The Warrior's Path to a Balanced Life | Aidan Lee | Ep 207

Aidan Lee  00:00

When you feel it in your bones and in your mind, that's how you know something's got to change.

Debra Chantry-Taylor  00:04

When you lose everything in business, when you lose everything in life, or you lose people in life, it takes time for the healing. So what did you do to get started on that journey?

Aidan Lee  00:13

You don’t have a one size fits all. Everyone then has a slightly unique situation or roadblocks or circumstances that they are struggling with, and that's where the coaching comes in. There's always more to optimise, but also being content with where we're at, because we don't want to be that person who's micro, micro magic every second in the calendar.

Debra Chantry-Taylor  00:36

Welcome back for another episode of Better Business, Better Life. I'm your host, Debra Chantry Taylor, and I'm passionate about helping entrepreneurs lead their ideal lives by creating better businesses.

Debra Chantry-Taylor  00:54

I'm a certified EOS implementer, an FBA accredited family business advisor and a business owner myself with several business interests. I met with established business owners and their leadership teams to help them live their ideal entrepreneurial life using EOS, the Entrepreneurial Operating System. Today's guest is a specialist, and he started martial arts at the age of four, and was teaching by the age of 10, he lost all his motivation and went to a dark place before pulling himself out, and he's now on a mission to create 10 million Dads who lead by example. Today he's going to share how you can create the right balance between work and life and use functional fitness to get more from your work and your life. Aidan Lee is a martial artist, transformational coach, speaker and dad. Welcome to the show. Aidan, great to have you here.

Aidan Lee  01:40

Great to be here, Debra. Thank you so much for having me.

Debra Chantry-Taylor  01:43

Oh, absolute pleasure. Now we've been having a bit of a chat, as we always do before the podcast, and you shared your story with me. I think it'd be really helpful if you could give a little bit of your story to the listeners.

Aidan Lee  01:54

Yeah, definitely. I'll try and keep it consistent, going to more in the great nuance. So I was telling, uh, Debra that I've been mostly in martial arts and fitness for the last 28 years or more, since I was four. And I got my first step into that world from my late dad. So he actually run one of the main martial arts schools in the area, called warlords skip Boxing Academy. So there I learned to not just only do martial arts, but from four years old, but by the time, I also didn't tell you, when I was 10, that's when I started teaching. So I was teaching in the classes, helping out.

Debra Chantry-Taylor  02:27

10 years old?

Aidan Lee  02:28

Yeah, yeah. Well, I was training most days, every day, so it was like natural just became second nature. So I was very lucky to be in that environment. And also back then, you know, it was a lot more hardcore, bit more raw and real, but it taught me a lot about life and a lot of things which can relate back to business, about discipline, focus, resilience, channelling energy in the right direction, and so on. So those are really powerful lessons for me. And fast forwarding to later, I picked up that was mostly doing kickboxing, then I picked up Boxing, Muay Thai, wing churn and bits of other martial arts as well, where really things came together for me is when I went to uni and I studied philosophy, and I thought, oh, I need to blend these two things together. But when I came out, my plan was always to become a world champion in kickboxing.

So that was the professional fighting path I was going to go down. And then I realised afterwards, after training two three times a day, six days a week, and making it about the competition, not about the process, not about just falling in love and just being a martial artist and being better, physically, mentally and spiritually, I fell out of love with it. Ended up with loss of injuries, brain damage, even from too much hard sparring since I was a little kid. But you know, you live and learn, and ended up depressed, anxiety. I was bed bound for some time. So I went from being in like, super fit fighting shape to being a bed band. It was quite a big, big change for me, and it took a few years to come out of that, that slump, shall we say?

Aidan Lee  04:01

But after So, what shall I do next? And I didn't want to go work a normal job or do anything which is going to deplete me further. Nothing wrong with the normal job. But for me, being in that world my whole life, it was I couldn't see another path. So all right, let me see if I can help others. After I picked myself back up on my feet to become fit and healthy, so I opened a small personal training studio. I did that for quite a few years. Then I realised something was missing. Went back to my roots and opened up a martial art school like my dad did. And then about two years ago, we stopped that, because I realised when students were coming in, is that I wanted to give them a lot more, but because when we were confined geographically to one area, but also I found I wanted them to grow physically, mentally and spiritually, way more than if they wanted to just come in for, say, a kickboxing class. But there was about select 10-20% of students who were really interested in. That self growth and that self development, and tying this back to business, it's about people, right? It's about your own growth, which can then be tied to your own journey.

