24Speaker 01

  No, I grew up in Austin, Texas. I was born in Houston and lived in Houston until I was about 14 and then we moved to Austin, Texas. And, yeah, I'm like a seventh generation Texan.

• 6:36Rich Roll?

  Oh, wow. How long have you been out in California then?

• 6:38Speaker 01

  Uh, three years. Yeah.

• 6:40Rich Roll?

  You like it out here?

• 6:41Speaker 01

  I do. I like the weather, but you know, I'm a Texas boy at heart, so I miss, I miss the breakfast tacos, not breakfast burritos. And, uh...

• 6:49Rich Roll?

  Have you found any good ones here?

• 6:51Speaker 01

  Uh, there's some, there's some good stuff out here.

• 6:53Rich Roll?

  Yeah.

• 6:53Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 6:53Rich Roll?

  Where do you like to eat in Santa Monica?

• 6:55Speaker 01

  Um...

• 6:56Rich Roll?

  To eat?

• 6:56Speaker 01

  Well, you know, I, uh...

• 6:59Rich Roll?

  It's limited these days.

• 7:00Speaker 01

  It is. I found that since I became vegan that I make about 95% of my meals myself at home.

• 7:07Rich Roll?

  Right, right.

• 7:08Speaker 01

  Uh, but when I do go out, you know, I like to just go to Whole Foods and get something really good.

• 7:12Rich Roll?

  Uh-huh.

• 7:12Speaker 01

  So...

• 7:13Rich Roll?

  Does that have anything to do with the fact that your dad was a founding investor in Whole Foods markets?

• 7:17Speaker 01

  Uh...

• 7:20Speaker 01

  No. Uh, well, maybe, you know, because I grew up with it in my home, you know, um, but, uh...

• 7:25Rich Roll?

  How did that have, let's take it back there. Like, how did, so, so your dad is one of the original?

• 7:30Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 7:30Rich Roll?

  OGs, right?

• 7:31Speaker 01

  He is.

• 7:32Rich Roll?

  Like, got involved in Whole Foods in the very beginning?

• 7:33Speaker 01

  That's right.

• 7:34Rich Roll?

  Was he a friend of John Mackey's or how did that come about?

• 7:36Speaker 01

  They, uh, they grew up together on the same street.

• 7:38Rich Roll?

  Oh, wow.

• 7:38Speaker 01

  And, uh, played, uh, high school basketball together and then went to school together and, uh, yeah, went through the whole thing.

• 7:45Rich Roll?

  So John, John was kind of like a hippie farmer guy, right?

• 7:49Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 7:49Rich Roll?

  Like, back in the day?

• 7:50Speaker 01

  Absolutely. And I, he's still, you know, he's still a, uh, a sort of rebel hippie at heart, I believe, you know?

• 7:56Rich Roll?

  Yeah. Well, he's quite the capitalist, too.

• 7:58Speaker 01

  Well, yeah, and he's, you know, he's not ashamed of it and he shouldn't be, I don't think, you know? Uh, he wrote that great book, Conscious Capitalism.

• 8:05Rich Roll?

  Right.

• 8:06Speaker 01

  Which is, uh, you know, I read it and I really like it, so...

• 8:09Rich Roll?

  Well, it's, it's quite amazing how Whole Foods has really transformed, um, you know, how we think about food.

• 8:16Speaker 01

  Absolutely.

• 8:17Rich Roll?

  In, in many, many, many interesting ways. And, you know, mostly for the good. There's some, I, I was in, uh, I just got back from... From Pennsylvania, I spoke at this event called Vegetarian Summer Fest and they bring in all these speakers and I had heard, I heard a talk by this guy Gary Francion, do you know who he is?

• 8:38Speaker 01

  I don't.

• 8:39Rich Roll?

  He's a professor of law at Rutgers and he's sort of a lifelong, he's probably the most hardcore animal rights activist advocate that I've ever come across.

• 8:52Speaker 01

  Really?

• 8:53Rich Roll?

  In my experience and he is so strident and intense, like his whole position is, he comes from an abolitionist point of view, right?

• 9:02Speaker 01

  Okay.

• 9:03Rich Roll?

  Like either, like if you draw an analogy between using animals as chattel with human slavery, like there is no middle ground, right?

• 9:14Speaker 01

  That's right.

• 9:15Rich Roll?

  There's either, either you adhere to this idea that animals are property and therefore it's appropriate for us to be able to exploit them, or you don't.

• 9:24Speaker 01

  Exactly.

• 9:25Rich Roll?

  There's no third option and from his point of view, and I'd never really heard this articulated before, but he was really like calling to the mat, like PETA and the Humane Society and Whole Foods, because in his opinion, he feels that this trend towards kind of grass-fed, sustainably raised animals is actually a move backwards in terms of the animal rights movement because it's making people feel more comfortable and better about eating animals for food, right? So we lulled into this idea and Whole Foods, if you really think of it in that context, like if you see it through Gary's point of view and you go to Whole Foods Market and you see these pictures of these farmers and you see pictures of cows that look like they're

• 10:09Rich Roll?

  living, you know, fulfilling lives, I guess, then you feel less guilty about choosing to purchase that and eat that, right?

• 10:18Speaker 01

  Yeah, and you know, honestly, for a long time I felt the same way, you know, I brought up the point that, you know, if Whole Foods is this conscious company and I truly believe that it is, you know, why is it okay with selling? Meat products and the fact remains, the fact is that it's because its customers ask for it. And so in order to do so, in order to fulfill what the customers want, they're going to do it in the most humane and sustainable way possible. But I, I agree with you.

• 10:51Rich Roll?

  They're also participating in cultivating that demand though, right?

• 10:55Speaker 01

  True.

• 10:55Rich Roll?

  So they're, they're, they're in partnership with that. But what was really interesting about what he was saying is how these organizations, you know, we think of PETA as being, you know, one of the most hardcore animal rights groups, right? But even they will sort of, you know, commend the whole foods markets or other organizations for making incremental progress.

• 11:13Speaker 01

  Mm hmm.

• 11:14Rich Roll?

  Okay. Well, this is great. So you're, you're now advocating cage free, for example.

• 11:20Speaker 01

  Right.

• 11:20Rich Roll?

  But then that just makes you feel better about buying eggs as opposed to Gary's point of view, which is you should just didn't, shouldn't do it at all. Either you're, so you're lulled into this sense that exploiting animals isn't, isn't so bad. You know what I mean? I'm not saying that I, I've just been thinking about this because I just heard his speech, but I thought it was an interesting point of view.

• 11:38Speaker 01

  It is. And, you know, I heard a, an amazing statistic recently when I was at the Engine Two Immersion in Arizona with Rip Esselstyn and we watched this film and, you know, I can't remember the name of it, but they were talking about, they talked to this farmer who has converted his cattle to grass fed and everything and he's in Montana. And he said, so, you know, what, what do you think about the, you know, in South America where they're raising cattle? And in order to do that, they're clearing X amount of rainforest in order to create grazing lands for these cattle. And, and the statement that the farmer makes is that, well, if the country can't sustain that kind of product, then they shouldn't

• 12:20Speaker 01

  be raising cows. And then he, you know, he, he replies by saying, well, did you know that if we want to convert all of our cattle in the United States to grass fed, we would have to cover the entire United States, all of Canada, have all of Central America and half of South America with grass grazing lands. That includes all the cities, all the mountains.

• 12:38Rich Roll?

  Right.

• 12:38Speaker 01

  You know, everything. And so our country can't. Sustain it as well.

• 12:42Rich Roll?

  Right, right. Well, that movie is called Cowspiracy.

• 12:44Speaker 01

  Cowspiracy, that's it. That's it.

• 12:47Rich Roll?

  And I'm a, I'm a, I have a producer credit on that movie because I've helped them kind of market that movie a little bit and Kip and Keegan are friends. And what they've done with that film is quite extraordinary. There's some, there's some pretty exciting things coming up with that with that film. So everybody's gonna be seeing it soon.

• 13:03Speaker 01

  There's some tough stuff to watch at the end, too.

• 13:05Rich Roll?

  Yeah. I mean, I think, I think when you hear that title, you think it's a movie that's about animal exploitation. Like you're sort of girding yourself to see animals suffering, but it's not that. It's really just the perspective of how we raise food, you know, via industrialized animal agriculture and the, you know, deleterious impact that that's having on our environment. It's really an environmental film.

• 13:27Speaker 01

  It's nothing like, I don't know if you've seen Earthlings, but I could, I could get through half of that movie without it becoming way too much.

• 13:33Rich Roll?

  That's a very, very, very, very difficult movie to watch. And I think people see Cowspiracy and they think it's gonna be that, but it's not that at all. But anyway, we, we digress.

• 13:42Speaker 01

  Right.

• 13:42Rich Roll?

  So, so your dad gets involved in Whole Foods Market at the inception. That's, that's pretty amazing.

• 13:48Speaker 01

  Yeah. And it's something I'm really proud of. And he, he currently is the executive in charge of business growth and development for Whole Foods. So he's located back in Austin.

• 13:59Rich Roll?

  So what does that mean?

• 14:00Speaker 01

  Um, he's in charge of the real estate, developing the new stores and, and I mean, the, the company has done really well since he's, you know, really become hands-on with the company. At first, he was taking over his dad's, his father's business. His father passed away from cancer when he was 25. And so he went home and ran the family business. And then at a certain point, I think it was right before I started high school, John said, you know, "We really need you to come here." And he came and joined us in that position.

• 14:34Rich Roll?

  Right. And how old were you at that, at the time?

• 14:36Speaker 01

  I was 15.

• 14:37Rich Roll?

  Okay. So you kind of were, you kind of grew up in a household where healthy food was surrounding you, the idea of healthy living.

• 14:45Speaker 01

  Absolutely. And my dad is a marathoner and

• 14:50Speaker 01

  You know, he, uh, from a very young age, I think even maybe too young, um, became very critical of, uh, you know, the way I, uh, chose to eat and, and live. And, um, and it wasn't until later that I understood it was because of the fact that he lost his father at a very young age to what could have been a preventable disease. Um, and he gets very, uh, scared of losing people who are close to him as a result of, um, preventable disease.

• 15:19Rich Roll?

  Right.

• 15:20Speaker 01

  So anybody who he's close with, that he, that he truly loves, if they're becoming unhealthy, it scares him and he becomes hypocritical.

• 15:28Rich Roll?

  Right.

• 15:28Speaker 01

  Um, instead of, um, just being able to open up to them and say, you know, I'm scared about what you're doing and this, you know, I don't want to lose you, uh, so that sort of thing, so.

• 15:38Rich Roll?

  Right, but back when you're 15, so you're just not buying it, like, you're just, what are you doing, like, you're?

• 15:43Speaker 01

  Well, I'm in high school and, and, you know, I'm, uh, I'm 15 years old in, in high school at a, a very, uh, competitive football high school and, and I didn't really fit in with the football crowd, but, uh, um, so I was, you know, I was kinda like your, your average rebellious teenager and, um, you know.

• 16:01Rich Roll?

  Were your parents saying you have to eat this way and this is the way?

• 16:03Speaker 01

  In the house.

• 16:04Rich Roll?

  So when you, as soon as you left the house, you're like, going to McDonald's?

• 16:07Speaker 01

  Exactly, yeah, in the house, it was certain foods, I never, we never had the, you know, a lot of the Oreos and all that stuff ever since I was little. Um, I would always go over to my friends' houses and play so that I can get, you know, the, the snacks and whatnot. So, yeah, do I think that that played into it, um, a bit? Yeah, into my, uh, sort of, as a rebellious way of, of saying, you know, whatever, uh, I can do whatever I want type of thing.

• 16:32Rich Roll?

  Yeah, yeah, yeah.

• 16:33Speaker 01

  That certainly played into it.

• 16:34Rich Roll?

  Yeah, screw off, old man.

• 16:35Speaker 01

  Exactly, that kinda thing, yeah.

• 16:37Rich Roll?

  But he must know what's going on, right?

• 16:39Speaker 01

  Oh, absolutely.

• 16:40Rich Roll?

  So this is causing like a strain in your relationship with your parents?

• 16:43Speaker 01

  It did, you know, especially later on, um, after college, because I was always really fit in high school.

• 16:48Rich Roll?

  But you, you didn't play football, but did you play sports?

• 16:51Speaker 01

  Um, well, I mean, my brother was on varsity tennis, so I used to play tennis with him as a way to, you know, help him train, um, and I have, that's my twin brother.

• 17:00Rich Roll?

  You're twins, right?

• 17:00Speaker 01

  My twin, yeah, and, um... Uh, but I did drama and uh, I was always really interested in arts and so I did drama and, and art classes and um, but I was always really fit and um, you know, so it wasn't really that big of an issue when I was in the house and as long as you didn't see it outside of the house.

• 17:17Rich Roll?

  Right.

• 17:18Speaker 01

  Guess it wasn't too bad of a, big of a problem.

• 17:19Rich Roll?

  Right, out of sight, out of mind.

• 17:21Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 17:21Rich Roll?

  Uh huh, okay, so, so, pretty typical high school experience.

• 17:25Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 17:26Rich Roll?

  For the most part.

• 17:26Speaker 01

  Absolutely.

• 17:27Rich Roll?

  Right, you go off to college and uh, somewhere along the lines, uh, the, the beautiful, wondrous effects of Adderall start to enter.

• 17:34Speaker 01

  Oh yeah, absolutely.

• 17:35Rich Roll?

  Right?

• 17:36Speaker 01

  Absolutely, I fell in love with that stuff. Yeah, you know, it was like my senior year in high school, actually, um, when uh, you know, I started taking Adderall in high school, but I didn't know until a senior, until my senior year, when someone said, you know, you just take a bunch of that, you can just stay up all night and, and study and get all your work done and, and uh, and I did that and from then on, I was just addicted to that feeling of being superhuman, of never having to take a break and, and always being at a hundred and ten percent.

• 18:03Rich Roll?

  Uh huh.

• 18:04Speaker 01

  And I loved it.

• 18:05Rich Roll?

  I love that too. I never took Adderall, but you're making me want, want some right now.

• 18:08Speaker 01

  Yeah, and it's, the thing is, you know, I was, I was prescribed it for attention deficit disorder, which, you know, and it's an over prescribed medication, um, you know, and, and then when you get to college, it's all over the schools, you know, I mean.

• 18:21Rich Roll?

  Students are using it like crazy, right?

• 18:23Speaker 01

  It's like the super drug.

• 18:24Rich Roll?

  So initially, it was, so, so you get, you get diagnosed with ADHD.

• 18:29Speaker 01

  Mm-hmm.

• 18:29Rich Roll?

  At some point along the line.

• 18:30Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 18:31Rich Roll?

  By, what, what happens? Like, your parents take you to a shrink or?

• 18:34Speaker 01

  That's right, yeah, I mean, I had, um, you know, I was kind of an angry kid growing up and uh, you know, uh, I used to fight the school, um, structured lifestyle, um, and so they took me to go talk to somebody and this therapist or psychiatrist suggested that I take.

• 18:54Rich Roll?

  Mm-hmm.

• 18:54Speaker 01

  At first Ritalin and then it became Adderall.

• 18:56Rich Roll?

  Mm-hmm.

• 18:57Speaker 01

  And uh, that, that was sort of the beginning of it, although, you know, at first, of course, I, I, you know, refused to take the medication, cause I, I was just sort of

• 19:05Rich Roll?

  Being rebellious.

• 19:06Speaker 01

  Yeah, exactly.

• 19:06Rich Roll?

  You're like, ah, actually this stuff's really good.

• 19:08Speaker 01

  Yeah, exactly.

• 19:09Rich Roll?

  You know, if I could take a drug that would allow me to just be super hyper focused.

• 19:13Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 19:13Rich Roll?

  And, and be hyper productive, like, I'm in.

• 19:16Speaker 01

  Yeah, exactly, that's, that's.

• 19:18Rich Roll?

  So, I hear these stories about, like, you hear Dave Asprey, you know, the bulletproof diet guy?

• 19:22Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 19:22Rich Roll?

  And he talks about Pro Vigil and how it makes him like a superhuman person and you can like crank out his work, like, that's. Very, very, uh, dangerous for me to hear that because my first impulse is like, I gotta get some of that.

