#254 How to take back control of your life and become the man you want to be, with Frank Rich.

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EPISODE TRANSCRIPTION

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Please note that while an effort is made to provide an accurate transcription, errors and omissions may be present. No part of this transcription can be referenced or reproduced without permission.

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Frank Rich  0:00  
Now in the process of becoming that person is where the decisions are going to come into play, right? You get to make decisions aligned with who it is you want to be. But those decisions a lot easier to make. This is discipline, right discipline is choosing what you want more over what you want. Now, if you're super clear on what you want in the future very easily to say discipline, why do people get distracted with pornography? Why do people get distracted on social media? Why do people get distracted all day throughout their entire life because they don't know what they want. There's no clear end destination. So the next distraction is very easily going to take you off track and off target.

Agi Keramidas  0:38  
You're listening to personal development mastery podcast, where you will find inspirational conversations, and actionable takeaways to master yourself and improve your life. I am your host, Agi Keramidas. A few years ago, I found myself unfulfilled and unmotivated. Like I had lost my sense of purpose and my life was merely passing by. Since then, I've been on a continuous journey of personal development that has transformed every aspect of my life. Now, my mission is to inspire you to grow, stand out and take action towards a purposeful and fulfilling life. In this podcast, I invite myself inside the minds of remarkable entrepreneurs, authors, thought leaders, spiritual teachers, people who share their journey milestones and learnings for you to be inspired to grow. In each episode, you will find actionable takeaways that you can implement right now. So make sure you follow the podcast to get them as soon as they are released.

Agi Keramidas  1:49  
In today's show, I am delighted to speak with Frank rates. Frank, you are a former bodybuilders entrepreneur, and immense health and recovery coach. You are also the host of the top ranked podcast the superhuman life which is dedicated to helping men break free from the shackles of addiction. You're on a mission to help men take back control of their lives, body, mind and heart. Frank, welcome to the show. It's a real pleasure to speak with you today.

Frank Rich  2:20  
Yeah, the incredible honour to be here with you today Agi.

Agi Keramidas  2:24  
I'm looking forward to this conversation very much and I will start. Frank, I want to ask some elements of your story. So from bodybuilding to men's health and recovery codes, give us one or two key defining moments along this journey.

Frank Rich  2:43  
Yeah, well what a great question. Agi. I think for me, all of this started. So a very defining moment in my life was I believe it was a summer of when I was 12 or 13 years old. I grew up in South Florida, you know, there was beaches, there was pools. I wasn't athletic kids. So I part like participated in played in a lot of sports. So I was very active. But also at the same time, like we weren't the healthiest family. Like you know, we we ate dinner out of boxes, sometimes, like we always had food, it was just we didn't really pay a lot of attention to what type of foods that we were eating. So by 1213, I can remember being a little bit insecure in the way that my body looks. So much to the point argue that I got a chance to spend the summer with my cousin, my cousin was one year older than me. So think about the mind of a 12 year old boy. Now he's going to hang out with boys that are 13 years old. And with 13 year old boys come 13 year old girls, right. So this was the first time I was at a poll in that summer where I felt unconfident taking my shirt off, I was so embarrassed that I was the Husky kid and that there were older boys that had chiselled abs and had muscles. And I didn't had that. And I remember the pain of that summer, I remember the feeling of how insecure I was to take my shirt off around women around girls around other boys as well. So I think that was a defining moment for me that when I got to the point where I could begin to make choices and decisions for myself, I went all in and bodybuilding. So when I graduated high school and literally moved away that first summer I dedicated my life to transforming my body so much to a point where I literally lost like 30 pounds and put 30 pounds of fat and put on like 20 pounds of muscle and like a very short window of time. So I caught the bug very early on. And the bug was me showing myself that if I put in work over a short period of time that I could produce the results that I was looking for. So I think the first defining moment was that summer when I was 12 or 13 years old, that feeling of pain, right? And I held on to that pain and that pain really, really fueled me through my 20s and early 30s. And I think the second defining moment in my life was October 22 of 2018. And for me this was the day that my life changed because this was the day I brought my faith into into my life. So I'd always been somebody that had been on a pursuit. You know, I've been studying personal development, Tony Robbins, attending the seminars, seeking answers all the questions I had in life. And a lot of a lot of what I found led me to some success in the world. But when I achieved success in the world, and I didn't have anything to really build that foundation on, I was just as unhappy as I was at that 12 year old kid, right. So second defining moment was the day that I accepted Christ into my life, which was October 22 2018.