So I realised, well, what can I do instead? And I'd recently become a father about it's been about four years ago now, and onto my third one, hopefully next week. So busy times. But I thought, well, what? What do we need in society? And I was telling you this earlier Debra, that sometimes lots of parents would come in asking us to teach their children martial arts. The main characteristic they wanted to develop in their child, or even themselves, a lot of the times, was confidence, or more energy, which then translators as confident, but I realised these dads weren't leading by example themselves, so they're asking their kids, or handing it off to someone like myself, to make their kids more confident, but weren't willing to do the same themselves. So it was quite hard, and I found actually this is not really getting the transformation we wanted. We actually wanted to turn it into the martial arts school, into a franchise, go national and so on. But because we were the, as far as we know, the only school which had a USB was like mixing martial arts and philosophy, even for like the two three-year-olds, we had super basic mental growth lessons. So it was quite the unique thing in the martial arts one. But that's what made us stop and say, No, we need to help dads instead. Because if we can help if we can help them, everything will trickle down to their children, to the local community, and then society thereafter.

Debra Chantry-Taylor  06:28

Interesting. I'm going to go back a few steps, if you don't mind, because I know that you said that you when you realise that you'd lost the kind of the love and the desire to kind of do the big competitions and things, you got into a space where, obviously you had some physical challenges, but also some mental challenges as well. Would you mind sharing a little bit about that? Because it feels like you would have lost your way, right? As in, suddenly, everything that you lived for had disappeared. And I've been through that when I had a business go into receivership, right? Because, you know, you'd spent your entire life kind of building this thing up, and then all of a sudden it was no longer there, and it could have a map. It could have a massive impact on you. Would you mind sharing a little bit of that journey with us?

Aidan Lee  07:05

Of course, yeah, please feel free to go deeper if I don't go so enough as well. But like you said, when you go into that kind of darkness, the abyss of bad and dark times, but you feel like you can't get out. That's where it really, it really, really feels bad and like there's no way, no way out. So even for me now, personally, I'm not, I'm not a big fan of these labels like depression and this and that. I think I was in that state of a depressive state, but being in a position where I could not move much, whereas before I could, you know, move and jump and spin and do all sorts of fancy, cool moves, but then not being able to get out of bed without my joints aching and really not being able to do much. I remember one day thought, let me just test how weak or how strong I am. How to, you know, pull up bar you can fit on the door. You stand on those I hope. I thought, let me just see you know what I can do, and I could barely just do one. And I know fine for some people who, you're fatal strong, that that would be an achievement. But if you were able to do sets and sets of those petitions, after a petition, you realise, Wow, I'm really, really weak. And when you feel it in your bones and in your mind, that's how you know something's got to change.

 So when that happened to me, that was quite a big realisation, like, wow, I need to, I need to fix this. I can't, can't let this go on any longer, because I would end up spending most of my days in bed trying to figure out, how can I get my energy back? And, you know, I think a lot of people experience not to this level, but to some level. A lot of the guys I speak to, because, like, you work with a lot of business owners, and that's who are business owners. They, you know, trying to balance life as a father, life as a business owner. They don't, they're operating on 10-20% when they've got another 80% left in the in the tank. So I felt like I had, I was operating on five, and I had 295, back to build. So, you know, even an extra five, 10% can make a make a massive difference. So the main things, I shall we say, quote, unquote, suffered with the like, the depression, the anxiety I had, like, red raw eczema, so I was, like, bleeding in the mornings when I woke up. So it's quite, you know, not really. I wasn't dying, but it was bad enough for me. Was enough to be like, well, I need to figure out how I can fix this. Had a bunch of gut issues or internal health issues, and you know, whether you're fits personal math or the everyday joke, you know when you're not aligned because the medicine, you know that when something is off, whether it's a small thing or a large amount, you know you need to fix that. And that's how I felt for a long time, and eventually came out the other side.

Debra Chantry-Taylor  09:40

So what do you think was the trigger that kind of made you because, I mean, say, having been there and knowing the effect it can have on you, you can recognise what's going on, but you still have to make the decision to actually do something about it, right? Because it's a little bit like, you know, I struggle with the weight a lot, with weight, a lot of my life. It's like, you know that you're overweight, you know that you that was only there's you. Something that makes you go, okay, now's the time I'm actually going to take action rather than just talk about it. So it wasn't a point that you, you know you got to and what was that trigger point?

Aidan Lee  10:11

Yeah, that's a great question. And I think you as you realise, well, Debra, you can have all the theory, all the potential knowledge, but until it transmutes into action, then what is, what is the point? Was there one defining point? I would say it was more of a like a series of different points. I don't know how if I can share this kind of stuff, because one, it's a bit more alternative. Is that okay with you?

Debra Chantry-Taylor  10:36

Yeah, absolutely go for it, yeah.

Aidan Lee  10:38

So about, I don't know how long ago, so maybe about 10 years ago, I did a Ayahuasca ceremony. Do you know what that is?