• 19:36Speaker 01

  Exactly.

• 19:36Rich Roll?

  I could use some of that. Think of how much more productive I could be. And as a, as somebody in recovery like yourself, like those messages are.

• 19:44Speaker 01

  Oh, yeah.

• 19:44Rich Roll?

  You know.

• 19:45Speaker 01

  They're.

• 19:46Rich Roll?

  Scary stuff.

• 19:46Speaker 01

  Exactly. And, um, you know, it, it was fine all the way through college, uh, but at some point, I guess maybe my last year of college, it, uh, it had taken its toll on my metabolism.

• 19:58Rich Roll?

  Mm-hmm.

• 19:59Speaker 01

  Uh, to the point to where it basically wasn't there. It didn't work unless I was on a lot of the medication.

• 20:05Rich Roll?

  Well, you developed a tolerance.

• 20:06Speaker 01

  Exactly.

• 20:06Rich Roll?

  So when you get to, when you get to college, I mean, how is this, how do you get it? Like, are you still going to the student union, like, like health center or something like that?

• 20:15Speaker 01

  Well.

• 20:15Rich Roll?

  Or is it people just selling it in the dorm?

• 20:17Speaker 01

  It's both. Um, I was seeing a doctor in, uh, in Georgia to get the medication and then I would buy it from people as well because I was taking, you know, the stuff, the amount that I would get from the doctor was never enough.

• 20:29Rich Roll?

  Right.

• 20:29Speaker 01

  Um, and so I'd have to buy some extra on the side. And it got to a point to where I was doing, when I got out of college, I was doing an obscene amount. I mean, the doctors would prescribe you, an average prescription, I guess is anywhere from 20 to 60 milligrams a day. By the end of my addiction, I was doing 450.

• 20:46Rich Roll?

  Mm-hmm. Every single day?

• 20:47Speaker 01

  Every single day.

• 20:48Rich Roll?

  How expensive is it?

• 20:49Speaker 01

  It's really expensive.

• 20:50Rich Roll?

  Uh-huh.

• 20:51Speaker 01

  Uh, especially.

• 20:51Rich Roll?

  So how are you subsidizing all of this?

• 20:53Speaker 01

  Unfortunately, uh, uh, with, uh, my Whole Foods stock.

• 20:58Rich Roll?

  Ah, I got you.

• 20:59Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 21:00Rich Roll?

  Uh-huh. So, um, all right. So walk me through like that first experience of when, when it really hit you like, wow, Adderall is something awesome. Like, like, did you, was it, was it a slow process of just realizing like, oh, this is like a secret weapon? Or, or did it kind of hit you one day? Like, you stayed up all night and cranked out a paper or something like that?

• 21:21Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 21:22Rich Roll?

  Thought this is like, this is how I'm going to make my way in the world.

• 21:25Speaker 01

  Exactly. I got all my work done. I never had to take a break. And then afterwards, all I wanted to do was just stay up and be fixated on something. Just, and so I got on to video games and started playing those like crazy all night long. And I still had energy at the end of it because I could just take some.

• 21:40Rich Roll?

  So you didn't have a crash?

• 21:40Speaker 01

  No, just take some more.

• 21:42Rich Roll?

  Just keep taking it?

• 21:43Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 21:43Rich Roll?

  And how, so were you sleeping at all?

• 21:45Speaker 01

  Uh, I would go on average, two, two and a half days without sleep. And then I would crash and then wake up, you know, 15, 16 hours later.

• 21:54Rich Roll?

  Uh-huh.

• 21:54Speaker 01

  And, uh.

• 21:55Rich Roll?

  Do you have like a hangover or?

• 21:56Speaker 01

  Yeah. And you get, uh, you know. You get really, really hungry afterwards. Um, and unfortunately, at the end, I was still hungry on it and addicted to fast food.

• 22:06Rich Roll?

  Right. Well, we're going to get into all of that in a minute, but I'm just like, I'm like super interested in just Adderall and the impact of that and how that kind of began to change your brain chemistry.

• 22:16Speaker 01

  Yeah, I mean, it, it, it affects you in, in every single aspect in the same way that meth does because Adderall is an amphetamine. That's exactly what it is. It's just legal amphetamine. And luckily, because I wasn't snorting it, I was just swallowing it. I was ingesting it. I didn't do a lot of the damage to my brain that a lot of addicts do. Um, but, uh, you know, it makes-

• 22:39Rich Roll?

  Does it have that, uh, I mean, did they give it to you in like a time lapse and then you chew, you chew it up? So you override the-

• 22:45Speaker 01

  There's two kinds. There's two kinds. There's a instant release and then there's the extended release. And I always asked for the instant release.

• 22:52Rich Roll?

  Of course you did, right?

• 22:54Speaker 01

  Yeah, exactly. They tried to get me on the extended release a few times. I said, no, it doesn't work on me.

• 22:58Rich Roll?

  Uh huh.

• 22:59Speaker 01

  So, but of course it does.

• 23:00Rich Roll?

  Right. Well, that's like, I mean, anybody who is tuned in at all to somebody who, who potentially is an addict, that would be a red flag right there.

• 23:09Speaker 01

  Right, absolutely.

• 23:09Rich Roll?

  Anybody who's asking for the instant release.

• 23:11Speaker 01

  Oh, and I was doctor shopping like crazy, which is where you have more than one doctor prescribing the same medication without them knowing about each other. And it's completely illegal. It's totally a felony.

• 23:20Rich Roll?

  Right. Do they have systems where they can monitor that kind of thing or?

• 23:24Speaker 01

  They do, but you know, the thing was I wasn't doing so, I wasn't, I was always uh, just having two doctors at one time to where it wasn't so many different pharmacies and so many different-

• 23:34Rich Roll?

  So you wouldn't get completely red flagged.

• 23:36Speaker 01

  Exactly. And I also wasn't filing it under insurance, um, which is really how they catch you.

• 23:41Rich Roll?

  Right.

• 23:41Speaker 01

  Because insurance won't fill a prescription if it's within a month of the previous one.

• 23:46Rich Roll?

  Uh huh.

• 23:46Speaker 01

  So I, I would just say, oh, I don't have insurance, hang out of pocket. And then it was just up to the pharmacy.

• 23:51Rich Roll?

  Right. So, so the message in that is this is how crafty you get when you become an addict.

• 23:57Speaker 01

  Oh, my goodness.

• 23:58Rich Roll?

  Learn, you, you become unbelievably resourceful.

• 24:01Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 24:01Rich Roll?

  Learning how to game a system.

• 24:03Speaker 01

  Incredibly. I mean, whatever, you know, even if it came down to, oh my goodness, I'm, I'm out today. I need- Some I would craft and scheme and call and do whatever is necessary and I would get it if I needed it.

• 24:15Rich Roll?

  Yeah, you always get it.

• 24:16Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 24:17Rich Roll?

  You always get it. It doesn't matter if you have to take spend your an entire day like figuring out how it's gonna happen.

• 24:22Speaker 01

  Because that's the only thing that's important.

• 24:23Rich Roll?

  Yeah.

• 24:24Speaker 01

  And that's.

• 24:24Rich Roll?

  It overrides everything.

• 24:25Speaker 01

  It makes your world about that big, you know, which I'm I'm making a symbol saying very, very small.

• 24:30Rich Roll?

  Right.

• 24:31Speaker 01

  Because it just literally revolves around, do I have any, how much do I have left? When does that mean I need to get more? How am I gonna get more? And then when all when all of that is figured out? Anything that's left over, any energy that's left over for social activities or work? You you may you may spare some energy for that, but it's not important. So I became this recluse of a person who just sort of hid in my apartment.

• 24:55Rich Roll?

  Yeah, you become, you think that it's the solution that's allowing you to be successful, like you attribute all of these. Um miraculous benefits to it.

• 25:05Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 25:05Rich Roll?

  But what you but you're completely myopic to the fact that your life starts to be just become smaller and smaller and smaller and smaller.

• 25:13Speaker 01

  Yeah. You think that you're controlling your life by taking it when it's completely controlling you.

• 25:17Rich Roll?

  Right, right, right. When I was in rehab, uh, I went to a rehab where uh, there were a lot, a lot of um, professional diversion groups would send their people. So there were a lot of doctors and there were a lot of pilots, but it was so interesting to hear the stories from the doctors, particularly anesthesiologists. Because they have so much access, right, to like drugs like uh, fentanyl and sufentinel. Which which I'm told have a very similar kind of effect in in terms of like allowing you to be really productive.

• 25:47Speaker 01

  Okay.

• 25:47Rich Roll?

  And and just the incredible lengths to which they would go to kind of like, you know, steal it out of a hospital, but do it in a way where no one would notice. And then writing their own, using their own script pads and spreading it across like every, they knew where every single pharmacy was.

• 26:01Speaker 01

  Oh, yeah.

• 26:02Rich Roll?

  A hundred mile radius.

• 26:03Speaker 01

  Absolutely.

• 26:04Rich Roll?

  Drive out of town and go way to a different town, to a different pharmacy, like it, you know, the amount of energy that would go into it is extraordinary.

• 26:12Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 26:12Rich Roll?

  And I think that's something that, you know, if you're a normal person. You're like, what? Like, I don't understand, you know, but when you're an addict, you're like,

• 26:20Speaker 01

  Right.

• 26:20Rich Roll?

  Of course, yeah.

• 26:21Speaker 01

  Yeah, that's just part of it.

• 26:22Rich Roll?

  Exactly what, of course, right?

• 26:24Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 26:24Rich Roll?

  So, alright, so, so at some point, though, you have to realize, like, this is not, not good. I'm, I'm sure that realization came somewhat before you doing anything about it, but did you, was there a moment where you're like, yeah, I'm addicted to this stuff?

• 26:39Speaker 01

  Oh, yeah. But I'm gonna keep going. What's interesting, though, is that, um, uh, I knew for a long time that I was an addict, um, and I could say it in my head, but I could never say it out loud. And there were nights where I'd be up, and I'd be feeling miserable, and I'd know that it's because I, you know, I'm almost out, and I'd be worried about it, and I'd say to myself, man, I'm an addict. And I asked myself to say it out loud, and I just could not get my lips to make the movement and actually say it. I couldn't do it. And, uh, but, you know, I just denied the help. I denied asking for it, and I knew it was there. My dad, you know, it-

• 27:16Rich Roll?

  Everybody must have known, because if you're not sleeping-

• 27:19Speaker 01

  Oh, my goodness, yeah.

• 27:19Rich Roll?

  You must be kind of looking a little strung out and like, BDI and stuff.

• 27:23Speaker 01

  Oh, my, yeah, it, you know, and, and, and everybody had sort of made their attempt to reach out, uh, you know, my sister, my mother, my father, friends, to say, you know, if, if you think you're fooling somebody, you're, you're kidding yourself, um-

• 27:38Rich Roll?

  And you, how, how would you respond to that?

• 27:40Speaker 01

  Oh, I'd make up, oh, it's, you know, because I have, uh, OCD, and you're seeing the tics are just part of my OCD, because I would get, you know, like, tics where things would bother me, and I'd have to, like, touch my, my hair, move it off my ears all the time, and, um, and they'd say, you know, we can tell, you know, you're always butzing with something, and, uh, and say, well, that's because I actually have OCD, and I'm seeing somebody about it, so don't worry about it, you know?

• 28:02Rich Roll?

  Just get everybody off your back.

• 28:03Speaker 01

  Yeah, just get everyone off my back, make up whatever I have to make up in order to just get off the subject.

• 28:08Rich Roll?

  How long, how long into, uh, you taking it before people started to notice?

• 28:13Speaker 01

  I think it was the last five years of it, so, uh, this was after college, um- I guess I was about 25.

• 28:23Rich Roll?

  Yeah.

• 28:23Speaker 01

  Um.

• 28:24Rich Roll?

  So you had a pretty long career of using this stuff.

• 28:27Speaker 01

  Oh, my gosh, yeah.

• 28:28Rich Roll?

  Yeah.

• 28:28Speaker 01

  I was a hardcore addict for probably 10 years.

• 28:31Rich Roll?

  Uh huh. So, but when you were in high school, it was just starting, right?

• 28:35Speaker 01

  Yeah, it was just for fun. It was just, you know, on weekends at parties, you know, I could hand it out, you know, uh, get people to come to parties and whatnot, be invited to parties and, and uh.

• 28:46Rich Roll?

  So it wasn't just for studying, you're, you're.

• 28:48Speaker 01

  Oh, no, it was, it was recreational, just as much it was for, uh, for studying, absolutely.

• 28:53Rich Roll?

  And you didn't venture off of Adderall and get into other drugs? I mean, it was just, Adderall was the drug of choice.

• 28:59Speaker 01

  I mean, of course, you know, I, I smoked marijuana in high school, um, and there were, uh, you know, a couple of occasions when I did ecstasy, um, and, uh, cause I went to some raves with some friends.

• 29:09Rich Roll?

  Mm hmm.

• 29:10Speaker 01

  But none of those really, they didn't do it for me. It wasn't the same.

• 29:15Rich Roll?

  Right.

• 29:15Speaker 01

  You know, it wasn't, I guess I was sort of seeking a substance that would allow me to have attributes that I, I was lacking. And that was being that type A personality. Um, I never learned how to do that on my own. Um, and this drug did it for me.

• 29:32Rich Roll?

  Right. Did you ever try cocaine?

• 29:34Speaker 01

  Yeah, I, it doesn't last long enough.

• 29:36Rich Roll?

  Right. But it, it kinda, did it have a similar?

• 29:39Speaker 01

  Oh, yeah, it's exactly, very similar.

• 29:41Rich Roll?

  Right.

• 29:41Speaker 01

  It's just, it doesn't.

• 29:42Rich Roll?

  It just wears off too soon.

• 29:43Speaker 01

  It just wears off too soon.

• 29:46Speaker 01

  Yeah. That's the bottom line.

• 29:48Rich Roll?

  Uh, I relate, Ben, you know, I was always too, you know, I'm older than you, so, so prescription meds weren't, they just weren't really around.

• 29:56Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 29:56Rich Roll?

  When I was in college, you know, I probably would have been right there with you. But I had like a super healthy fear of, of cocaine because I knew myself well enough to know that if I tried that, that that would be the end of me.

• 30:08Speaker 01

  Mm hmm.

• 30:08Rich Roll?

  So I just stuck with booze. Um, but had I, had I taken that leap and, and gotten into cocaine, I think it would have, it would have accelerated the whole process.

• 30:17Speaker 01

  Probably, yeah.

• 30:19Rich Roll?

  And, uh, I'm sure I would have loved Adderall.

• 30:21Speaker 01

  Oh, well, be glad you didn't try it.

• 30:24Rich Roll?

  Yeah, maybe I dodged a bullet there. But what's also interesting is kind of, well, there's a couple of observations. Um, you know, at some point.

• 30:33Rich Roll?

  There is a cross addiction with food, right?

• 30:35Speaker 01

  Absolutely.

• 30:36Rich Roll?

  So you come off of, you know, this protracted high and then you have this intense hunger. And you're also kind of meanwhile, sort of, you know, at a young age, you're rebelling through, you know, eating fast food and stuff like that. So then when that intense hunger kicks in, the pangs after the drug is starting to wear off, and then you're on this roller coaster, right, of up and down and sort of binging on fast food, which kind of, my impression is that, you know, you sort of develop this eating disorder at the same time that you're developing this Adderall addiction.

• 31:07Speaker 01

  I became an emotional eater 100%, you know. When I would come off of the drug, I would feel miserable and, you know, it was an instant, you know, source of instant gratification, you know, go to McDonald's, get two cheeseburgers and come back and just watch TV and, you know, almost became like a hoarder. I had, you know, all this garbage around my couch, which was just fast food wrappers.

• 31:32Rich Roll?

  Yeah.

• 31:33Speaker 01

  It's because I didn't really give a, I didn't give a crap about anything else, you know. I let my hygiene go, I let my health go, I gained, you know, a whole bunch of weight, especially by the end and...

• 31:44Rich Roll?

  Right, so you're, I'm, I'm looking at you right now, you're a skinny, fit guy, but I know, because I'm also looking at a before picture of you, that you were at 1.300 pounds.

• 31:54Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 31:55Rich Roll?