Agi Keramidas  5:32  
I will, I will ask a bit about the second one. And then there is also something about the first but since you, you many times we find that this external success does not come along with internal fulfilment. And it's, it's it's always a realisation when that happens, and it happens to too many people I wanted to ask when you said you brought faith into your life, and you gave a very specific date. So do you want to elaborate a bit more on what happened on that day? And it remained so remarkable in you to, you know, know that date my heart?

Frank Rich  6:14  
Yeah, yeah, absolutely. So like I said, Man, I was, you know, I was chasing success. I was chasing accomplishments, I was chasing knowledge. What I thought at the time was wisdom. You know, like I said, I was an insecure kid, right? I lacked a lot of confidence in the way that my body looked. We didn't come from, you know, great success within our family, we always had enough, but we never had what the kids down the corner had or the other kids at school. And I thought that if I could achieve monetary success, then I would make that I would be happy. Because when I looked at my family, when I looked at, okay, the home that I was living in, I love my parents to death, but they didn't get along. There's a lot of anger. There's a lot of fighting, there was a lot of tension. And I looked at my aunts and uncles, I was like, okay, they're struggling with addiction, like they're there. They're not happy as well. Why is everybody in our family miserable, unhappy and depressed? When I look out in the world, there's all these successful people. So I connected the dots that success creates happiness. So for me, 20s and 30s was about chasing success was about monetary success was about how quickly can I make six figures I accomplished that at 21 years old. How expensive was my car? How expensive were the watch how expensive was the clothes that I was wearing? How much money was able to spend at a club or at a bar at a restaurant, on a weekend, these were all things that I thought were going to make me happy. And when I accomplished them, and I reached the top there or whatever it was in my eyes. To me, that was the top and I felt just as bad if not worse than I had before. It was like, Okay, there's like, this isn't the answer. And I had been I had been in business for six years in 2017, I had been running a few different companies. We had a few we had we had a little bit of success. But in January of 2017, I hired a business coach because I wanted to get into the online fitness marketing space. And I knew that if I was going to enter into a new industry and category, I needed to buy some time I needed to get some expert help. So I joined a mastermind. And in that mastermind My life changed in a lot of different ways. Obviously, I learned internet marketing, I learned content creation, everything I'm doing with our companies now is a product of those things that I started learning back in 2017. But what it really showed to me is is through this mastermind I got connected with guys that were having massive impact. I talked about my dad, right you know, my dad was like he was providing for the family blue collar guy getting out there busting his ass five, six days a week, grinding 50 hours, every single day to make sure we have a roof over our head and food on the table. I hold a lot of respect for my dad, but he wasn't he wasn't the most present father, he wasn't the most loving father. He never talked to us about our dreams, our goals, our ambitions, what we can do. And when I looked at every other man in my family, it was like drug addiction, sex addiction, alcohol addiction, depression, suicide, like this is the lineage that I come from. So I began to accept that that is how I was made. But when I began to see other men in the world, that were leading their families that were having massive impact in what they were doing, I began to I began to realise like this is what I've always been looking for. And through this group, I began to see that there was a unifying thing between all the men that I was beginning to surround myself with. They all were in different industries, right? They all were crushing their businesses, they all had families, but in a little different of a dynamic. The unifying piece for a lot of them was that the centre of their life