Debra Chantry-Taylor  10:44

Oh, yes, I do. Yeah.

Aidan Lee  10:46

So I did that, and that was a one of the big, big turning moments for me. So I won't go into too much detail, but basically, for those who don't know, one of the most powerful natural psychedelic snow to ban, and the idea of it is that it can help you to go through your life in a way which helps you to fully understand what's happening and come out the other side. But when you come on the other side, you have to really do the work and implement the change. So the big visual for me that change was inside this experience I was in. I could see myself inside this boxing ring, and then this life size pair of scissors came in and chopped the ropes. And then when it did that, it like went into a puff. And that was the message to me, saying, it's time to move on. Your time with this part of your journey is done. So for me, that was, that was a, like a really eye opening moment.

Debra Chantry-Taylor  11:40

Fantastic, I love it. I know that a lot of my friends, have actually done that. I haven't done it myself, but I'm, I'm quite keen. I think it will be very interesting experience to go through, but also bit scared, if I'm really honest, you had that realisation, which is great. And then obviously, I'm guessing it took some time. It's like, you know, when you lose everything in business, when you lose everything in life, or you lose people in life, it takes time for the healing. It takes time for you to build up the muscles that you've you need to use to get back to it. So how? What did you do to get started on that journey? Because you said you could only do, you know, one pull up and you used to be super fit. How did you start putting in place the ability to build mentally and physically to get back to where you needed to be?

Aidan Lee  12:19

Yeah, I think there's 2s look at this was a lot of these kind of stories of like someone coming back or something. I think there's a bit of a false perception that people think, Oh, they came back and it was like 90 days later. And of course, that can happen, but like you say, it tends to be more of like a process over years and also for myself, I've been in, you know, this martial arts fitness world my whole life. So theoretically, I could have done it a lot sooner, but it actually took me years to get to that point, whereas from this rock bottom to more of an optimised position, that that took a long time, but it was really about focusing on the basics and also on what I love. So, for example, I don't like doing certain styles or types of training, but if I did that, then I knew it would have taken longer for me to do that. What I did was a couple of things.

At that point, I was I was also vegan. So for not saying it can't work for anybody, but for me, it didn't. It didn't work. I did it for eight years. Towards the end of it, I was having some really, really bad health issues and showing in line with the things I was experiencing. So I dropped that eventually picked up my health massively. As a result, I was able to have better gut health, mental clarity, build muscle easier. So that was a huge shift for me.

Aidan Lee  13:28

So to really relay this to a lesson to the listeners, it's like, find the not just about nutrition, but the right elements you need to build the right response in your body. So for some that will be nutrition, some will be dealing with stress, with hormones, optimising testosterone and so on. Whatever that is, you have to find the biggest levers, just like in business, that are holding you back from making the biggest gains with the least amount of work. So that was the, probably one of the biggest things for me. And then secondly was focusing on, all right, well, now I need to build my weight, my strength back up. So even though I done most of my life in more like martial arts stuff, I took a big educational turn into focusing on functional strength. I still kept the martial arts up, but I realised I needed a bit of a better foundation posturally, mechanically and, you know, from a muscular point of view as well. So I focus on that.

Aidan Lee  14:25

And then thirdly, I would say, I really focused on my mental state. That was the, and I don't mean this in, like, a, you know, wishy washy sense, like, oh, you know, feel happy and content. No, I I really tried to say, what did I learn from martial arts from philosophy, and how can I intertwine those things in a way where I can really get better? Because even at that point, I was especially on the tail end of it, I was still helping, teaching others a little bit, but not in in the thick of the bad times, but on the tail end, I was building, starting the business. I thought, right, I got. Apply this stuff to myself in a deeper and a better in a more transformative way. So, start reading more, understanding more of these concepts, and also just looking back at my life so well. How was I able to train so hard and build so much speed, athleticism, movement? I did that because I had a certain state of mind. So I wanted to make sure I went back to thinking and being like I was when I was in my in my prime.

Debra Chantry-Taylor  15:24

Nice, okay. And so you obviously use these tools now, and you're helping other people who are stuck, I guess.

Aidan Lee  15:32

Yeah, exactly. And I think this is where it's really important is that you don't have a one size fits all, because everyone needs especially in business. I think you know, as you know, of course, business principles are universal, but everyone then has a slightly unique situation or roadblocks or circumstances that they are struggling with, and that's where the coaching comes in. So well, right? You know, you need to eat, right, sleep, right? Don't stress too much train, go for a walk, get some sunlight, you know, and so on and so forth. But what's stopping you from doing those things? And more often than not, of course, some people literally don't have the knowledge, and I would say, especially in this market, like the kind of people we work with, they're clever people. They're not they look and research and do stuff. A lot of people I work at, they actually know loads about health, and sometimes they surprise me with things that I've not heard about. It very interesting. So it's not that they don't know, but it's more about, well, how do we apply this in a tangible way to their lives?