  Right?

• 31:56Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 31:57Rich Roll?

  Which is hard to imagine, looking at you right now, it doesn't even, I can't, I don't even, you don't resemble before myself at all.

• 32:01Speaker 01

  Yeah, I know.

• 32:02Rich Roll?

  So, so, you know, a lot of these eating issues, and this is what I want to get into, kind of stem from this, you know, sort of lack of self-esteem or kind of body images, you know, body image dysmorphia that you had. And it's an interesting subject, you know, I just got an email the other day from a guy who's a professional triathlete. I'd met him like last year and he sent, he sent an interesting email and he said...

• 32:29Rich Roll?

  You know, one thing you haven't talked about on the podcast is eating disorders in men, particularly male athletes. It's something, it's kind of a shadowy subject.

• 32:37Speaker 01

  Okay.

• 32:38Rich Roll?

  That I think exists, you know, that I think there's a lot of athletes out there, male athletes, that do struggle with an eating disorder. But unlike it is with women, it's kind of a, you know, it's still, I think, kind of a shameful thing, right?

• 32:53Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 32:54Rich Roll?

  I think there's a lot of men that are, that are suffering quietly from this. And it's different if you're a guy, like to say, I'm anorexic, or I'm bulimic, or I have this body dysmorphia, and I'm obsessed with, you know, what I'm eating as a result of trying to control my life, and the kind of disorder that, that blossoms out of that. So I'm interested in kind of getting into that, you know, how that developed in you, when you became aware of it, and kind of what your, you know, daily practices around food were at that time.

• 33:20Speaker 01

  Um, you know, I think I've always had, uh, I've always struggled with self-image and with some kind of low self-esteem when it comes to body image. Um, and, uh, I think that what happened was, um, my relationship with my twin brother, you know, we would sort of qualify each other's lifestyles by doing the same thing. So if he was, you know, eating unhealthy, and then I could do it, it's fine, you know?

• 33:49Rich Roll?

  Were you guys wearing the same clothes every day?

• 33:50Speaker 01

  We were.

• 33:51Rich Roll?

  Were you?

• 33:52Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 33:52Rich Roll?

  Until what age?

• 33:54Speaker 01

  We, we, well, we, you know, we wore different colors when we were little, when we were real little. We, my brother, my brother wore-

• 34:01Rich Roll?

  Are you an identical twin?

• 34:02Speaker 01

  Yeah, my brother wore blue and I wore red until, you know-

• 34:05Rich Roll?

  You're wearing red right now.

• 34:06Speaker 01

  I'm wearing red right now.

• 34:06Rich Roll?

  So you still do it?

• 34:07Speaker 01

  I still do it.

• 34:08Rich Roll?

  Is he wearing a blue shirt today?

• 34:09Speaker 01

  I, you know, he might be. I doubt it, though. Um, but, uh, yeah, until, you know, middle school, and then it didn't, you know, it was all about trying to differentiate ourselves from each other, trying to, to find our own identity. And that was, that was an interesting struggle that, you know- He would find a, uh, an activity that he really liked and of course I really liked it too, but he would get mad because I was doing it.

• 34:33Rich Roll?

  Right, that's my thing.

• 34:34Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 34:34Rich Roll?

  Find your own thing.

• 34:35Speaker 01

  Exactly. Find out who you are, this is who I am.

• 34:38Rich Roll?

  Right, so he's playing tennis and what else is he doing?

• 34:41Speaker 01

  Uh, in high school, he, um, uh, well, basically he just, he was all about tennis and, uh, he had, uh, we were both really into cars and he had the fastest car in high school, so.

• 34:52Rich Roll?

  What was he driving?

• 34:53Speaker 01

  It was a, a ninety-seven Mustang Cobra with a Kenny Brown C4 racing package on it.

• 34:59Rich Roll?

  No high school kid should have a car like that.

• 35:02Speaker 01

  It was pushing six hundred horsepower.

• 35:03Rich Roll?

  Wow.

• 35:04Speaker 01

  So, it was pretty sick. He had nitrous on it and everything.

• 35:06Rich Roll?

  Oh my god.

• 35:07Speaker 01

  I know.

• 35:08Rich Roll?

  It's like right out of like Friday Night Lights.

• 35:10Speaker 01

  It, it is, you know, and not only that, it's, you know, Texas high school.

• 35:13Rich Roll?

  Right.

• 35:14Speaker 01

  So, um, yeah, and, uh, so we used to, we used to drag race, um, and stuff like that.

• 35:20Rich Roll?

  Uh-huh.

• 35:21Speaker 01

  But, uh.

• 35:21Rich Roll?

  Were you, did you have a fast car too?

• 35:24Speaker 01

  No.

• 35:24Rich Roll?

  No.

• 35:25Speaker 01

  I mean, I, I liked cars and I, I'm still obsessed with cars, but for some reason he always got the, uh, the better car.

• 35:30Rich Roll?

  Uh-huh. But. So, is that making you resentful as a young person?

• 35:34Speaker 01

  It was.

• 35:35Rich Roll?

  How are you differentiating yourself?

• 35:36Speaker 01

  It was, because you know, uh, all of our closest friends, we were all about cars and, uh, you know, I was, I was Bobby's brother, Bobby who had the fast car, I was his brother and, uh.

• 35:49Rich Roll?

  It'd be different if he was like your older brother, like.

• 35:51Speaker 01

  Right.

• 35:52Rich Roll?

  He was, uh, you know, Matthew McConaughey in Dazed and Confused.

• 35:55Speaker 01

  Right, exactly.

• 35:56Rich Roll?

  Brother, but, but you're the same age.

• 35:58Speaker 01

  Exactly.

• 35:58Rich Roll?

  And you look exactly alike.

• 35:59Speaker 01

  So, you know, I never had, I never got to really do any of the racing, um, but it was fine, you know, I did, um, I did drama and I competed, uh, nationally in, in, uh, in drama and prose and things like that and, uh, it was pretty cool and, um, but, uh, you know, we were both really, really interested in art as far as computer animation and film and we both got, it was weird, we were kind of recruited by Savannah College of Art and Design. They came to our high school and they, they went to our electronic media class, which is our computer animation course. And, uh, our professor sort of pulled us aside and had us show this, this, uh, representative our portfolios.

• 36:40Speaker 01

  And they said, oh, this is exactly what we're looking for and they offered us the, the biggest scholarship that they can offer to the school.

• 36:46Rich Roll?

  Wow.

• 36:47Speaker 01

  And so we both accepted and we went there originally for computer art. Until we found out what that meant is a career path, just sort of sitting in a room, staring at a screen, creating problems for yourself and, you know, thinking that you're gonna be in charge of a Disney film is, you know, it's not gonna happen. But, uh, we've, both of us have been big fans of film ever since we were little.

• 37:08Rich Roll?

  Right.

• 37:08Speaker 01

  Um, and so we changed our major to, uh, to film and I remember the first time that I rolled, uh, on my, uh, short film, it was on super 16 millimeter on an old Aerie camera and I just fell in love with being behind the camera. And I think that a lot of that passion was, was fueled by Adderall as well because I came, I became obsessed with camera work.

• 37:33Rich Roll?

  Mm-hmm.

• 37:34Speaker 01

  And with photography and not just the art, but understanding the technology. I could now stay up all night long, reading the manuals and it would be pleasurable because I was on Adderall.

• 37:45Rich Roll?

  Right, right.

• 37:45Speaker 01

  And I could show up.

• 37:46Rich Roll?

  High like.

• 37:47Speaker 01

  I could show up and know more than everyone else and I, I got really high on that, that feeling of, of being the person who knew more than everyone else about a certain subject.

• 37:57Rich Roll?

  Does, with the Adderall though, does the memory fade? Is it that thing where like you can, you can cram for a test and know it the next day, but then like a week later, you can't remember any of it?

• 38:06Speaker 01

  No, um, I've actually, uh, for, ever since I was little, had, uh, an amazing, uh, um, amount of recall. Um, the only time that it would get difficult is if you're on like day three of staying up and you're trying to actually be effective.

• 38:23Rich Roll?

  Right.

• 38:23Speaker 01

  At, at that point.

• 38:24Rich Roll?

  At some point.

• 38:25Speaker 01

  Just not gonna happen.

• 38:26Rich Roll?

  The wheels are still gonna fall off the wagon, right. Alright, so, so you're, so basically your brother becomes your filmmaking part, I mean, I know you guys have, have a film, you have a film company today and you guys work together.

• 38:37Speaker 01

  Yeah, um, we were, we, you know, we used to work together a lot more. Now he just runs the whole thing himself back in Texas.

• 38:45Rich Roll?

  Um, oh, he doesn't live here?

• 38:46Speaker 01

  No.

• 38:46Rich Roll?

  Uh-huh.

• 38:47Speaker 01

  Um, but, uh, yeah, we did, um, you know, we got our first, uh, our first break on a, a film with Luke and Owen Wilson and Will Ferrell and them called, uh, The Wendell Baker Story.

• 38:58Rich Roll?

  I know the film well.

• 38:59Speaker 01

  Do you really?

• 39:00Rich Roll?

  I have a little bit of history with that film.

• 39:01Speaker 01

  Really?

• 39:02Rich Roll?

  Well, not really, tangentially. So, I, uh, wrote and directed a short film called Down Dog that was like a satire on yoga and this was in like, we finished it in 2005 and it did really well on the festival circuit, so we've traveled all these festivals and, um... We were at the Maui Film Festival where they premiered the movie.

• 39:23Speaker 01

  That's right.

• 39:23Rich Roll?

  So Julie and I hung out with Luke and Andrew a little bit.

• 39:27Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 39:29Rich Roll?

  Which was interesting. And I see Andrew around Santa Monica.

• 39:32Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 39:33Rich Roll?

  For people that don't know, he's the other Wilson brother. And he's got beautiful, long hair and he kind of has a beard. He looks sort of like what Jared Leto looked like before he cut his hair. Like he had this hippie vibe to him.

• 39:44Speaker 01

  Right.

• 39:44Rich Roll?

  Handsome guy. And that was kind of like, he's always been overshadowed by his brothers.

• 39:49Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 39:50Rich Roll?

  This was kind of more his movie than the other movies that they had worked on together.

• 39:54Speaker 01

  Right.

• 39:54Rich Roll?

  We were there when they screened it for the first time and spent a little time with Owen was there too, so got to hang out.

• 40:00Speaker 01

  Yeah, they're actually really great guys. I remember, this was my first thing, I was still in college. And it was interesting because my mom runs into Luke at Whole Foods in Austin. This is when they're scouting locations and whatnot, or even, this might have been even before that. And my mom is never one to shy away from an opportunity or just to talk to somebody. And so she walks up to Luke Wilson, she says, this is her famous line, she walks up and she goes, you know, does anyone ever say that you look like Luke Wilson? And she totally knows it's him.

• 40:30Rich Roll?

  Yeah.

• 40:31Speaker 01

  And she asks him, you know, are you guys making a movie? Because I have two sons who are in film school and they would love to work on it.

• 40:37Rich Roll?

  Uh huh.

• 40:38Speaker 01

  Luke says, well, our producer is right over here, why don't you talk to him? And he comes up to her and they start talking and he says, well, you know what, I'll tell you what. If you can get me a meeting with the CEO of Whole Foods, I'll give your kids a job on the film. And she says, well, alright, just give me one second.

• 40:58Rich Roll?

  That's easy. Why did he want a meeting though?

• 41:01Speaker 01

  He's just, he was a big fan of Whole Foods. His name is Dave Bouchelle. And a super healthy guy, big fan of Whole Foods. You know, needless to say, we got the job. And it was great because Luke and Andrew. They were amazing. They sort of took us under their wing and allowed us to experience the filmmaking process and still have that air of magic about it. Because a lot of times when you show up on set and you're working on set, the magic gets killed because you see all the bureaucracy behind.

• 41:38Rich Roll?

  They just did, this was independently financed. They just did their own thing.

• 41:41Speaker 01

  They just did their own thing. And so Luke and I actually still, we still stay in touch. And I saw him recently. And yeah, they're great guys.

• 41:50Rich Roll?

  Yeah, that's cool. Well, that's a cool way to kind of kick off your, that's a pretty sexy, fun way to expose yourself to the industry. Was that all shot in Austin?

• 41:58Speaker 01

  It was. And it was a lot of fun. It was during the summer in Texas. Most of it was shot outside, which meant it was a really hot shoot. But yeah, it was great. And Bobby and I continued to work in film. I worked for a company called Action Figure back in Austin. We did music videos for the Flaming Lips and Southwest Airlines commercials and things like that. And it was pretty fun. But at the same time, I was still sort of nurturing this addiction that was taking the first seat.

• 42:28Rich Roll?

  What's your brother doing? Because he must know, like, I'm trying to work with my brother and he's strung out all the time.

• 42:36Speaker 01

  Well, you know, my brother is, you know, he, unfortunately, I was a pretty shitty brother at the time. Because he's prescribed Adderall as well, but he doesn't abuse it. And I would do whatever I needed to to get it from him. And so I think.

• 42:57Rich Roll?

  You're pimping his stash.

• 42:58Speaker 01

  Exactly. And, you know, I just thought of this right now, but when I said earlier that we would sort of qualify each other's lifestyle, I'm not sure if there's a little bit of him that said, you know what, I'll make this seem okay for him. And I won't. And I'll sort of take backseat with our career as well. And he just sort of started living the same lifestyle that I was, where, you know, I would stay up all night and then I wouldn't eat really well. And if that's the case, if I sort of got him into that unhealthy lifestyle, then, you know. Feel really bad about it, but you know.

• 43:38Rich Roll?

  So there was some level of like sort of extended codependency.

• 43:42Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 43:42Rich Roll?

  Sense that he's not only allowing you to continue to live your life this way, but he's, he's, he's on some level kind of dipping his toe in it.

• 43:50Speaker 01

  Exactly.

• 43:51Rich Roll?

  Feel more okay about doing it.

• 43:54Speaker 01

  Yeah, because you know, our, our father at the same time was seeing our lifestyle habits getting really bad. And is like I said, very critical person and it would, I, I, I would take any kind of criticism about behavior. As a criticism about who I was as a person, I wasn't able to separate the two and I would.

• 44:14Rich Roll?

  Most people can't.

• 44:15Speaker 01

  Right, but you know, it was, it, it wasn't on him that I couldn't do that. I was just unable to see that this was how he was trying to say that I love you and I'm worried about you. I took it as him saying, I don't approve of who you are as a person. And so I used to get really depressed and you know, so my brother and I would sort of make it okay by. Allowing each other to feel like this is our, hey, this is the way we live our lives. So you know, I do it too.

• 44:42Rich Roll?

  Mm hmm.

• 44:43Speaker 01

  So.

• 44:43Rich Roll?

  Interesting. All right, so, so depression is happening. Uh, your weight is escalating.

• 44:49Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 44:50Rich Roll?

  This fast food addiction is really kicking in. How long does it take before, um, you know, you swell up to, you know, your maximum weight of three hundred?

• 44:58Speaker 01

  I guess my, I hit my maximum weight at around two thousand and ten, two thousand and eleven. Um, where I, I finally hit the, you know, two eighty to three hundred range and.

• 45:09Rich Roll?

  Right.

• 45:10Speaker 01

  You know, I, by that point, I, I barely saw anybody else. I didn't hang out with any of my friends. I didn't like who I was. I didn't like the way I looked and so.

• 45:20Rich Roll?

  You're starting to be like a shut in.

• 45:21Speaker 01

  Yeah, absolutely.

• 45:22Rich Roll?

  And, and of course that's, that's, you know, fostering the depression, I would imagine.

• 45:27Speaker 01

  Yeah, absolutely.

• 45:28Rich Roll?

  And then are you getting medication for the depression also?

• 45:31Speaker 01

  Yeah, they put me on several different things that I would not really take.

• 45:38Speaker 01

  I wasn't taking them seriously. I would take them every now and then.

• 45:41Rich Roll?

  Right.

• 45:41Speaker 01

  Um.

• 45:42Rich Roll?

  But of course, like, I mean, anybody could see, like, well, he's depressed because he's stuck in this cycle that he can't break out of.

• 45:49Speaker 01

  Exactly.

• 45:49Rich Roll?