was Christ. And I'm not here to you know, to preach to anybody. This is my story. This has been this has been my walk. But being around these men now that that lived their life, Christ first began to show me good models and examples of what a real leader as a man should be in its home in his community, and its companies like these men truly inspired me so I So that was 2017. For a year and a half, I spent every single week, one day a week, I would go with this group and then we'd work out together, then we'd have lunch, and then the workouts and lunch turn into once you come to dinner with with our families, we can watch you come hang out at the house would join us with the pool. So I began to get accepted and loved by men that I've never experienced before, like a brotherly type of love. Like we want to support you. But we also want to challenge you to be better. And there's a particular individual in this group. His name is Josh Kashia. Dora and I've had him on my podcast a couple times. But he was somebody that I spoke to weekly. Josh was there for me and the good he was there for me in the bad. He was there for me whenever I need it. Well, that day, October 22 2018, Josh was flying down from Philadelphia. So he lives in Pennsylvania. I live in Florida. We've been talking about it for a couple of weeks, and he was coming into town and wanted me to drive over and me it was about an hour long commute. And I was like excited to go see a Josh, we're going to be talking about just catching up on the good stuff that we got going on. He runs a few different businesses very successful. Men will Josh had knew that he was coming to Florida for a different reason. He he knew for a long time that there was something on his heart that God had placed on his heart and there's something that I needed to hear. So when I picked him up at his hotel, and we drove to downtown Orlando, the the main street that runs through downtown Orlando was called Church Street. So we pulled into a parking garage, we got off, we start walking down Church Street, said there's a great restaurant right there, Josh, why don't we go have lunch at the steakhouse. It'll be quiet, intimate. We just had an amazing conversation. And I'll bring this to a close because I know it's getting really long winded here. So we sit down. And literally within being there for two minutes. Josh goes, Do you mind if I ask you a couple questions. He said, How's your relationship with your father? And what do you know about Jesus Christ? And I was kind of taken aback because for weeks prior to that, I had had a conversation with my girlfriend at the time where things weren't going well, in our business things were really clicking in our relationship. And I remember saying stuff, I don't know what I'm not doing. Like, I feel like I had every box checked correctly. Maybe we need to go to church, because all these guys have been spending time with have church in their lives. So maybe that's what I missing. Why don't we go to church and just for context, like I didn't have faith, I didn't have religion, no talk. None of this was in my background, just always seeking always seeking, always seeking. So when Josh brought that, to me, it was like I was so open and willing and ready to accept it. That literally, we sat there for two hours in that in that restaurant that day. And he shared the entire, you know, gospel with me, he shared with me, you know, going from Genesis, Adam and Eve all the way to Revelations, who was Jesus? Why did he come here? What was this story in this man's life ultimately about? And how if I accept Him into my life, can things change for me, so we walked outside the restaurant, to a History Centre was literally across the street, Josh place his hands on me. And we literally prayed together and accepted Christ into my life, for the first time on that day, October 22 2018. Now, the interesting part is literally four months later, is when I made the choice to get porn out of porn out of my life. And the rest has been history, right, top producing, you know, top ranked podcasts, you know, we've had a company mission that has helped 3000 Men radically transform their lives, you know, I've been interviewed 100 plus times to share this story. So yeah, there's a lot of meaning there to me to that date, because for me, it was a day that I felt I was reborn. Wow.