Debra Chantry-Taylor  16:34

And I think sometimes we tend to sort of over complicate it as well. I know certainly in business, but also in life as well as that, we take things and we really make them more difficult than they need to be. And so first of me, it's always about coming back to the basics and going, how do we really simplify this down? And you're absolutely right. I mean, if you think about business, the framework that I use as a US, it there's nothing kit science in there. Like most business owners, know what they need to do. It's just about having a framework and simplifying it down so they can actually follow it. And I think having somebody who can actually hold them accountable as well, so having a coach that is there to bring them on that journey. So I always liken it to building a house. We need to lay the foundations. We put up the framework, which is the EOS model, how you want to decorate it, what works for you in that house, what fittings and fixtures you need. That's all very, very different based on the business and the business owner, but the foundations and the framework need to be there for you to do that well.

Aidan Lee  17:25

Exactly. That's a great analogy. That's it. And if you don't have those foundations, all the bio hacking, the supplements and whatever, for health and saying for business, the shiny new marketing tactic or something, it doesn't matter, right?

Debra Chantry-Taylor  17:38

Okay, so let’s explore a little bit about the work that you do. So you work a lot with dads who are business people. What do they come to you for? What's usually the biggest challenge when somebody comes to you? Do you think, what's the normal?

Aidan Lee  17:49

Yes, there's a couple which I say really, really come up. One is the work life balance in terms of, usually they're too zoned in on the business in a way where it's not just detrimental to family life, but also they realise that their performance is not as high as it could be. So how would you summarise that in a word or two? Well, it's like productivity, brilliant energy, or focused, focused energy. So that's from a work slash potential point of view. I'll say that's the main thing. And then personally, that they don't feel like they're being an example. Being an example to their kids, whether they got young kids like myself or old kids. Because it doesn't matter whether kids are 18-20, 30, you still want to be a person to them that they can look up to throughout the whole of their lives. So it's also about being an example. And then also sometimes with their wives, usually that because they focus so much on the business and neglected their health, then, you know, as a connection, not just intimately, sometimes intimately too, but also as a connection that that has because they focus so much on business, they've left the kids the wife to just focus on themselves, and it's not as integrated as they like, but the initial like, surface level thing is definitely the energy productivity, performance, and then the other things tend to go from there.

Debra Chantry-Taylor  19:09

Yeah. It’s interesting. When I first started putting this podcast together, I think it's almost three years ago now, one of the things was I recognised that the people that I were working with, they were often, I mean, obviously, very, very passionate about the business and so engrossed in the business that they had, from the outside looking and it looked like they had it all, because they had a good business and making good money. They had the house, the toys, the car, all that kind of stuff. But in reality, yes, there was that missing. And I, I always struggle with the word balance, because it makes me feel like it should be absolutely equal, but it's really about balance. It's about making sure what's right for you. So are you spending enough time with the people you love? Are you spending enough time doing the things you're passionate about? And I realised that, you know so from the Outlook and from the outside in, they might look fantastic, but in reality, they lost that ability to connect with their children, connect with their with their wife, and they had look after their health. Because I think the health is one of the first things that tends to go I think if you're if. For most people, if you're really, really engrossed in your work, because you're trying to balance all these different things, we'll see the health is the easiest one to let go.

Aidan Lee  20:09

Yeah, 100% and you know, to be honest, I've even ironically and just being honest is I've even said, oh, you know, I'll train tomorrow, or I'll do that tomorrow, you know, but I know I don't do it, really do anymore, but I have done that when I especially when I first started business, because I was one inexperience. I didn't know I was overwhelmed, and so on and so forth. And I think depending, even if you're mid to higher size business, the pressure gets higher, the responsibilities are higher. So naturally, I think people, even if they don't plan to and they've got that business experience, sometimes they go back to their almost like early business days in terms of how they treat things, and they just go, I've got to go all in on business, and nothing else can happen until our revenues hit a certain point, until I've got enough team members, or until I can delegate this. But I think the key belief that people need to shift is that if you can optimise your own health and even just get an extra five 10% out of yourself in terms of productivity, that will translate into more money, more time off, more presence. And like you say about the balance, it's not that it has to be 50/50, no, it's if you're going to spend an hour in the evening with your kids and then an hour with your wife, or an hour or together, whatever, be fully present in the hour and make the most of it, because that's way more, more worth than 10 hours of checking your phone every five minutes for a different email or going back and forwards just, you know, be present. That's the main thing.