  So another medication is not solving the problem.

• 45:52Speaker 01

  Exactly. I've said that so many times. I said, you know, when, uh, when your lifestyle is making you sick and unhappy, you don't need a new pill. You don't need a new product. You need a new lifestyle. Um, and, you know, it wasn't for, uh, lack of my, you know, anyone reaching out. My dad called me a few times and said, you know, Adam, what's going on with you? You're gaining all this weight. You're unhappy. Uh, you're not working. Um, you know, uh, I can see that, you know, your, your money's going away and you have nothing to show for it. Um, you know, are you, he, he brought up the, uh, the possibility, thought I might have a gambling addiction.

• 46:26Rich Roll?

  Um.

• 46:26Speaker 01

  Um, and he said, you know,

• 46:27Rich Roll?

  Because the money's disappearing so quickly.

• 46:29Speaker 01

  Right.

• 46:30Rich Roll?

  Adderall.

• 46:30Speaker 01

  Exactly. And he said, you know, uh, you know, I know that you have an addiction to Adderall. You know, you want, you want help? Do you need help? Don't be ashamed of it. Um, and it was because he had reached out so many times and I wasn't ready that those times that he would ask, but I, it was because of that, that when I was ready, when I did wake up that morning, he was the person I called.

• 46:52Rich Roll?

  Mm-hmm.

• 46:52Speaker 01

  Um, and it was just because I looked down the line, you know, five, six months and, uh, I saw myself living on the street and, uh, I grew up, uh, pretty comfortable and I, I don't have the skills to survive on the street and I was really scared. And so I called my dad and said, okay, I need help. Uh,

• 47:12Rich Roll?

  So was this after like, you know, a couple of day binge? I mean, did anything, what do you think it was that suddenly gave you that moment of clarity?

• 47:21Speaker 01

  Uh, it, it really was the fact that I knew that in about six months I was gonna have no money.

• 47:26Rich Roll?

  Uh-huh.

• 47:26Speaker 01

  And, uh,

• 47:27Rich Roll?

  So it was really the fear of,

• 47:28Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 47:29Rich Roll?

  of, of suddenly being out of money and not being able to,

• 47:32Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 47:33Rich Roll?

  get Adderall. I mean, you would have been forced to have to steal it or, you know,

• 47:36Speaker 01

  Exactly. Steal it and, and I would have, I wouldn't have been able to pay rent. I would have been out on the street. So, um, uh,

• 47:42Rich Roll?

  You could have thought, I mean, a good act would have been like, I got six months left. I'll worry about that then.

• 47:47Speaker 01

  Yeah. Well, luckily I didn't do that.

• 47:51Rich Roll?

  So the elevator's going down and you had at least enough, you know, wherewithal to understand that, you know, this, this train was about to crash.

• 48:02Speaker 01

  Yeah, and I was, I was really sick and I was really, really depressed. I, I just, I, I hated life at that time. And I guess I, you know, it's a, it's a cliched saying, but I got sick and tired of being sick and tired all the time.

• 48:17Rich Roll?

  So walk me through like a typical day, uh, you know, in it when you were really in the grips of the addiction.

• 48:22Speaker 01

  Um, okay. So I would get up, if I had slept the night before, I'd probably get up around noon, uh, and go straight to Torchy's Tacos and, uh, get, you know, like six breakfast tacos. Um, come back, pop some Adderall, start, you know, either doing some pointless online research, sort of self educating, um, just to get into the throes of it. And then I'd probably get on, you know, a, uh, an online role playing game like World of Warcraft or something like that, which I've seen.

• 48:53Rich Roll?

  Is this idea that you're being productive?

• 48:55Speaker 01

  Yeah, it's a false, it's a false, uh, you know, sense of productivity because I'm, I'm researching all this stuff. So that must mean I'm a productive person.

• 49:03Rich Roll?

  Right.

• 49:04Speaker 01

  Um, and I would, right, I would do that for five hours and I'd be like, all right, yeah, I learned all this new stuff about all this new technology. So I, I, I'm okay. I'm at least I'm up to date with where the industry is.

• 49:14Rich Roll?

  But you're not employed.

• 49:15Speaker 01

  Not employed. Exactly. But I know, but I, you know, and I had this arrogance, oh, but I know more than anybody. You know, it's like, well, in theory, no practice behind it. Um.

• 49:27Rich Roll?

  Yeah, it's that weird thing that, that addicts have where deep down, you know, you're, you know, the biggest turd on the planet, but you're more arrogant than anybody else and, and, you know, feeling superior to everybody.

• 49:38Speaker 01

  The, the, I, I had this insane superior superiority complex. I was incredibly arrogant and I had no self-confidence. It's the weirdest combination.

• 49:47Rich Roll?

  It it's like, how do you even fathom that you could entertain those two ideas simultaneously? But that is the condition of being an addict.

• 49:55Speaker 01

  Exactly. And uh, and so, you know, I would do that and I'd play video games and then take a break, go get fast food, come back, play video games, order, order pizza, watch a movie and by pizza, I mean a large Papa John's pizza with like the side of the, the chicken strips and all that stuff.

• 50:13Rich Roll?

  The whole deal.

• 50:13Speaker 01

  The whole deal. And uh, you know, I never went to the grocery store except to buy like sugary cereals like um, Lucky Charms or Fruity Pebbles.

• 50:22Speaker 01

  And I would eat those at night, you know, it was basically just, it was nothing but drug use. It was all substance abuse. Because eating like that is a substance abuse.

• 50:31Rich Roll?

  Yeah, salt, sugar, fat and Adderall.

• 50:33Speaker 01

  Yeah, exactly. That's exactly what it was. Nothing real. I wasn't eating anything real. Oh my goodness. I used to drink like nine regular sodas a day. And uh, yeah, I had this belief that I, you know, I was in control of my life, you know? Um, and so that would be it and uh.

• 50:51Rich Roll?

  And then staying up super late, right?

• 50:53Speaker 01

  Yeah. Oh yeah. I mean, if, especially when I first got a refill. I mean, it's supposed to last you a month. It would only last me about six days. But uh, you know, for three days at a time, just non-stop, I was, my problems did not matter anymore. I remember when I would go to the pharmacy and get it filled, I'd be like, alright.

• 51:11Rich Roll?

  Game on.

• 51:12Speaker 01

  Game on. Yeah, exactly. No more problems.

• 51:14Rich Roll?

  Right.

• 51:15Speaker 01

  So.

• 51:15Rich Roll?

  Alright, so you, so you wake up this morning, on this one morning.

• 51:19Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 51:19Rich Roll?

  Discuss it with yourself. You call your dad.

• 51:22Speaker 01

  Yeah. And uh, I said, you know, I need help. And he knew exactly what I meant. And he said, you know, don't worry, I'll take care of it. And we went and we met with this, this therapist uh, who recommended a place called Sierra Tucson. And uh, we called them and uh, I talked to them and, and wanted to know all about what they do and, and whether it would fit in and you know, the whole time.

• 51:45Rich Roll?

  Only the addict is like interviewing the rehab. You know what I mean?

• 51:48Speaker 01

  Exactly. Um, you know, my dad is, at the whole time, he's, you know, saying how um. Uh, you know, this take this as an opportunity to sort of not only change your, uh, your lifestyle around drugs, but your lifestyle around, uh, food and, and to get, cause he's always sort of, it's, it's funny because, uh, you know, I used to hate him, uh, for trying to impose his beliefs on food on me and, um, it's, it's amazing because I used to give him so much, I used to direct all my anger towards him. It was all his fault and, uh, he took a lot of shit for a long time and he just, he just took it. And when the, the moment came when I finally asked him for help without

• 52:33Speaker 01

  second thought, you know, was there to offer all the support I needed. And I remember it was actually a, a year before I asked for help that he sent me to, uh, the first immersion that Rip Esselstyn did for the engine too.

• 52:45Rich Roll?

  Oh, wow.

• 52:46Speaker 01

  Um, and it's sad and funny at the same time because, you know, I went and I accepted because I didn't want to upset my father. Um, and I went and I was using at the immersion, but at the same time I was also really learning a lot because I had this addiction to, to, to learn all I could and know more than everybody. And so I, I learned everything that I could from these sessions. And what was amazing is because of that, when the time came for me to save my own life, I had all that knowledge.

• 53:17Rich Roll?

  Yeah, you know what to do. I mean, that's like somebody going to an AA meeting drunk, you know, on some level, uh, even though they're not there yet and they're not ready, like, you know, that, that message is seeping in.

• 53:27Speaker 01

  Exactly.

• 53:28Rich Roll?

  When they are ready, you know, it, it can, it can go to work. Was that the one, was that one in Austin?

• 53:33Speaker 01

  It was. Yeah. Um, and, you know, I stuck to it for like two weeks and, and then it just sort of went back to my own.

• 53:41Rich Roll?

  Right.

• 53:42Speaker 01

  Ways.

• 53:42Rich Roll?

  Well, when you're using drugs, it's like, you know, all bets are off on anything else.

• 53:47Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 53:47Rich Roll?

  You know, in your life, sort of being organized.

• 53:49Speaker 01

  I went, I went to Sierra Tucson and this was in September of 2012. And I walked into, into what they call MAS, which is where you spend the first at least 24 hours of your stay in rehab. They have to medically assess you. And if you do have to detox, that's where you detox so that you're separate from everyone else and that you're in a safe, controlled environment. And if you're not detoxing, you still have to stay there because they're running all these medical tests and they have to get them back.

• 54:18Rich Roll?

  Yeah, yeah, yeah.

• 54:19Speaker 01

  And so you sit in this sort of dormitory area and watching movies and you can't go outside. You can't, they bring you your food and I'm bored out of my mind, but you know, I had to do all these physicals and stuff, which were really embarrassing for me because you know, I did not like the way I looked physically and you know, they have to do, you know, the full body physical and.

• 54:39Rich Roll?

  Do they rifle through your bags when you arrive?

• 54:40Speaker 01

  Oh, yeah, yeah. And you gotta take off all your clothes in front of them, make sure you're not, you know, stashing stuff and.

• 54:47Rich Roll?

  I showed, I showed up at a couple, two quick stories. So I showed up at rehab and it was the same thing. Like I showed up drunk and they, they're going through all my stuff.

• 54:57Speaker 01

  Oh, yeah, everybody, everybody shows up to rehab on their drug.

• 54:59Rich Roll?

  And I'm indignant, you know, I'm like, why would I do that? You know, what do you think, who do you think I am, right? And then they're like, just go into your room over there, right?

• 55:07Speaker 01

  Right.

• 55:08Rich Roll?

  I go into my little dorm room that's like right off this sort of like bay of cubicles where the nurses are. And then, you know, I pass out, I wake up the next day and I'm like, okay, so what's the program? You know, like what are we doing? And they're like, just go back to your room, you know, like no one would tell me what was going on. I'm like, you know, I was like, what's happening? You know, I don't understand. They're like, just go back in your room. Like so then a nurse would come in and do the same thing. They're like, cause they're so used to dealing with incorrigible people that are coming off drugs and alcohol. They've heard it all. Like they're just like, they have no tolerance for, you know, any BS whatsoever.

• 55:40Speaker 01

  And they're trying to avoid getting to the point of an escalated situation.

• 55:43Rich Roll?

  Right, right. They're just like cutting it off. But I remember when I got to that point where I was like, okay, I'm going to rehab. And I was in that position of like, okay, I'm going to interview all these rehabs and find the right fit. And I really wanted to go to Sierra Tucson because it looked really nice. And I was like,

• 55:59Speaker 01

  It was amazing.

• 56:00Rich Roll?

  Warm and sunny. And, and I was working with an addictionologist. And he's like, yeah, it's good and everything. But he had a relationship with Springbrook, which is now Hazleton up in Oregon. And that's where he wanted me to go. And he's like, look, they're to have a bed there. This is where I want, yeah, but like Sierra Tucson, I don't know, it looks pretty good. Like, let's call them. And he's like, ah, you just go up there. But I remember like, that's what I, that's kind of like where I wanted to go to rehab, as if I was going on vacation.

• 56:25Speaker 01

  Exactly.

• 56:26Rich Roll?

  It's so ridiculous.

• 56:26Speaker 01

  But that's not ridiculous because a lot of addicts use rehab as just a vacation from their addiction. And then they just go right back on it.

• 56:34Rich Roll?

  Yeah, I was just gonna go for a spin dry and get back to my life.

• 56:36Speaker 01

  Same here.

• 56:36Rich Roll?

  Get people off my back or what have you. I mean, I knew I had a problem and I knew it was an opportunity. But on some level also, I was like, what's the least amount of work that'll be the most pleasurable and the least painful?

• 56:47Speaker 01

  And you don't have to accept complete responsibility.

• 56:49Rich Roll?

  Yeah, exactly. But what was ironic, so I didn't go to Sierra Tucson, but what's ironic and interesting is that I recently spoke at this event called Revitalize. That's a, it was kind of like a wellness summit that's put on by Mind Body Green, the website. And it's kind of a curated weekend where they bring in kind of wellness leaders. And they do like a TED Talk kind of weekend. It's not open to the public. It's just kind of like, you know, sort of a whole bunch of thought leaders. And, and the morning before, one of the mornings that I was there, I got up early and I went on a run. And I was kind of exploring around. It was in Tucson, right? And I run down this road and I see the entry, entrance to, to Sierra Tucson.

• 57:31Rich Roll?

  And I was like, oh, my God, it's right here. It was like literally across the street from the place where I was staying.

• 57:35Speaker 01

  Yeah, there's that, that.

• 57:36Rich Roll?

  It's called Miraval.

• 57:37Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 57:38Rich Roll?

  It's the resort right there. And I was like, wow, like it just hit home so heavy that, you know, this arc of my life, like, you know, I was, I, I thought at one point, like, that's where I was gonna go to rehab. And here I am, like a speaker at this, where I'm talking about wellness at this event. Like, the full circle of it was just so, like, profound because it was just right there.

• 57:59Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 57:59Rich Roll?

  It was crazy. So, yeah, I ran right by the entrance. I didn't go in, but. There were people.

• 58:04Speaker 01

  They wouldn't let you in either.

• 58:05Rich Roll?

  Yeah, they wouldn't let me in. It was all, and you can't see any of the buildings from the road. It's all very secluded and all of that. So, alright, so you ship yourself off to Sierra Tucson.

• 58:13Speaker 01

  Yeah, and day two, I get a call from the doctor, needs to come and meet with me, doesn't want to let me know what it is. If we're gonna talk about.

• 58:22Rich Roll?

  What is, how, first of all, how is the detox off Adderall?

• 58:25Speaker 01

  It, it's not bad. You don't go into any kind of medical conditions or sweats or anything like that.

• 58:32Rich Roll?

  They don't put you on like Thorazine or?

• 58:34Speaker 01

  No, or Suboxone or anything like that. You just get tired, uh, because your, your body is accustomed to having all this amphetamine pumping through it. Now it doesn't.

• 58:42Rich Roll?

  Yeah, your adrenals must be just cooked.

• 58:44Speaker 01

  Yeah, exactly. And, uh, so I get this call from the doctor and I go into his office and, uh, he sits me down and he goes, you know, you know, you have high blood sugar. I said, no. Uh, it was interesting because a year before that, uh, I was living in Israel and I got really sick. And I went and they did a blood test on me and everything came back fine. Um, but my blood sugar was at like 300. And he says, you're diabetic. Uh, and this is, you know, type 2 diabetes is a lifestyle disease. You don't get it unless you give it to yourself. Um, and so here's the numbers. Here's the situation. I could not deny it. I could deny my addiction all I wanted and I kind of was.

• 59:26Speaker 01

  Um, I even was able to talk them into prescribing me Adderall in low doses.

• 59:31Rich Roll?

  While you were in?

• 59:32Speaker 01

  While I was in Sierra Tucson.

• 59:33Rich Roll?

  Really?

• 59:33Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 59:33Rich Roll?

  That's crafty.

• 59:34Speaker 01

  Because I just said, I said, well, I'm here really on mood, uh, for depression. Uh, I take Adderall. It has, you know, I've, I've used it recreationally, but I just, uh, you know, I'm prescribed it. Um, and so they, they gave me like.

• 59:47Rich Roll?

  I can't believe they bought that.

• 59:49Speaker 01

  I know, believe me. You should, you should have seen what my sister did during family week when she found out. She went crazy. Um, but, uh. And this was the first time that I had to take responsibility and accept my part in my destructive lifestyle habits. Here's the blood sugar numbers, you know, here's your weight. You can't deny it. This is, you've done this to yourself. And I got pretty upset about it. And, you know, I remember being very scared, hearing the list of things that can happen to you as a result of diabetes, losing your eyesight, losing your hearing, losing fingers, feet, legs, things like that.

• 1:00:31Speaker 01

  And I mean, this diabetes is a pretty awful disease. It kind of screws you in every single way possible. I mean, risk of infection, recovering from injury, recovering from surgery goes way up. And so...

• 1:00:45Rich Roll?

  It's this weird thing, though, that because so many people now have it...

• 1:00:48Speaker 01

  Yeah, like it's commonplace.

• 1:00:50Rich Roll?

  Yeah, it's like, oh, you got the diabetes, you know, like you and everybody else.

• 1:00:53Speaker 01

  So just take this. Take Metformin.

• 1:00:56Rich Roll?

  Right, take this medication, don't worry about it. Everyone else has it. By 2030, 50% of Americans are going to be diabetic.

• 1:01:01Speaker 01

  It's crazy.

• 1:01:02Rich Roll?

  Or prediabetic.

• 1:01:03Speaker 01

  It's crazy.

• 1:01:04Rich Roll?

  Crazy.

• 1:01:05Speaker 01

  And so, of course, they prescribed me the medication, and of course, I took it. And, but the thing was that I went and I remember I made a phone call to my dad, and he said, he goes, okay, so, you know, he wanted me to believe that, you know, that this is, just not to freak out about it. I understand that it's hard for me to accept this, but I was accepting it, but realized that I know that this is reversible. He wanted me to remember the fact that I knew that this was a fact, that it's reversible, and that I also not only knew that, but I knew what to do in order to do that. And that the fact remains that I have it, so let's not focus on that. Let's focus on what I can do to change that situation.

• 1:01:55Rich Roll?

  It's weird that the thing that pierced your denial was the health, you know, less than the Adderall addiction.

• 1:02:02Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 1:02:03Rich Roll?

  Like, you're still struggling with a little bit of denial over that.

• 1:02:05Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 1:02:06Rich Roll?

  But you were able to hear that, you know, you were gonna have to change your lifestyle habits around food.

• 1:02:10Speaker 01

  It, for some reason, it really, it really hurt, hearing that, because, you know, it was, I don't know, I knew that I had done it to myself, and this was sort of, I don't know, addiction is a very emotional disease, whereas, uh, type 2 diabetes is very, it's a very scientific and intellectual diagnosis, where it's like, this is why you are type 2 diab- type 2 diabetic. Your blood sugar number is over this, over this amount, it's over 125.

• 1:02:44Rich Roll?

  Yeah, they can't say, uh, here, you're a 9.2 on the addiction scale.

• 1:02:49Speaker 01

  Exactly.

• 1:02:50Rich Roll?

  And here's the, your blood test that proves it.

• 1:02:52Speaker 01

  Exactly, and so, for me, I'm very, uh, I, someone who had taken medication, taken drugs to sort of cover up having to understand what emotions were, and having to deal with emotions, I would pop a pill, so emotions sort of, you know, just sort of, I didn't understand them, and I didn't like them, uh, but if it was in intellectual form, then I could completely accept it, and because I could, I could accept it, it hit me, and I said, "All right, I'm a type 2 diabetic, that means I'm responsible," uh, and then somebody, I can't remember who it was that told me, they said, "You know what the best part of being responsible for your situation in life? If you're the problem, you get to be the solution.

• 1:03:34Speaker 01

  If it's somebody else, or something else that's causing your situation, then it, you can't do anything about it until they, or whatever it is, decides to allow you to do so." Um, and so, I remember, I walked myself from the doctor's office over to the personal trainer's office, normally you gotta put your name on this list, and then hopefully within that week, she'll get back to you, letting you know they're gonna schedule you, so probably by the second week that you're there, you get to start training with her. And I went over to her, and I said, "Uh, you the personal trainer?" She said, "Yes." I said, "Listen, I'm really scared right now, I just got diagnosed as a type 2 diabetic today, um, I need to start working with you, and I need to start working with you tomorrow, please, can we do this?" And she said, yeah, let's do it. And, um, you know, in re- in rehab, you don't have a lot of

• 1:04:18Speaker 01

  control over what you eat. They give you the food and you eat the food.

• 1:04:21Rich Roll?

  Yeah, how was the food there?

• 1:04:23Speaker 01

  It was okay. Um, uh, but what I did, I tried to eat as healthy as possible. Um, but I hadn't really gone a hundred percent hardcore on the diet part, but it was the fact that I'd taken a step forward in changing my, my lifestyle habits and saying that I need to change and I'm doing the exercise. And I did lose some weight, um, during rehab, but the real, the real work started after rehab and sober living.

• 1:04:48Rich Roll?

  Mm hmm.

• 1:04:49Speaker 01

  You know, rehab is a place for you to accept and learn about the problem that you have. It's sort of like preparation for the real road to recovery.

• 1:04:57Rich Roll?

  Mm hmm.

• 1:04:57Speaker 01

  Um, and so when I got into sober living, uh, and this is a, this is like a big passion of mine now is I noticed that sober living, that I was in stock their house with refined sugars, processed foods, hydrogenated fats. I mean, it was everything from Oreos to microwaveable pizzas. And I said, you know, you're required to offer, to have food for me to eat and I can't eat any of this. I'm a type two diabetic. And they said, well, I had, they had an assistant manager that just started when I got there and his name was Luke Chittick. And he said, all right, I agree. What can I do for you? You write me a list and I, and I'll get it for you. Um, and we'll set aside a space in the refrigerator

• 1:05:40Speaker 01

  for you. Um, and cause he's very health conscious and he wanted, he sort of saw this as an opportunity for, I think for himself to prove, uh, to the management as well that this is, you know, what should be happening.

• 1:05:52Rich Roll?

  Right.

• 1:05:52Speaker 01

  And so I wrote a list and at the time it was just, it was egg whites, any leafy green vegetables that were available and some fruit. And he got that for me and I ate that for every meal, every day for 10 months. Um, and I reversed my type two diabetes in about six months. And after that, because the majority of my diet was plants.

• 1:06:21Speaker 01

  I I chalked it up to, well, this must be the majority of the reason and became a complete vegan within a year. And since then, since that that day, a year later, I lost over a hundred pounds. Went off of my sleeping medications, went off of my mood stabilizers. They thought I was bipolar. Went off of my Metformin and was just a completely different person. I was, I struggled so much in therapy. I went to IOP every day and for people who don't know, that's intensive outpatient therapy. And you go about four to five days a week for about five hours doing group therapy.

• 1:07:02Speaker 01

  And I would fight it every single day because I didn't, I didn't have any self-worth. I didn't feel like I was worth saving. But I had a plan and a goal and a purpose in life, and that was reverse my type two diabetes. And drugs didn't fit into that. And so that kept me sober while I was still fighting therapy. But it was when I reversed my type two diabetes, it was when I saw the weight coming off that I felt self-worth for the first time and I felt like there was somebody worth saving. And I had enough self-confidence to say, all right, you know what? I'm going to drop the ego with my therapist and say, I don't know what to do. The way that I know how to live my life clearly isn't working as far as an emotional individual.

• 1:07:45Speaker 01

  Maybe I should just do what they're saying I should do and see what happens. And then from that point on, the real recovery began as far as my emotional recovery.

• 1:07:54Rich Roll?

  You surrendered.

• 1:07:55Speaker 01

  Yeah, exactly.

• 1:07:55Rich Roll?

  You have to get to that point where you're, you're really ready to let go of your idea of what's best for you.

• 1:08:02Speaker 01

  Exactly.

• 1:08:02Rich Roll?

  So it's interesting. So that moment didn't really occur for you, at least on the, on the recovery tip while you were in rehab.

• 1:08:09Speaker 01

  No, it didn't at all.

• 1:08:10Rich Roll?

  So, so how, did you do the 28 days or what was your?

• 1:08:13Speaker 01

  I did 37 days.

• 1:08:14Rich Roll?

  37 days, okay. So, you know, look, for people that don't know, when you're in, in rehab, I mean, look, first of all, like Sierra Tucson, as cushy as it is, it's still a mental institution.

• 1:08:25Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 1:08:25Rich Roll?

  Like your best thinking got you sent to a mental, mental institution where people are, you know, full-time focusing on changing the way that you think and behave. Right? Because the way you're thinking and behaving landed you there in the first place. And basically it's all-day therapy, pretty much group sessions, individual sessions, working your steps and, you know, just on and on and on.

• 1:08:46Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 1:08:47Rich Roll?

  Until you go to sleep at night, but that's not, that wasn't really, you didn't have any kind of surrender or epiphany while you-

• 1:08:53Speaker 01

  The only surrender I, I had there was surrendering my lifestyle habits as far as my physical health.

• 1:09:01Rich Roll?

  That's interesting.

• 1:09:02Speaker 01

  My emotional health came much later. And I think it was because I needed it to be intellectual. I needed it to be A plus B equals C. So when I got out of rehab, I knew that if I ate the right foods, if I exercised, I would lose the weight and I would reverse my type 2 diabetes. And that's what I made my day about every single day.

• 1:09:22Rich Roll?

  But, but you know, you, you recognize of course, that the solution to your Adderall addiction is not through diet, right? Like you're, you're, you're like intense focus on trying to control your diet and your lifestyle is not going to resolve, you know, sort of your, your addiction problem.

• 1:09:40Speaker 01

  Absolutely not. And the thing is, I had to go to meetings as part of living in the house. You have to go to five meetings a week.

• 1:09:45Rich Roll?

  Did you go to Sober Living out here?

• 1:09:46Speaker 01

  Yeah. Out here, yeah. I went to Transcend Sober Living in Santa Monica.

• 1:09:50Rich Roll?

  Oh, okay.

• 1:09:51Speaker 01

  They have five houses, I think, in, in West LA. The one I went to at the time was located on, on the beach in Santa Monica, right next to the Lowe's Hotel.

• 1:09:59Rich Roll?

  That's not bad.

• 1:10:01Speaker 01

  It's not bad. And, you know, I would walk myself to the gym every day. And that was immediately after getting back from IOP. And, you know, what was great was the manager there, Phil Hamburger, he made it very clear to me, he said, you know, you're going to get really angry and you're going to need someone to be angry at, because you're going to want to get angry at the world and that can blow up on you. And if you need-

• 1:10:30Rich Roll?

  Right, because you've been, you're off Adderall. First of all, like, are you having trouble mentally focusing?

• 1:10:36Speaker 01

  Absolutely.

• 1:10:37Rich Roll?

  It's gotta be hard. You're not, I mean, I know that people that are coming off that, like, they can't read a book, they can't focus on anything.

• 1:10:43Speaker 01

  And I had, I was basically incapable of experiencing pleasure, being happy with doing anything. I remember-

• 1:10:51Rich Roll?

  Like, everything's just blah.

• 1:10:52Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 1:10:53Rich Roll?

  Right.

• 1:10:54Speaker 01

  Absolutely.

• 1:10:55Rich Roll?

  That goes on for a long time.

• 1:10:56Speaker 01

  It does. And, you know, I remember sitting in Sober Living and they would have, every weekend was pizza weekend. And this was during the football season. And needless to say, I'm a football fan. Um, and I remember watching all the guys eating the pizza and drinking the sodas, watching the football game. And me sitting there with my kale salad crying because I couldn't have the pizza and I couldn't have the soda. And then realizing, man, that my addiction is much more than just Adderall.

• 1:11:27Rich Roll?

  Well, you're still, you're still playing the victim.

• 1:11:29Speaker 01

  Absolutely. I, and I played, you know, I played the victim for a while. Um, and, uh, to the point to where, you know, when they finally, uh, confronted me about my addiction to stimulants. Because I stole some from the med cabinet and, uh, you know, you, you get drug tested and like, bro.

• 1:11:47Rich Roll?

  While you were in sober living?

• 1:11:49Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 1:11:49Rich Roll?

  So, so, all right. So now I'm getting a clearer picture of what's going on here. So it really like, the tail is wagging the dog a little bit here because you go for your Adderall addiction, but you're kind of having none of that.

• 1:12:00Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 1:12:00Rich Roll?

  You get fixated on, on resolving your, your, the type two diabetes thing rings your bell.

• 1:12:06Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 1:12:06Rich Roll?

  And that becomes your entire focus, but you're really overlooking the larger problem. Like what I always say to people is, okay, you have type two diabetes, we need to address that. Or, you know, you're smoking two packs a day or whatever other habit you're doing. Like, we can get to that, but like, we've got to focus on the biggest issue first, which is your drug addiction. Like, once we can at least get a handle on that, then we can start to address these other things.

• 1:12:29Speaker 01

  It's interesting.

• 1:12:29Rich Roll?

  It happened in a reverse way.

• 1:12:31Speaker 01

  It did.

• 1:12:31Rich Roll?

  You're relapsing basically while you're in sober living. So you're still not getting it.

• 1:12:35Speaker 01

  I wasn't getting it and it wasn't until, you know, I finally saw a different person in the mirror physically than I was when I got there. And, and it was someone that I was actually proud of to look at. Um, you know, this goes back to my, my issues with self-image. Um, that I realized that I accepted the fact that I didn't know what I was doing in terms of my health. And I took someone else's advice. This was Rip Esselstyn's advice. This is what he taught me. Um, uh, and I implemented that into my life and just accepted and surrendered to it. And as a result, my life.

• 1:13:12Rich Roll?

  Rip was your higher power.

• 1:13:13Speaker 01

  He was. He absolutely was. Um, and my life got better as a result of it. And at the same, but at the same time, I'm still a very angry person. I'm a very entitled person and I'm having a lot of trouble dealing with my therapist and dealing with my IOP. Maybe I need to take the same approach that I did with my physical health towards my emotional health.

• 1:13:34Rich Roll?

  Yeah, well, you, you, your best friend had been taken away from you and you're still not really leaning into any of the tools that I'm sure they, they tried to teach you in rehab. So of course your emotions are, I mean, you're like king baby.

• 1:13:47Speaker 01

  Exactly. Yeah, exactly. That's a good, that's a good term.

• 1:13:50Rich Roll?

  Yeah. Tell people what king baby is.

• 1:13:52Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 1:13:52Rich Roll?

  You know, how, how they define that?

• 1:13:53Speaker 01

  No.

• 1:13:54Rich Roll?

  So king baby is like a term that, that characterizes a lot of addicts and alcoholics, which basically means that you think the whole world revolves around you. You're incredibly entitled, but you have like, you take zero responsibility for any of your actions and you have no empathy for anybody else and it's all about you.

• 1:14:13Speaker 01

  That's exactly who I was. It's exactly who I was. It's a hundred percent who I was. And so I'd say by about, you know, month, month three is when I, I started to say, you know, this needs to change as well. And so by the time-

• 1:14:31Rich Roll?

  Maybe I, maybe I should look at this.

• 1:14:32Speaker 01

  Maybe I should look at this in the same-

• 1:14:34Rich Roll?

  The underlying fact that I'm a drug addict.

• 1:14:35Speaker 01

  Exactly. And so they, you know, they took me, you know, they said, listen, if you want to continue going to IOP, they're not going to let you continue if you, if they see another failed drug test. You can go get another doctor somewhere else, but you can't come to IOP anymore. If you want to go find a doctor to, to prescribe you Adderall, go right ahead, you know, but you're not gonna-

• 1:14:55Rich Roll?

  I'm surprised they let, they didn't boot you out of sober living.

• 1:14:57Speaker 01

  They didn't-

• 1:14:58Rich Roll?

  You can't be, you can't be using and being in sober living.

• 1:15:00Speaker 01

  That's right. That was the other thing, you know, they said, you know, you get one with this, with this manager, he would allow you to mess up once and, and then that was it. It was sort of your warning because, you know, relapses, they say relapses happen in recovery and especially early on in recovery, they, they, he allowed you to see the fact that, yeah, you made a mistake. Here's, this is part of it, but it's not going to be part of this sober living anymore for you. You can either now choose to accept your problems and commit to recovery. Or you can continue doing what you're doing and you will get caught. And when that happens, you're gone and you're on your own. And if you think you have the tools to survive on your own, then good luck. Uh, and I knew I didn't.