Debra Chantry-Taylor  21:31

Yeah, people. But yeah, it’s interesting because I did a lot of leadership coaching. We talked about that as they had the hamster wheel, right? The hamster wheel is where you're always going. Well, when I get to this, when I get to this, when I get to this, it's like, What about just actually recognising where you are at now? And I think Dan Sullivan talked about this in one of his books, where he talks about always measuring backwards, so rather than just be chasing the next thing is, kind of go, Well, where am I now? And how does that compare to where I was 12 months ago? And therefore measuring the progress you've made, rather than chasing the next big thing that, whatever that is. And he talked about in his book, this, this guy who was a business owner, who he was like, I'm going to be happy when I make a million dollars, and I'm going to be happy when I make $2 million and every time he hit his doll, he wasn't happy until he had, like, the next one. So when I make $15 million and he actually ended up dying and didn't sort of achieve his goal, which meant that he was never actually happy. So there is some merit in sort of looking at, okay, how do you become happy with where you are right now? How do you become present and enjoy what you're doing now?

Aidan Lee  22:27

Wow, is that a true story? That's amazing.

Debra Chantry-Taylor  22:30

It's a true story, yeah yeah.

Aidan Lee  22:32

You know, even if it wasn't as just as a parable, it is so telling is that that carrot is dangled in front of you, but it's up to you whether you keep chasing it. Of course, you should aim higher and increase the revenue and profit margins, blah, blah, but if it's at the detriment of the quality of your life, then, and you got to ask, well, what are you building this business for? Is it to just purely for money? Because we all know money is only a means to an end, but if you help, help, helping others, making an impact, you're healthy and you're making money, like, why not? You can have it all. I think that's the thing as well. So have it all. Why not have everything, rather than just one or two things?

Debra Chantry-Taylor  23:08

Yeah, absolutely. Okay, so somebody's sitting here and thinking, You know what, I have, let my help go a bit, and I probably am not being as good a father or mother as I possibly could be. Where would be the first place you would get them to start? Because having the recognition is one thing, doing something about it is quite different.

Aidan Lee  23:24

Yeah, definitely. Well, what I usually do with all my students is a couple of assessments, because it's very one irresponsible. Me say, oh, cool, go and do this. Go and do that, but also on the student or client spots to say, go and do this, but without any benchmarks. So a couple of things, and I'll turn this into something actionable for people in a moment, but initially for myself with students, is a biomechanics assessment. So Biomechanics is just a fancy word for your movement pattern, so how you move. And there's really, there's like, four key movements to analyse. So it's one standing, like I'm doing, that is how you walk, how you run, and then how you throw. So those are the four key fundamental human movements, and if you do those four things, well, for example, you stand, and you're not like this, and you can sprint, and you can sprint more than 10 meters without pulling a muscle or pulling it back, then you know you're doing all right. But the jokes aside, like what we do is we analyse this with the videos.

So I ask them to take videos of their form and movements, and this gives me the data I know. All right. Well, your posture is like this, and you're really tight here in your pecobidin, for example, and that's causing you to have shortness of breath and so on and so forth. So you see, there's actually a lot of downstream effects from having the wrong base, like you said earlier, about the house. You could have a house. We all have our one and only house, our body, but if it exists in poor form, then it's a really bad thing to tell for me to tell you, I'll go and do this. This exercise without fixing the base, and that's what a lot of people do. Hence why you can see from my build, I'm not massive. That's not my, my style Bruce Lee is more my, my uh, influence those kind of figures. But it's if you build on bad foundations, like if you see a bodybuilder who's got really bad posture, but they look massive and muscular. Sure, it might look good if that's what you're going for. But from a functionality perspective, for example, can your average huge bodybuilder scratch their back? They can't this. They sound silly, but, you know, they can't do that.

So you need to have a balance where you're actually moving well, like our ancestors did 1000s of years ago, we should be saying, well, my benchmark is my, my great 100 generations ago, Grandad, who could sprint after some prey and catch it with a, would you call it a bow and arrow or a spin? That's it. That's what I'm looking for. So, you know, could I not literally do that? But could I run and keep up with them and do that kind of stuff. Okay, I was interested

Debra Chantry-Taylor  26:01

Okay. I was interested when you said, Stan, walk, run and throw us thinking exactly. It's caveman, cave and behaviour, right? That's where we actually came from. That was that is functional fitness, right? That is what's going to keep us healthy going forward. Okay, so you, you analyse, you have a look at that, you analyse that, but that, and that's what you're doing to help them set some benchmarks. What do they need to do to get themselves in the right position, I suppose, to be able to make changes.