• 1:15:40Rich Roll?

  Right. Um. But meanwhile, are you, you're going to meetings too, right?

• 1:15:43Speaker 01

  Yeah, you have to go to five meetings a week.

• 1:15:45Rich Roll?

  Right. And are you like not identifying? Like are you saying, oh, these people are not like me and?

• 1:15:50Speaker 01

  I used to say that a lot, um, uh, but it became easier and but the thing is again, I never really uh, truly identified with, with AA. Um, uh, you know, I didn't, I didn't do the steps, but I, I, I identified with the Buddhist recovery, Smart Recovery. Um, and I did that for a while. Um, and I still go to AA meetings with friends and support other people. And I still like to go to AA meetings to feel connected to the sober community and connected to people who share the same disease that I have and to hear their stories. But I've still never done step one.

• 1:16:26Rich Roll?

  Really?

• 1:16:27Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 1:16:27Rich Roll?

  Interesting.

• 1:16:27Speaker 01

  Um.

• 1:16:28Rich Roll?

  Hmm.

• 1:16:29Speaker 01

  Uh, yeah, I know. I get that a lot. I get that a lot.

• 1:16:32Rich Roll?

  Listen, I don't have any judgment on, you know, what, I'm not somebody who's, who, who believes that the 12 steps are the only way to get sober.

• 1:16:40Speaker 01

  Right.

• 1:16:40Rich Roll?

  Um, I know there, that that's what's worked for me and I know that's what works for many, many people that I know, but you know, I reserve judgment on people's other paths.

• 1:16:49Speaker 01

  Yeah, of course. Yeah. Um, the thing is that, you know, for me it was, uh, I, I, I got more out of the, uh, the, the spiritual teachings and the Buddhist teachings. Um, and, you know, I, I, I was an angry person at the time and so I didn't allow myself to, uh, connect to AA because of the whole God thing. Um, and, uh, that was part of my, my, uh, arrogance is that I was like-

• 1:17:18Rich Roll?

  That's a common thing though, you know, that's, that's very, very common for people that are new. Like they just can't wrap their head around that and then they just, you know, it's like talk to the hand and they're out the door.

• 1:17:26Speaker 01

  One thing I did was, I did allow myself to do though, was that while I don't consider myself, uh, of, you know, and a member of AA, um, I would go and I would say, you know what, I'm, I don't understand the whole God thing, but I'm going to listen to everything else they say, because everything else they say makes sense.

• 1:17:44Rich Roll?

  But if you just remove the word God and just say higher power and that can be anything, like you're using RIP as your higher power in a health context, so use the people in the room who collectively understand how to get and stay sober better than you do and just say, well, these people know better, so I'm going to, you know,

• 1:18:01Speaker 01

  Right.

• 1:18:01Rich Roll?

  surrender to this collective wisdom.

• 1:18:04Speaker 01

  And to be honest, I've been very tempted to start the steps lately, like so much more so than ever before.

• 1:18:09Rich Roll?

  All right, well, we can talk after.

• 1:18:10Speaker 01

  We can talk after the podcast.

• 1:18:13Rich Roll?

  Are you still angry?

• 1:18:14Speaker 01

  No, I mean, I'm, I'm much more, a completely different person. You know, I, I've, everything about my life has completely changed my relationship with my father and what's interesting, what's interesting is that the qualities in him that I used to hate the most are the ones I want most in myself today. And it's, you know, he's, you know, my brother and I are still extremely close and we always will be, but he is living a completely different lifestyle than I live. He doesn't eat, he doesn't have the same awareness of food and, and consciousness of what he puts into his body that I do, and so it makes me uncomfortable being around

• 1:18:57Speaker 01

  it, and I'm sure it makes him uncomfortable being around me. And so there's that, but on, you know, as far as being identical twins, we're always going to be incredibly close.

• 1:19:05Rich Roll?

  It's a, it's a weird thing when that's the gift of sobriety in some respects, like when you're somebody who, who goes to that extreme, that it brings you, you know, to your knees, literally, then the world opens up to you to then make a, you know, an incredibly profound change in your life. So that's why people say I'm a grateful alcoholic or whatever, because they have this, you know, profound moment in which suddenly they decide they're going to live their life completely differently, whereas somebody who is not an addict or an alcoholic can kind of be on a slow burn with unhealthy habits their whole life and never reach that point where it's enough of a crisis to do something about it, or it doesn't cause enough pain, and so you can just kind of perpetuate it.

• 1:19:50Speaker 01

  Yeah. And, and, but what's interesting is that today, the person I feel like it can be myself the most with is my father, and that was never, never the case. That's interesting. And, uh, you know, he's, uh, he's, he's- Now you're way more preachy than he ever was. That's true. He's nearing, I'd say he's nearing the end of his, his marathon career. He was supposed to run New York this year, but, uh, the friends that he runs with didn't qualify. Um, and so he deferred till next year, and I said, you know, Dad, if, if this is gonna be your last, let me be, let it be my first and I'll run it with you. Oh, wow, that's cool. Um, and so, I really think that that, that moment, when we cross the finish line

• 1:20:33Speaker 01

  together next year, that's gonna be, that'll put the seal on my recovery for me. Interesting. That, you know, that, that I've come full circle in my relationship with my father. So, in the parlance of, of recovery, I mean, did you make an amends to your dad? Or how did you then bridge that gap to get back to- Absolutely. Um, you know, I, I, I don't waste any opportunity to tell him how grateful I am, uh, for everything that he's, you know, been able to offer me. Uh, you know, I wasn't working for Whole Foods when they did the, uh, Engine to Immersion, and at the time it was really only open to, uh, Whole Foods employees, cause they were using it as, as a way to change the idea of what healthcare is, and what, how companies should look at providing healthcare for their employees.

• 1:21:15Speaker 01

  Um, but he said, you know, if you, if you really wanna go, I can get you in. And so, I went, and, uh, you know, he was, he was never shy, um, uh, about making himself, making his, his, uh, his, uh, opinion known to me that it, while it, it scared him and he was critical in the way he did it, I knew at heart what he was talking about, but my, my addiction and my arrogance sort of would backfire. Mm-hmm. Um, but, uh- So what's the, so what's the lesson? You know, uh, I, I'm, I remember I made an apology to him about eight months into my recovery, and I, you know, I said, Dad, I wanna apologize to you for never understanding

• 1:21:58Speaker 01

  the way you chose to show your love for me, and that was by him being critical of the way I was living my life. That's how he was able to say, you know, I love you and I'm scared, please change. Um, so, you know, the lesson, I guess, is- You know, you're, if you're in a relationship with somebody, if you're especially, you know, if you're a son of a critical father, I'm gonna use this example because this is the example that I know from my life experience. You know, your opinion and your view of this situation is only half the story and you gotta think of the fact that, you know, your ego wants you to believe that you're okay

• 1:22:40Speaker 01

  and so it's gonna, it's gonna help you or it's gonna want you to attack back at that criticism. Make it seem like, oh, it's because they don't like me. Well, screw them, I'm fine. That's what I was doing. You know, I never thought to think of the fact that, you know, I was my, I was, the age that I was when I was at my worst was the age when my dad lost his father.

• 1:23:01Rich Roll?

  Hmm.

• 1:23:02Speaker 01

  And it never occurred to me to think of that.

• 1:23:04Rich Roll?

  You never thought about that.

• 1:23:05Speaker 01

  Never occurred to me to think about that because it wasn't about anybody else but me.

• 1:23:08Rich Roll?

  So how old were you when you went to rehab?

• 1:23:10Speaker 01

  I was 29 when I went to rehab, but when my dad really started to reach out, I was 25 and that's when he lost his father. And it never occurred to me to think about that. When, when, when it was all happening, I was just like, oh, well, you know, he's just an asshole and he doesn't like me and so.

• 1:23:27Rich Roll?

  Yeah, I mean, when you're, look, when you're, when you're addicted, like, you can't see outside yourself at all.

• 1:23:34Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 1:23:35Rich Roll?

  You know, and so the, the thing that you always hear is somebody who's in the throes of the disease, like, well, you know, leave me alone, this is my life and I'm not hurting anybody, these are decisions I'm making for myself, like, get off my back. You're completely unable to understand, let alone empathize with the fact that your behavior has impacts on, you know.

• 1:23:55Speaker 01

  On everybody else.

• 1:23:56Rich Roll?

  On everybody around you.

• 1:23:57Speaker 01

  Everybody else, yeah.

• 1:23:58Rich Roll?

  And you also don't, you don't fully appreciate that, that they even understand what's going on. Like, you, the denial extends to this idea that they don't even really know that you're doing it. Like, you'll just tell yourself, like, well, they don't, they don't really know what I'm doing, you know?

• 1:24:13Speaker 01

  Exactly.

• 1:24:14Rich Roll?

  Even though they can, it's obvious to anybody around you.

• 1:24:16Speaker 01

  Yeah, I mean, I'm sure they didn't know to the extent, you know, what I was doing as far as the, the doctor shopping and all that stuff, but they knew that I was an addict to the full definition of that word. And they were scared, but, you know.

• 1:24:31Speaker 01

  And I'm sure at the same time, they didn't want to press too hard that I would run away from them and then that would be it, you know. And, you know, they, they asked me, you know, were you ever suicidal? And the fact is, I was never suicidal. This goes to my relationship with my twin brother. We're so close that I know that if I was ever to ever hurt myself, it would probably cause him to do the same. But at the same time, I didn't care if I died the next day. You know, if, if I got hit by a car and died, I'd be fine.

• 1:25:00Rich Roll?

  So you were so like bereft of any sense of self-confidence or self-assuredness that, that even the idea that, you know, your life could be improved by getting sober didn't really resonate. It was only when you began to see results as a result of changing your,

• 1:25:20Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 1:25:21Rich Roll?

  your, your dietary and lifestyle habits, that that seed was planted that maybe your life is worth something.

• 1:25:27Speaker 01

  Exactly. And, you know, I think that-

• 1:25:30Rich Roll?

  And you needed that in order to even be interested in, you know, saving yourself from-

• 1:25:38Speaker 01

  Yeah, I needed to like, I needed to have some, some kind of, you know, worth some, I needed to have, to like myself just a little bit to want to put in the effort that's necessary to make that change. And that's, it is incredibly difficult. And I also believe that the diet that I put myself on allowed me to regulate my emotions better. It allowed me to, you know, deal with anger better than I was before because my energy was just up and down. It was sugar spikes and sugar crashes and, you know.

• 1:26:09Rich Roll?

  Right. Usually it's the reverse, like you get clean and sober from drugs and alcohol and then it's not until much later and you're kind of immersed in the steps when you start to connect, you know, how your other behavior patterns, how you use them to modulate your emotional state. And of cour-, you know, whether it's smoking or food or gambling or pornography or whatever it is, shopping, you know, usually it's something, right? Because you strip away your best friend, the drug, and, and your addict is looking for something else, right?

• 1:26:39Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 1:26:40Rich Roll?

  So where are they gonna, where are they gonna, you know, plan- At their roots, and so it's very common that food then becomes a big problem.

• 1:26:46Speaker 01

  Absolutely.

• 1:26:47Rich Roll?

  So you go to A meetings and it's donuts and coffee and cigarettes. You know, sugar is like a huge problem.

• 1:26:52Speaker 01

  It's a huge problem.

• 1:26:53Rich Roll?

  With people in recovery because they're looking for anything that can take them out of the moment. That's going to make them feel different, that's going to alter their consciousness in even the smallest amounts of ways. So, you know, food is, is an obvious thing, but I think it takes most people quite a long time before they really appreciate, "Oh, my God, I'm eating to, to repress my emotions."

• 1:27:13Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 1:27:13Rich Roll?

  Or, "Oh, wow, you know, I didn't notice that like," you know, because we just, it's so habitual, right? Like, "Oh, I feel depressed, I'm going to go," you know, suddenly I'm at the drive-through. But you don't really solve that equation and understand or appreciate why you're make, why you're taking those actions.

• 1:27:29Speaker 01

  And not only that, a lot of people get put on medications where they tell them, "Oh, you're probably going to get an appetite and gain weight on this medication. That's normal," you know?

• 1:27:37Rich Roll?

  That's almost an excuse to just eat whatever.

• 1:27:39Speaker 01

  Exactly. And I, you know, there are a lot of friends that I have, that I made in sober living that ended up gaining a lot of weight in sober living, which is common. And then going on more medication as a result of gaining the weight, secondary, you know, health issues coming up, whether it be sleep apnea, or type 2 diabetes, or hypertension. And, you know, the whole point of recovery is not to go on more medications, is to get you stripped down to your authentic self. I think that that's the search for your authentic self is the essence of recovery. And it was surprising to me, and it's still surprising to me today, that nutrition is not mandatory in most recovery. And you go into the sober living house, most sober living houses in this, in this city,

• 1:28:22Speaker 01

  and you look at the way they stock their pantries, and it's just like, "Boy, are you kidding me?"

• 1:28:26Rich Roll?

  Yeah, but it shouldn't surprise you. I mean, it's overlooked everywhere. Like, I just, I just went to the Olympic Training Center and I gave a talk to the USA National Junior Swim Team, like, the fastest kids that are 18 and under, and I was around some of the, you know, all kinds of Olympic athletes, all these people that are training there in Colorado Springs. This whole place is just about... Refining excellence, right?

• 1:28:49Speaker 01

  Right.

• 1:28:49Rich Roll?

  Athletes from all across America come there to like be their best. And you go to the cafeteria and it's just abominable.

• 1:28:56Speaker 01

  Really?

• 1:28:57Rich Roll?

  You can drink soda, you know, soft serve ice cream up the hill. You know, just everything's greasy. It's like insane, right? Like, these are the cream of the crop of our talent. And then, you know, look, wherever you look, go to any hospital.

• 1:29:10Speaker 01

  Yeah, I know.

• 1:29:11Rich Roll?

  Why should it be any different in rehab? Like, this is, uh, this is our blind spot, right?

• 1:29:16Speaker 01

  Exactly.

• 1:29:17Rich Roll?

  This is part of the holistic equation to being well and being healthy. And this has to change.

• 1:29:23Speaker 01

  I agree. I mean, you look at the dynamic that this country has in its relationship to food. You have kids who come from nothing, who are going to public schools, getting fed processed foods and then eating fast food after school, becoming type 2 diabetic. And the kids who come from everything, who are in the wealthiest, you know, percentage of the country, starving themselves to fit in. So you have kids who have every opportunity, being too skinny and starving themselves to death, and kids who have absolutely zero opportunity and, and come from nothing, being too fat. That's our relationship to food in this country. I mean, how messed up is that?

• 1:29:56Rich Roll?

  Well, there's a lot of privileged kids that are fat, too.

• 1:29:58Speaker 01

  There are.

• 1:29:59Rich Roll?

  They're just playing video games all day.

• 1:30:00Speaker 01

  Exactly.

• 1:30:01Rich Roll?

  Ordering pizzas and, you know, what have you. So it's across the board. And certainly socio-economically, it's a huge problem because of farm subsidies and how cheap fast food is and processed food is. And it just becomes the easiest option.

• 1:30:20Rich Roll?

  I just had, um, this guy Stephen Ritz on the podcast, the most recent episode that I put up, and he's an elementary school teacher in the Bronx, which is an urban food desert.

• 1:30:29Speaker 01

  Right.

• 1:30:29Rich Roll?

  Like, there couldn't be any place worse. Like, giant-

• 1:30:31Speaker 01

  I just listened to this podcast.

• 1:30:32Rich Roll?

  Yeah, yeah, like giant towers, you know, where people live in subsidized housing, and not even real grocery stores, just bodegas, where all it is is like malt liquor and chips. You know, and like, these kids are super unhealthy and- You know, the attendance is abysmal and nobody graduates from high school and like what he's done by, you know, growing food in his classrooms and transforming block after block after block in his community into like urban gardens is literally transforming his community like one student at a time.

• 1:31:00Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 1:31:01Rich Roll?

  And it's inspiring, you know, but it took such a strong personality. I mean, that guy's a force of nature, you know, to like make that happen. And so, you know, you can't clone Steven Ritz and put a guy like that in every town.

• 1:31:14Speaker 01

  Right.

• 1:31:15Rich Roll?

  So it needs to be addressed, you know, at a systemic level, at the highest levels of government and legislature.

• 1:31:21Speaker 01

  I agree.

• 1:31:21Rich Roll?

  When, you know, when the legislature and the media is bought and paid for by Big Pharma and Big Food, like you're dealing with a behemoth that you're trying to turn around the Titanic and it's a very, very difficult thing. So, you know, I think it's going to change through changing consumer demand, you know, one person at a time through podcasts and grassroots movements and, you know, stories like yourselves, like your story that help people realize, you know, what's really going on and, you know, empowering people to, you know, rethink this equation. Cause we're just in this matrix, you know, we just, oh, you know, chocolate milk is the ultimate recovery drink. We just buy, we just, we just take at face value whatever we're told through whatever marketing message

• 1:32:05Rich Roll?

  and we just, we just buy into it because we're busy and we don't want to think about it or we don't have time to read the research and what have you. So here we are in this, you know, predicament of the worst healthcare crisis, you know, known to humanity. And, you know, unless we make some significant changes, it's, it's not going to get any better. I mean, look at school lunch.

• 1:32:25Speaker 01

  It's crazy.

• 1:32:25Rich Roll?

  It's incredible.

• 1:32:26Speaker 01

  You know, one of the, you know, I've said Engine 2 and I've said Rip Esselstyn a few times. And, you know, he's, I consider him a mentor of mine and, you know, I'm honored to call him a friend. And you mentioned earlier about being able to come full circle. And, you know, for me, that happened when he asked me to come and speak at his immersion recently. And I got-

• 1:32:52Rich Roll?

  How did that, how did that happen to me? Did you know him beforehand?

• 1:32:55Speaker 01

  Well, I knew him, you know, through my dad and, you know, I attended his immersion. And so I, I sent him an email saying, you know, that I've completely reversed my type 2 diabetes. I've become a vegan. I've gone off all seven of my medications and I've become a holistic lifestyle coach.

• 1:33:15Speaker 01

  You know, can I just come meet with you? I want to talk about, you know, how do I make a career for myself in this industry? And so we came and he hadn't seen me in like, you know, two years. And he didn't even recognize me when he saw me. I had to tell him it's Adam Sudd and he just went crazy. And he asked me to come and speak at his recent immersion in Arizona. And he wanted me to talk about addiction and addiction recovery. And, you know, he didn't want me to hold back and, you know, I thought, how, how interesting is that? That I get to come back to his immersion where I was using the last time I was there. Did you, did you say that? Oh, I told him. I was here in the audience a couple of years ago and I was high as a kite.

• 1:33:55Speaker 01

  It was funny because when we met, he goes, so when, when you came to my immersion, were you an addict then? I said, Rip, I was using at your immersion. And he goes, just make sure and say that when you speak to them. And it was interesting because Dick Beardsley spoke at that immersion that I went to the first one. And he talked about his struggle with addiction. And I remember being so moved by what he said that he was almost the first person I walked up to and said, I'm an addict. Oh, wow. And He has an incredible story. He does. And I didn't. Again, I, you know, I chickened out.

• 1:34:33Speaker 01

  But it was, it was quite a thing for me to be able to come back to an engine to immersion and speak about my, my journey with recovery. Where I was using and where I, where I almost, I think I realized for the first time that I needed to change after hearing his story. But I still wasn't ready to admit it to anyone else. And so that was, that was pretty incredible. How'd it go? You know, I don't, I'm a pretty modest person. I don't like to, to, you know, brag. You could toot your horn. But, you know, I had a whole lot of people coming up to me at the end of it saying that they thought that I was the highlight of the, the immersion

• 1:35:10Speaker 01

  and giving me hugs and, and it was amazing how many people came up to me in confidence and, you know, admitted to struggling with addiction. We had our own little sessions to the side where we'd talk about how, you know, the great thing about being an addict. A recovering addict and having to look now at recovering your lifestyle and your connection with food is that you've done it with one substance.

• 1:35:34Rich Roll?

  Mm-hmm.

• 1:35:34Speaker 01

  We just have to do it with another. And think of addiction not as a negative thing. You know, I was amazing addiction, uh, drug addict. I was very, very good at getting my drug and living that lifestyle. I just needed to make sure that my new addiction is productive, not destructive. And that my new addiction is, is vegan and it's all about being healthy and it's all about creating, uh, health in the body, reversing disease, preventing disease, uh, moving forward, uh, healing my body and spirit in order to become a better person today than I was the day before.

• 1:36:07Rich Roll?

  Mm-hmm.

• 1:36:07Speaker 01

  And, uh, what can I do today in order to keep that going forward?

• 1:36:11Rich Roll?

  Mm-hmm.

• 1:36:11Speaker 01

  So.

• 1:36:12Rich Roll?

  I think that it's also, but it's also important to, to be aware of, you know, that addictive beast that's inside of you.

• 1:36:21Speaker 01

  Oh, absolutely.

• 1:36:21Rich Roll?

  Because it can latch on to, you can, you can have an eating disorder as a plant-based.

• 1:36:26Speaker 01

  Oh, absolutely.

• 1:36:27Rich Roll?

  You can eat a whole food, plant-based diet and have an eating disorder and be an addict.

• 1:36:30Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 1:36:31Rich Roll?

  You know what I mean?

• 1:36:31Speaker 01

  Absolutely.

• 1:36:32Rich Roll?

  So, because your addict can go, oh, this is my new thing and you can be sort of, um, you know, what's that term where you're overly obsessed with healthy eating? Uh, it's called, uh, I'll forget, I forget it right now, it escapes me. Um, anyway, uh, I'll think of it in a minute. But, but, uh, the point being that you could fixate on that, like, as you said, you know, I'm, you, you, basically you're saying I'm transferring my addiction, but also, you know, it's about like being balanced in your life, right?

• 1:36:59Speaker 01

  Right, it is. But at first I had to make it more of like, I, I need to focus every single day in the same way I would focus on my destructive addiction. I need to now make it focused on my recovery. Be a sort of, and I use the term addicted.

• 1:37:13Rich Roll?

  An addict about, yeah, being addicted to recovery.

• 1:37:14Speaker 01

  I use the term addiction, addicted to it. I need to be addicted. What I'm saying is I need it to be the primary motivation for my daily actions, uh, to be, to, to allow myself to recover.

• 1:37:26Rich Roll?

  Mm-hmm.

• 1:37:26Speaker 01

  So, that's what I did and that's, you know, it. It's, you know, it took me a good while before I started to actually enjoy what I eat. Now I love it. Um, but, uh, you know,

• 1:37:37Rich Roll?

  It's important to admit that.

• 1:37:38Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 1:37:38Rich Roll?

  Like, a lot of people say, "Oh, you know, I don't understand, like, why people think it's so hard." You know, you have to make it, you know, you have to weather a little bit of-

• 1:37:46Speaker 01

  You do.

• 1:37:46Rich Roll?

  You have to weather some discomfort. You have to go to food rehab.

• 1:37:49Speaker 01

  You really do. You really do. I read, um-

• 1:37:51Rich Roll?

  You gotta get to the other side. Like, you, I, you know, how long, how long was it before your obsessive craving for Adderall went away?

• 1:38:00Speaker 01

  Um, it was, you know, five months, easy.

• 1:38:03Rich Roll?

  Five months, right?

• 1:38:04Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 1:38:05Rich Roll?

  So, how long before those obsessive cravings for McDonald's cheeseburgers and Papa John pizza went away?

• 1:38:11Speaker 01

  Uh, probably a year, which is crazy, because that was stronger than my, uh, my Adderall addiction.

• 1:38:18Rich Roll?

  Yeah, and the difference is, with drugs and alcohol, you draw a line in the sand and you don't go there.

• 1:38:24Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 1:38:24Rich Roll?

  But food, you have to eat every day.

• 1:38:26Speaker 01

  You do, and those, you know, the destructive foods are on every corner.

• 1:38:29Rich Roll?

  Mm-hmm.

• 1:38:30Speaker 01

  And it's interesting, because I read Doug Lyle's book, The Pleasure Trap, and that, uh, in, in, in another situation, allowed me to understand intellectually what was happening to me emotionally in regards to food and changing the way I eat. And, uh, he was actually at the, uh, immersion in Arizona, and he and I had lunch together, and I just sat there, and I was like, "I, I, I gotta tell you, and this is really surreal right now, because your book was so, you know, instrumental in changing my understanding of what was happening to me when I, you know, when, when I'm changing the way I eat, why it tastes so bad right now, and why I want those other things so badly, and instead of having to struggle with the emotions that were involved with that, just understand that this is why it's happening,

• 1:39:10Speaker 01

  and this is what's happening, and not, I don't need to understand where the emotions are coming from, but just know that that's the situation and deal with it."

• 1:39:17Rich Roll?

  Right. It's a great book, but for people that are listening who are unfamiliar with the book, like, just lay out the thesis.

• 1:39:23Speaker 01

  Okay, so the thesis, he talks about the dopamine response, uh, to, uh, supernormal stimuli, uh, something like refined sugars or hydrogenated fats. Um, there, he makes the statement, "There's no species of animal that is not designed to love what it eats, what it's designed to eat." When you eat the foods you're designed to eat before you've tried any supernormal stimuli, your dopamine response in your brain registers, uh, a, a level of pleasure that's in the normal range. And every species on this planet is motivated by three main motivators: pleasure-seeking, sex and food. Um, pain avoidance and energy conservation. And so when you eat foods that are uh what you're designed to eat.

• 1:40:06Speaker 01

  And you get that pleasure response and you get the calories, your brain and your body are saying, this is good, this is what we need to do. Then when you go and you try something that is a super normal stimuli or refined sugar, let's say an Oreo cookie. Yeah, yeah. The dopamine response that happens is much higher. It's very, very high. It's a super normal stimuli. And the other thing that happens is that you're also getting a lot of calories. And you're not expelling a lot of energy to get them. And because your brain cannot distinguish the fact that this is a chemical based substance, that this is artificial, this does not exist in nature. Your brain sees a lot of pleasure, a lot of calories. This is good. This is right. This is what we're supposed to be doing.

• 1:40:46Speaker 01

  So you become habituated over the course of continuing those behaviors to where what once was a super normal stimuli is now just registering a dopamine response in the normal range. And then you end up getting a diagnosis because you've been going so long. You get diagnosed with type 2 diabetes or you just become overweight and unhappy and depressed. And someone tells you, well, you need to go back to starting to eat what you're designed to eat. You need to start eating fruits and vegetables, whole grains. And you do that. What happens is because what was once normal is no longer the normal. It registers a low pleasure response. And it's also not calorie dense as say an Oreo. So when you're doing the right thing, your brain and your body are telling you that

• 1:41:31Speaker 01

  it's the wrong thing. And you just have to weather that for about a month. Yeah, you have to recalibrate. You do. It's like you gotta reboot the operating system. Exactly. And it takes time. And so, you know, as long as I understood that, oh, okay, I know why I don't like this food, but I'm accepting this, the fact that I'm supposed to enjoy this. And that I will start to enjoy it and it will become, you know, normal for me to eat these things. And that I understand why I don't enjoy going to this right now. I'm just going to weather it until it gets to that point. I didn't, and I didn't worry about the fact that it was making me angry because I knew why I was getting angry. I didn't have to understand what the anger was about. Because a lot of times, a bunch of issues and a bunch of emotions from past stuff comes up when you're in a very heightened emotional situation.

• 1:42:16Speaker 01

  I didn't want to have to worry about where that was coming from. I can deal with that in therapy later. But when I'm eating, I'm just gonna deal with the fact that I just need to eat these foods, get it over with, and, and move on to the next meal. It's just like with recovery with my drug add, with my drug addiction. You know, I don't have to worry about being sober for the rest of my life. I have to, I have to worry about being sober today. So when I woke up, I had to worry about eating the right things today. And that's what I did.

• 1:42:39Rich Roll?

  Yeah, I mean, it's pretty powerful to kind of leverage the tools of sobriety and apply them to food. And of course, there is that differentiation in that, you know, it's, you can't just avoid food altogether like you need to do with drugs and alcohol.

• 1:42:51Speaker 01

  Right.

• 1:42:52Rich Roll?

  Eat it, but, but still, there are so many powerful tools that you can use. And, and one of the most powerful is staying in the now, like being in the moment.

• 1:43:01Speaker 01

  Exactly.

• 1:43:02Rich Roll?

  The one, the annoying one day at a time thing is so true. Like, you know, if you start to think, oh, my God, I'm never gonna have cake like my whole life.

• 1:43:09Speaker 01

  Right.

• 1:43:09Rich Roll?

  I'm gonna kill myself, like what, life isn't worth living. Like, you don't have to think about that. You don't have to worry about that. What do you eat? What's your next meal?

• 1:43:16Speaker 01

  Exactly.

• 1:43:16Rich Roll?

  Just focus on like making the right choice for your next meal.

• 1:43:20Speaker 01

  Yeah. And, you know, people say, you know, I remember when I first became vegan and people would say, you know, Adam, you're gonna live like this for the rest of your life? And I said, yeah. You know, I haven't had a cheeseburger in three years, and I don't care. I don't miss it, you know? I mean, it's, it's not a part of my life anymore. That's just a fact. And I've accepted that reality as my life. Cheeseburgers don't work into my day. That means today I'm not gonna have one. You know, so is it a problem? No. I, I, you know, there's this really superficial saying that, you know, um, nothing tastes better than being skinny. Um, but I, you know, I, I changed it to, you know, nothing, nothing tastes better than being happy and healthy with who you are. Um, and that's how I feel every single day.

• 1:44:05Speaker 01

  I'm, I, you know, for the first time, I think it was a month ago, I had a dream where I saw myself the way I am today. And I've never in my life liked the way I looked, uh, physically until now. And now I know that my subconscious is accepting it. So I'm becoming a completely different person than I've ever been in my entire life. I'm happier than I've ever been. Uh, I'm healthier than I've ever been. I'm more content. With who I am and, and the lifestyle that I lead and, and the impact that it has on other people, um, being an example to, uh, you know, members of my family, to people that I love that, you know, I don't, I don't like to go out and preach to them when they're

• 1:44:48Speaker 01

  eating something that I don't agree with and say, oh, you shouldn't eat that. But I know that if they ever reach a point to where they need to make a change, all they have to do is come to me and ask, and I will gladly help them to, to accept those things. So that's, you know, it's, it's, it's really amazing because I, I truly hated my life about three years ago. I was, I was fed up with it. And now I, you know, while I'm, I'm upset that I wasted my twenties as an addict, I, you know, I, I said to my dad, you know, people come up to me and they say, you know, are you upset that you wasted your twenties? Are you upset, are you upset that you've lost, you know, the later part of your twenties to being, uh, you know, overweight and, and an addict? I said, you know, well, that was necessary for me to become who I am today. And today I'm younger than I was five years ago.

• 1:45:33Rich Roll?

  Yeah. You will not regret the past.

• 1:45:35Speaker 01

  No.

• 1:45:35Rich Roll?

  Or wish to change it because that you had to burn in the fire.

• 1:45:39Speaker 01

  Absolutely.

• 1:45:40Rich Roll?

  To, to become the person that you are today. And there's so much power in owning your story.

• 1:45:45Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 1:45:46Rich Roll?

  And then, and then, and then telling it, you know, you are going beyond the kale, right? It's like you are, you, you repaired your health through this lifestyle shift and now you're sharing that message in service to other people. And that's super inspiring, Matt.

• 1:46:01Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 1:46:02Rich Roll?

  It's really cool.

• 1:46:02Speaker 01

  Thank you.

• 1:46:03Rich Roll?

  Yeah, it's great. I mean, when you were, you know, shipping yourself off to Sierra Tucson, I mean, what did you think you were going to be doing with your life?

• 1:46:11Speaker 01

  I had no idea. I really didn't know. I just knew that this was, that I needed to do this for 30 days to make people think that I was taking my life seriously and then I could go back home and get my drug. That's literally what my plan was.