Aidan Lee  26:25

Yeah, so I should have added to that as well. So that's the biomechanics. Then we do things like lifestyle and environment assessment. So for example, it's like even things like, what bedding that I use, you know, what lights are in their house, what water they drink, all these things they have a especially in the modern house and lifestyle that will have a toxic load. So we have to think, or how can we reduce the things which are interfering with their hormones to optimise them to the highest degree? And of course, you look at nutrition and fitness and so on. But after this, is that all right? Well, can we get you to do our baseline fitness training? And what would you get from this? And this and this is a bad example, but just something that everyone would know. So how many press ups can you do? Or you can do five, all right. Well, okay, I know we are. How many squats can you do, and so on. So we look at these other benchmarks and build from there. So in terms of then, what can we actually get going?

Aidan Lee  27:18

Well, I don't want to get too technical, but after we've got all of that data, we build a simple system, and I like to recommend, especially for business owners, that you train for 30 minutes a day. It's not too long. You know, I think even the business of people can say, all right, I can do 30 minutes. If they really, they really want to, they'll find a way. It's not like saying, Oh, you need to do hours, because that's the wrong mentality. Most people have this idea. They have to train like a bodybuilder for hours a day. It's like, you don't really. I recommend 30 minutes a day, six days. Take one day off, alternate the training. So one day is is functional strength. The next day is like, I usually teach the kickboxing on the other days, so something like that. So functional strength, kickboxing, or some other form of cardio, like good running, sprinting, Hill sprints, or whatever it is, depending on the person.

And then you alternate, basically for the six days, have one day off. But the key difference is it's not just what you're doing in that half an hour. It's what you're doing in the other 23 and a half that really builds the body, like one of my students, Jamie, he just recently wrapped up with me. He dropped about 30 pounds in 12 weeks. And it's not that he was like, super intelligent or did something really amazing. What he did is just follow the system, did the work and got the result, asked the feedback, went back and forwards. We kept it really simple. And if you can follow a basic system like that that I've just outlined, can you commit to training for 30 minutes? State, can you go for a walk at least once a day, if not a bit more? And many other various habits, which, if you want some more, let me know I can go into them. And if you can get these key habits down, then it's almost impossible. Whether you've got weight to lose, or you want to build muscle, whatever your goal is, or more energy, it's almost impossible to not. Because I think, just to wrap this part up, is that most people in one lifestyle, unless they are fit and healthy and they're doing all these things I'm talking about, their lifestyles are so far from natural that it doesn't take much to get the desired result if we just change a few key things.

Debra Chantry-Taylor  29:28

Yeah, I did talk about the environment in our home, and I've done a lot of work with a naturopathic doctor who's very much into that, in the effect of natural light, and then, of course, the effect of unnatural light on our hormones or what that has on us. And we live in a society now where there is just so much stuff going on that is so unnatural, isn't it?

Aidan Lee  29:47

Oh, massively, I've got some lights on me and stuff. And for me, this is really unusual. We usually have a don't if you've done this as well, if you've worked with someone like that, we usually have red light. All the bulbs in our house are red lights. For the podcast. I wouldn't do that too, but, yeah.

Debra Chantry-Taylor  30:01

Um, let's go. No, we actually, we did. We went through our whole house and turned them all into Hue lights, because they could actually change the colours of them, which means they go, um, obviously red at nighttime. But also, I think one of the things I learned, which was quite fascinating, was about the overhead light. So most modern homes have got down lights everywhere, right? Which is beautiful from a lighting point of view, not so great from a body point of view, because it actually tells the body that we're in the middle of the day when, in actual fact, it's nighttime. So we actually have a rule where we try, so we do it every single day, but we try really hard to actually make sure after five or 6pm we actually don't have any overhead lights on. We use side lights, we use table lights, things to actually try and mimic more of a natural environment. I also know it's really important to go out for a walk first thing in the morning, get sunlight first thing in the morning. So there's so much that we have forgotten about because of our modern lifestyle.

Aidan Lee  30:50

100%. It's great you you've got all that in place already. Debra, because most, most people don't have that, or even if they have the idea of it like it seems really, really simple to change your light bulbs, but it's quite a big resistance for most people, even some students. When I tell them it's a good idea to change, change your light bulbs. Well, like you say, Don't focus on these lights up here. Get a few lamps. And as you say, you want to get that close to fire as possible, especially in the evenings, because you need to wind down. And a lot of a lot of business, I realised, you know, they're always, especially at nighttime, checking emails on the phone and so on and so forth. And, you know, sure, we've all been guilty of it, but there are some ways, one, to mitigate this, but two, it's more about habit change like anything, then about the actual tactics. Of course, the tactics do matter, but they need to be tied with pure hardcore, not hardcore, but, like, religiously abided to habit change, not just, I'll do it for five days. You know how it goes? No, especially with things like, like, balance, it takes, takes some time.

Debra Chantry-Taylor  31:53

Yeah, absolutely. I know there definitely are some great technologies out there that can help you, even if you do want to check your email, but you're right, the best thing you can do is actually have a a true switch off period where you kind of go right. This is actually my relaxed wind down, wind down time, also my family time and time spent a rush. We used to do it around the fire right when we were cavemen, we'd all sit around the fire and have that, that family time together, so kind of with that. Okay, so people listening in, I always ask for three top tips or tools that they can, you know, sort of take away things that could actually make a fundamental difference. What would be your three top tips or tools Aidan?

Aidan Lee  32:30

Definitely. Well, number one is quite a unconventional way of looking at it, but number one thing I recommend to people that it can even help you lose weight and fat, because it helps to drain the lymph system, help the body to get nutrients to where it needs to be, in the right times the right places, is to do a practice called the acronym is MFR, which stands for myofascial release. And it's really the simple way of looking at is just self-massage. I switched from stretching comparing when I was in I was in traditional martial arts, so I spent a good 15 plus years trying to do the splits and all these kinds of things. Now I don't stretch at all. I don't believe in stretching. I don't think it's good for you, but there's another story.

So instead, you know, everyone thinks they need to stretch, but what you just need to do is just do some simple massage. Just need a tennis ball or a hockey ball, and obviously you place it on the areas where the tightness or your posture is dysfunctional, and then you put as much pressure on as possible in various positions. And that will help you to release the position, because there's a this leads onto a framework, which I use is basically you need to release the area. For example, as I said earlier about the tight posture, about the tight posture, I've got this roundness here. I need to release that. Great. It's released. Okay. Now I need to strength or retention, which is basically strengthening. So now I strengthen in this area. Because again, if I do some bench press like this, but I'm sitting like this. So actually, that's only going to make that area tighter, and it's going to make it round even more at the chest, actually, we want to release retention and then reintegrate at the last stage. That means the body and structure is more aligned, and it's basically aligned as it should be. So that's, that's the first thing I would recommend, is doing my facial release. Second thing..

Debra Chantry-Taylor  34:20

Actually, that's really painful too. I've tried that. I mean, really painful.

Aidan Lee  34:24

Do you do it with a tennis ball?

Debra Chantry-Taylor  34:26

Yeah, yeah, and also with rollers and things as well. So yeah,

Aidan Lee  34:31

Oh, nice. If you can hack it, I'd recommend to get a hockey ball or a lacrosse ball, one or the other.

Debra Chantry-Taylor  34:39

Oh, really? Okay.

Aidan Lee  34:40

Yeah, it's a lot harder. Yeah, I think it was a bit of a lacquer I've gone through tip number two. So after you do MFR, the second thing I recommend is find a practice or a style of training that you really love. Now for me, the balance, and what I teach to my students is the balance between functional strength. Training and martial arts. The reason is or kid boxing, specifically the martial arts, Kid boxing side is a skill most people get bored of training in exercise because there's no skill development. There's nothing to look forward to. This is why the belt system in martial arts worked really well. So, oh, I want to go from white belt all the way to black belt, whether or not you know it means much to have a belt. That's another story.

But mentally, there is a progression that you can see and visualize, and you've acquired skills along the way to help you demonstrate that. And at the same time, you're getting massively fit. And as a bonus, two birds with one stone, you're able to defend yourself. So one quote I like to I might be hacking at it, but I'll just paraphrase. I don't know if you've heard of this book. It's called the Book of Five Rings, by a samurai called a Miyamoto Musashi. He was the most famous samurai, but he basically says, Once you see the way, and he's talking about the way, it says, The Taoism and the eastern way of looking at how the universal order of things comes together. So he says, Once you see the way, you'll see it in all things. And he's referring to martial arts. Martial arts is a great way or path, to help you understand yourself, other people, and also the world around you. So he's saying, Once you see the way, you'll see it in all things.

Hence why there's books like The Art of War by Sun Tzu that loads of people in business use, because why it helps you to see the way in others. So I know I went off on a bit of a tangent there, but that would be the second thing is, find something that you love, a skill that's going to keep you going and you can see yourself doing for the rest of your life.

Aidan Lee  36:42

And lastly, third thing, there are so many more, but tied down to this one thing is, I also teach the which kind of ties into what I just said there, especially the martial arts philosophy as part of our program. So again, one of the other unique things we do is that, because I feel it's one, is very connected to martial arts. But two, I know a lot of people in business do read, and they do educate and stuff. But a lot of the dads Sometimes I work with, they struggle, obviously, to fit some time and just to do some exercise and training, let alone be able to read 10 pages a day. So if one habit, I try and build on to yourself. How can you read for 10 pages a day? It could be, listen to an audio book. It could be you actually physically read it, excuse me, which is great, but the commute somewhere else, you can definitely listen to 10 pages, at least, especially on two times speed, more than possible.