• 1:46:23Rich Roll?

  And is there a specific moment where that shifted? Or was that a gradual?

• 1:46:28Speaker 01

  It was a gradual thing, uh, because like I said, I continued to, uh, to lie and, and steal drugs, uh, from the sober living when I first got in, uh, you know, and, uh, I don't remember the exact day that I said, you know, everything has to change today, but at some point it did. And I know that I wouldn't have been able to accept it had I not accepted that the type two diabetes diagnosis and said to myself that I'm going to change this one thing because it proved to me that accepting your place in life, accepting your responsibility, accepting the fact that I am the cause of my problems is what allowed me to change everything in my life.

• 1:47:11Speaker 01

  And, you know, today, I, you know, I surround myself with an amazing group of people. I go back now and I teach nutrition as a tool in recovery to transcend sober living, to the Canyon IOP where I was a patient. And I go to this amazing gym called Dethrone Base Camp or Base Camp Fitness, they changed the name, Base Camp Fitness in Santa Monica. And the trainers there, you know, they, when I walked in, I told them my story, of course, because, you know, I'm pretty proud of it. And, you know, they went crazy and, you know, they made me feel so good about myself and,

• 1:47:53Speaker 01

  you know, they, Nigel is the studio manager there and Nick and Ian and everyone there, they said, well, dude, print up flyers, like promote yourself here at the gym, you know, come in and bring your, the guys that you work with at Sober Living, we'll do a class specifically for them. And it just seems like everybody that I've been able to meet since I accepted my reality and decided to change it has been more than willing to just say, yeah, let me help you in whatever way possible. You know, Rip came back into my life as a mentor and has allowed me to, you know, come and speak to people and help change their lives. I'm speaking in Austin, the weekend of August 8th and 22nd, at Whole Foods Market Stores

• 1:48:36Speaker 01

  in Austin to the 28 Day Challengers for the Engine 2. I, you know, it's just been, it's been a crazy road and, you know, my dad, like I said, my dad who never gave up on me is now my best friend, which is an amazing thing to say. And It's just, it's, I, you know, I, I know that people wouldn't say that nutrition is, is a true form of recovery, but I really believe that it is my AA. And it, I, you know, I owe my life to the fact that I, I was finally able to say that I need to do this and.

• 1:49:16Rich Roll?

  Yeah, it started with, with accepting that you had a problem, surrendering to it, and asking for help.

• 1:49:23Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 1:49:23Rich Roll?

  And I think a stumbling block for a lot of people is that surrender.

• 1:49:27Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 1:49:28Rich Roll?

  You know, they're like, that means defeat.

• 1:49:29Speaker 01

  Exactly.

• 1:49:30Rich Roll?

  That means giving up. And, and look at how empowered you are now and look at how big and full and, and exciting your life has become by overcoming that hurdle.

• 1:49:43Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 1:49:43Rich Roll?

  And having the willingness to throw your hands up and say, I don't know, help me.

• 1:49:47Speaker 01

  Right.

• 1:49:48Rich Roll?

  Right, which is very difficult for everybody. It's more difficult for addicts and it's even more difficult for male addicts, I think. You know, this idea of-

• 1:49:56Speaker 01

  I agree.

• 1:49:56Rich Roll?

  It's an assault to your masculinity or yourself, a sense of, you know, self domain or what have you. You know, we're not taught when we're young that, you know, we're supposed to know the answers to everything.

• 1:50:07Speaker 01

  Exactly.

• 1:50:08Rich Roll?

  And, and to raise your hand and say, I don't know, is to be weak. And to surrender is the very definition of, of weakness. And yet, I have come to learn and, and clearly it's been your experience that that is the path to strength.

• 1:50:21Speaker 01

  Absolutely. It's, uh, yeah, it's been quite a ride. And, and I have to say, you know, I wrote to you on Facebook that one day just out of whim, you know, I read your book, Finding Ultra, and, uh, you know, I said, you know what, why not, just give it a shot, just find his Facebook page and send him a message. And then when you wrote me back that night, I like literally flipped out. And, uh, like I called my therapist, who's like one of your biggest fans.

• 1:50:44Rich Roll?

  Oh, cool.

• 1:50:45Speaker 01

  And said that, you know, I'm, I'm gonna be on the Rich Roll Podcast and, uh, you know, it's just, for me, it's just another example of, I guess, that what I'm doing is- Is the right thing for me to keep doing and that I'm on the right path when I have people like you and people like Rip and my dad and John Mackey saying that, you know, what you're doing is worthwhile.

• 1:51:05Rich Roll?

  Yeah.

• 1:51:05Speaker 01

  So it means a lot.

• 1:51:06Rich Roll?

  You know, as I said in Finding Ultra, when you're on the right path, the universe will conspire to support you and you're certainly on the right path and the universe is conspiring to support you.

• 1:51:16Speaker 01

  It is amazing because as someone who's very, you know, scientific minded and sometimes doesn't go in for all that stuff, it's amazing how true that statement is and especially for me over the last few years, you know, for some reason, somehow I just found myself being put in the path of people that are allowing me to continue to move forward.

• 1:51:37Rich Roll?

  Yeah.

• 1:51:37Speaker 01

  It's unbelievable.

• 1:51:38Rich Roll?

  It's all energy, man.

• 1:51:39Speaker 01

  It is.

• 1:51:39Rich Roll?

  When you're vibrating on the right frequency.

• 1:51:41Speaker 01

  It is.

• 1:51:42Rich Roll?

  Stuff just shows up.

• 1:51:43Speaker 01

  Yeah, just people believe this because it's 100% true.

• 1:51:46Rich Roll?

  It's a crazy spiritual equation that defies all logic and rationality.

• 1:51:51Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 1:51:51Rich Roll?

  But time and time again in my life, that's been proven to be the case.

• 1:51:54Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 1:51:55Rich Roll?

  And it's cool, man. No, I think, look, your story is super inspiring. I was excited to meet you and hear about it. And I think, you know, what kind of differentiates this podcast from some of the other ones out there is, you know, I love the, I love the stories of transformation. Like, I love the, you know, normal guys, you know, it's like, look, it's fun to go get people that everybody know, like, you know, Dean Karnazes or what have you, but like, for me, these are the most special conversations.

• 1:52:23Speaker 01

  Thank you very much.

• 1:52:24Rich Roll?

  Because you're just an average guy and, and you decided to make a change. And if you can do it, I think that's really powerful for everybody who's out there listening to understand that transformation is not reserved for some kind of special person out there.

• 1:52:39Speaker 01

  Right.

• 1:52:39Rich Roll?

  It is something that is accessible to all of us. That doesn't mean it's not hard work. That doesn't mean that you're not going to have to take a hard look at yourself and get to that point of acceptance and ultimately surrender. But if you can get there, you know, if you have the willingness to do the work, that incredible inherent like potential energy to completely shift your life is within your grasp.

• 1:53:02Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 1:53:02Rich Roll?

  And you're a living example of that.

• 1:53:03Speaker 01

  Thank you very much.

• 1:53:04Rich Roll?

  That's beautiful.

• 1:53:05Speaker 01

  I appreciate it.

• 1:53:06Rich Roll?

  Yeah, man. So we'll shut it down here in a second, but I would like to kind of close it with. You know, maybe some helpful tips or tools that you could relate to somebody. You know, this is kind of how I close the podcast down regularly. Like, you know, if somebody's listening right now, maybe they're quietly suffering in an addiction. They haven't had the courage to either admit it to themselves or to somebody else in their life. Or, you know, they're just suffering from, you know, food addiction or just being depressed and feeling stuck in their life, like they're ordering the Papa John pizza and playing video games. And, you know, they're tuned into this podcast because on some level, they want to change,

• 1:53:49Rich Roll?

  but they're just, they can't get to that first base, that first step.

• 1:53:54Speaker 01

  Well, you know, for me, it was, you know, I had to, unfortunately, I had to get to the point to where I was a type 2 diabetic before I accepted my issues.

• 1:54:04Rich Roll?

  Pain is the ultimate motivator.

• 1:54:05Speaker 01

  Exactly.

• 1:54:06Rich Roll?

  It takes what it takes, right?

• 1:54:07Speaker 01

  You know, as hard as it, I remember it being impossible for me to admit it to somebody that I was struggling and that I was an addict and that, you know, I was, I wasn't happy. I know, I truly believe that if, that when I finally did, when I finally did call it, everything in my life changed. So if anybody is out there and they're struggling with just being depressed with, I wouldn't say, even if you, you know, there's a, there's a difference between eating disorder and disordered eating. And a lot of people suffer from disordered eating, whether it be because they eat emotionally or they just don't know how to eat properly. You know, reach out to somebody and don't be, don't be ashamed of your situation in life

• 1:54:48Speaker 01

  because, you know, I, I was as, as close to, you know, my life was very close to ending. I was, I was really unhealthy and really unhappy and I just didn't care if I lived or died. And, and the thing is that. You know, when you finally accept your place in life is that that's the point when you can change it. So don't be ashamed of it because it's going to make you who you are going to become. And there's something to be said for someone who can accept the situation that they're in and then put themselves through that test of fire every single day. Be comfortable with being uncomfortable on a daily basis to become something they've never been before. And it's the hardest thing you'll ever do in your life, but it's the greatest thing you'll ever do in your life. And give it a shot, you know.

• 1:55:33Speaker 01

  Uh, you can, you can call me if you want. My phone number is 512-731-0245. Give me a call and I will.

• 1:55:39Rich Roll?

  You better, you better watch out, man. I think your phone might ring a few times.

• 1:55:43Speaker 01

  That'll be great. Give me a call and I will talk to you about it because it is my life's goal right now is to help people who, if, if you were feeling, if, if you're feeling close to how awful I was feeling, if you're feeling worse than I was feeling, then I want to talk to you and I want to help you make that first step. Um, it, it, my, you know, you talk about finding your life's purpose a lot. Um, and I didn't, you know, for a long time I felt like, what's the purpose in bettering myself when my life has no purpose? Um, now I truly know that my purpose in life, I've made it about spreading the message of how plant-based diet, along in addiction recovery has a place, that it should be taught,

• 1:56:28Speaker 01

  that it should be the third leg of that stool. It should be, uh, your therapy. It should be your, uh, recovery, whether it be smart recovery or AA or whatever. And then there should be nutrition, should be mind, body, spirit. And, um, my purpose is to make that the new commonplace. And, uh, because for me, it's completely transformed my life and I, you know, that's, they say, give it back. And, uh, that's what I want my life to be about every single day.

• 1:56:55Rich Roll?

  That's a beautiful thing, man. Thank you. Yeah, listen, uh, there's nothing to be ashamed about, you know? Shame is really the thing that keeps your, your life small and keeps you isolated and keeps you in pain. And, uh, You don't have to live that way. And trust me, there are people out there who have done worse and who understand

• 1:57:16Speaker 01

  Absolutely.

• 1:57:16Rich Roll?

  your pain, if you're out there suffering. There are people like Adam who will take your phone call.

• 1:57:22Speaker 01

  I will.

• 1:57:23Rich Roll?

  You know? And, uh, and there, there is hope. Because if you could go from somebody who truly had so little self-worth that, that, you know, 32 days in rehab couldn't even penetrate your consciousness about your Adderall addiction to where you are now.

• 1:57:36Speaker 01

  Mm-hmm.

• 1:57:37Rich Roll?

  You know, that arc is so massive and dramatic, you know, let alone, you know, going from 300 pounds to, what do you weigh now?

• 1:57:43Speaker 01

  170.

• 1:57:44Rich Roll?

  170. Yeah, that's, that's unbelievable. Then, uh, you know, hang your hat on Adam's experience and understand that, uh, if he was capable of doing it, that, uh, that that possibility exists for you as well.

• 1:57:59Speaker 01

  Thank you very much. I appreciate that.

• 1:58:01Rich Roll?

  So thanks for your time today.

• 1:58:02Speaker 01

  Thank you.

• 1:58:02Rich Roll?

  All right. Well, everybody's got his phone number.

• 1:58:04Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 1:58:04Rich Roll?

  I don't know if we need anything else. You're, you're, you're, you're, there's not that much about you on the internet.

• 1:58:08Speaker 01

  There isn't.

• 1:58:09Rich Roll?

  I've poked around.

• 1:58:09Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 1:58:09Rich Roll?

  You gotta start writing, you gotta blog more, man.

• 1:58:11Speaker 01

  Well, I'm, I'm in the process of writing a book.

• 1:58:14Rich Roll?

  Oh, you are?

• 1:58:14Speaker 01

  Yeah. Uh, it's slow going. So what, I'm just sort of journaling, like chronologuing my, uh, recovery path.

• 1:58:20Rich Roll?

  Mm-hmm.

• 1:58:20Speaker 01

  And that's sort of bringing back new memories, uh, and I'm writing them down as I go.

• 1:58:25Rich Roll?

  That's exciting.

• 1:58:25Speaker 01

  And, uh, RIP is, uh, is offering to help me as well, which is amazing.

• 1:58:29Rich Roll?

  Yeah.

• 1:58:29Speaker 01

  So.

• 1:58:30Rich Roll?

  I'm happy to be of whatever assistance I can to that.

• 1:58:32Speaker 01

  Thank you so much.

• 1:58:33Rich Roll?

  process for you, for sure. And, uh, you're on Instagram though, right?

• 1:58:36Speaker 01

  I am on Instagram.

• 1:58:37Rich Roll?

  Adam Sud 82, right?

• 1:58:40Speaker 01

  Yes.

• 1:58:40Rich Roll?

  All right.

• 1:58:41Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 1:58:41Rich Roll?

  Is that it?

• 1:58:41Speaker 01

  That's it.

• 1:58:42Rich Roll?

  That's the only place?

• 1:58:43Speaker 01

  That's the only place. I mean, you can find me on Facebook.

• 1:58:45Rich Roll?

  You're on Facebook too.

• 1:58:46Speaker 01

  Yeah. But, uh, I haven't really created, you know, the social media identity of, uh, you know, the recovery type of thing yet, but it's.

• 1:58:53Rich Roll?

  Well, there's, there's task number one for you.

• 1:58:55Speaker 01

  There's task number one.

• 1:58:56Rich Roll?

  Yeah. All right. Well, thanks so much, man. It's a total pleasure.

• 1:58:59Speaker 01

  Thank you. It's an honor for me to be here.

• 1:59:01Rich Roll?

  You're an inspiration, man.

• 1:59:02Speaker 01

  Thank you so much.

• 1:59:03Rich Roll?

  So keep doing what you're doing, all right?

• 1:59:04Speaker 01

  Appreciate it.

• 1:59:04Rich Roll?

  All right, Adam. Peace.

• 1:59:07Speaker 01

  Lance.

• 1:59:13Rich Roll?

  All right, I hope you guys enjoyed that. I really like that kid. I'm really looking forward to seeing what he does next and where he's going with his life. So, hope you dug it as well. Make sure you check out the show notes for the episode at richroll.com. I've got links to interesting articles and information about the stuff and the people that we discuss, so don't miss that. I put a lot of work into that. For all your plant power needs, go to richroll.com. We've got meditation programs, we've got nutrition products, we've got signed books, we've got garments, we have Plant Power Tech Tees, we have sticker packs, temporary tattoos, limited edition art prints, basically all kinds of cool stuff to help you take your health and your life to the next level at richroll.com.

• 1:59:53Rich Roll?

  Keep sending your questions for future Q&A podcasts to [email protected], of course. Check out my online courses at mindbodygreen.com, The Ultimate Guide to Plant-Based Nutrition and The Art of Living with Purpose. Just go to mindbodygreen.com, click on video courses, you can find out everything you need to know there. And, uh, thanks, you guys. Thanks for supporting the show, thanks for telling your friends, thanks for sharing it on social media, for using the Amazon banner ad, for giving us a review on iTunes, all that good stuff. I appreciate you guys tremendously. I just can't tell you how much this show means to me, and it touches my heart to know that it is affecting other people out there as well. I get all your emails, I read them, I can't always respond to all of them, but know that

• 2:00:38Rich Roll?

  I'm feeling very deeply connected to you guys and very grateful to be on this journey with you. So, thank you. See you in a couple of days. Make it great, and I'll talk to you guys soon. Peace. Plants.