Debra Chantry-Taylor  37:34

Yes, man, after my own heart, I love the two times feed. And I suppose you can do that when you're going for your walk. You can do it when you're commuting into work. There's many different places. You can actually just listen to something, if you can't physically sit and read a book.

Aidan Lee  37:49

Exactly. And I think as long as we have this mind of state of mind, that there's always more to optimise, but also being content with where we're at, because we don't want to be that person who's micro, micro magic every second in the calendar. But I get, you know, I also get the principle of that too. It's just, do you have a healthy relationship with that? And are you tying it back to yourself where you say, well, all right, I'm looking after myself. Everything's optimised. My health is optimised, my family, my lifestyle, and as a result, my business is doing great, too.

Debra Chantry-Taylor  38:17

And we ask people to do it in business. We talk about, you know, setting your rocks for your quarter and making sure you actually book time out in your diary to do it, because if you don't book time out in your diary, you won't do it. And I always show people my diary, my personal diary, and I say the same thing happens to your personal stuff too, if you don't actually make the time for the things that are important. So I do have a personal trainer three times a week. It's in my calendar that's not negotiable. I have time for my reading, I have time for Asia as you have a bedtime in my calendar that says I am due to be winding down to go to bed at 8:30 and people laugh at that. And so it doesn't mean that I do it all the time. I can make a decision. I can actually say, you might invite me out for a drink and I'll go, okay, just this once, I'll go and do that. But if it's not in your calendar, it's not part of your routine, it's just too easy to not do it. And so, you know, by putting it in there and making the time means you've got the ability to make the decision whether or not you want to do it.

Aidan Lee  39:09

But at least you’ve got the time to do it 100% you hit the nail on the head, and it's good. You're practicing this stuff because it shows it can be done and it's not. I think a lot of people also think that when you schedule to this kind of level, like, I also have bedtime in my calendar too, and I think it's, yeah, honestly, it's useful.

Aidan Lee  39:27

And sometimes, you know, you get so wrapped up in what you're doing that, or, you know, even if you're just relaxing, that you do forget that. Oh, actually, I should be doing this now, because it's also about a little bit of delayed gratification. Is that if I do stick to this then, well, tomorrow I won't suffer. Well, I'll get off to a better start tomorrow. So a lot of people forget that, especially when it comes to health, nutrition, training and businesses, that I'll exercise tomorrow, I'll train tomorrow. But really, every time you put it off, you're reinforcing the signal that it's okay to do that, that that's a standard that you accept. Accepted. That is a standard that you're willing to share with your employees, your team, your children, your wife and so on. You know, if your employee was having a problem and they were super unhealthy and you knew that was affecting their work and their life, you would probably advise them to go look after themselves, take some time out.

Debra Chantry-Taylor  40:19

Yeah, and we talked about this right in the beginning. It's like, you know that to be a good leader, good leader, you actually have to lead. You have to lead by example, whether that be as a father, as a business owner, you need to actually by example. So the boundaries. I talk about boundaries a lot, and I think boundaries are really important. It's like, if you have the boundaries in place, people know what to expect. If you let those boundaries slip, you suddenly have new boundaries.

Aidan Lee  40:39

Exactly, yeah. And they almost become boundless.

Debra Chantry-Taylor  40:43

Yes, exactly. Oh, that's fantastic. Okay, so the three things so the MFR, myofascial release practice, your style of training that works for you, I think that's really important. And something that you can actually learn and improve in as well is that you've actually got some motivation to continue and then find time to read or listen to 10 pages a day so that you actually have the ability to keep learning as you as you grow.

Aidan Lee  41:08

Yeah, that's it.

Debra Chantry-Taylor  41:10

Brilliant look. Aidan, been lovely to talk to you. Thank you so much. I know it's late over there in the UK, and I appreciate you not having red light on the podcast. It makes for a better viewing when you're watching it online. If people want to get in contact with you, what's the best web address for them? Yeah,

Aidan Lee  41:24

Yeah, at the moment I'm focusing on delivering a newsletter every Monday. It's less than five or five minutes or less, and it's basically lessons which help you to build a warriors physique and lead your family by example. So if you go to Fit Roots, which is what I'm wearing now, fitroots.co.uk, forward, slash newsletter, that's where you can join and take a look.

Debra Chantry-Taylor  41:45

Excellent. I should do that myself as well. Hey, look. Thank you so much for your time. Really appreciate it.

Aidan Lee  41:50

Likewise. Thank you Debra., Appreciate it.

Debra Chantry-Taylor  41:53

Thanks. Aidan.