Agi Keramidas  13:24  
That's a very intriguing story. And there was something you said that a few months before that they you were things were not going as well as you wanted, or you're expecting to and you were wondering what it is that you're not doing because you felt like you were doing everything? And that is a situation that I'm sure many people can or some people who definitely can relate to that I know I can relate to something like that. When you seemingly do everything you take the box assess, as you said, the actions are they're guided, you know, by the coach or whatever else it is, yet, the results do not match the expectations of the action. So my my question is, how do you think braiding faith and what you shared about understanding Jesus's life and purpose and all that? What do you think was the the missing link that feed in that? If I take that to the to the business that we were talking about, and we will talk about porn that you said in a little bit later on, but I just want to understand that in terms of the business, how do you think it helped get the results that you wanted by as in contrast with previously?

Frank Rich  14:57  
Yeah, no, absolutely. That's a great question. And I think Probably the best way to to answer this is, let's remove faith in Jesus out of the conversation, right? Because I don't want that to speak over somebody, I want to, I want to because you asked a very specific question about business, I want to give the answer in a way that's actually going to answer your question. For me, what changed is, I stopped looking at what I was doing as far as checking boxes, to get things done to what am I doing to become the person that I'm supposed to be. So if somebody is struggling with their business, and they're like, I'm doing all the things, we'll stop doing the things, figure out what the goal is within the business, and then reverse engineer that through the lens and perspective of who do I need to become in order to achieve the success that I want. And I think for me, that's where Jesus has as radically changed me. It's like, okay, if you focus on you, if you focus on becoming more like Christ, every single day, and granted, you're aligned with what you really want in this world, the success is going to be inevitable, right? Because you focus on who it is you're showing up as every single day. So from a business perspective, stop, stop focusing on the task, or the daily habits, or the daily check marks as like their to do list, begin to work towards becoming the person that you need to be to accomplish all the goals within your life. And here's the thing, if you become the person that can accomplish all your goals in your life, and you set your aim correctly, you will have everything you want in this life, it's just going to be a byproduct of you having to become that person.

Agi Keramidas  16:39  
That's great. So becoming that person. Does it mean that you compile a list of traits and characteristics and behaviours that this person that you want to become? Has? Or is it a way of decision making every time whether my decision is towards the person I want to become? Or not? Or a combination of the two? I hope, hope my question is, makes it

Frank Rich  17:05  
Yeah, yeah. And I think it's gonna be a combination of of the two, right? I think in order to become the person that you want to be, you got to get really clear on actually what you want. I don't think most people actually know what they want in this world. You know, they want to make more money. What does that mean? How much more money? And how, like, how long like, until you want to get there? So how much money do you actually want to make? And when do you want to make that money? I want to grow and scale my business? What does that actually mean? What is scaling a company? So you got to get clear. And and it's interesting, because I saw a quote yesterday, and it's speaking so true to this conversation, right? The hardest thing in life is getting clear on what you want. The easy part is getting it most people don't know what they want. They don't know what type of business, I want a successful company. What the hell does that mean? What isn't a successful company define success? Define company. So I think the problem with most people is they're blindly running through life or running through business without any clear destination, you want to know about GPS systems work so well, because you have a you have a place where you currently are your your proximity, and you have a destination, and when you know where you currently are, and you know where the destination is, the map is just it's easy to just connect those two dots. Most people don't have a destination in life. So how are they ever going to become somebody that they don't know where it is or trying to get to? So I think the first thing is you got to get really, really clear on what the goals and the outcome is you're working towards. The second thing I would say is you do you want to work on the character development of that person. So if I know I want to achieve X goal and in order for me to achieve this x goal I need to become why person will what character traits, what daily habits, what belief systems, what friends does this person have become that person. Now in the process of becoming that person is where the decisions are going to come into play, right? You have to make decisions aligned with who it is you want to be. But those decisions a lot easier to make. This is discipline, right? Discipline is choosing what you want more over what you want. Now, if you're super clear on what you want in the future, very easily to say discipline. Why do people get distracted with pornography? Why do people get distracted on social media? Why do people get distracted all day throughout their entire life, because they don't know what they want. There's no clear end destination. So the next distraction is very easily going to take you off track and off target. But if you knew every single day, this is who I need to be. This is exactly what Aggie needs to do today to become the person that he wants to be you set that as your aim and the distractions are no longer penetrable into your life. So I think it starts first with a clear aim and direction of what you want. Secondly becomes the development of the character and the person and then through that process, you're gonna have to learn to make the right decisions, but I think it's a lot easier to make those decisions when you know what it is you want.

Agi Keramidas  19:54  
I want to take a short break from this episode, and very quickly let you know about something I'm really excited about. For me, having a podcast made a tremendous difference in my life's journey. And I know the kind of impact it can have on one's personal development. And that is why I'm so passionate about this service I offered helping coaches who are ready to amplify their message and reach a global audience by creating launching and growing a top quality podcast, even if they aren't tech savvy and are limited on time. Maybe you've thought about having your own podcast. But you don't want to go through the time consuming learning processes of how to create launch it or how to record edit host and so on. If you said yes to that, then I got a solution for you something that takes away all the complexity and allows you to only concentrate on creating quality content. Go to my website, AgiKeramidas.com to find out more and to get your free copy of my guide about creating and launching your podcast. Alright, let's jump back to the episode.

Agi Keramidas  21:09  
Absolutely. And I think you're so right about many people not having a clear destination, where they want to go and you know what it's like success. So they're being used very broadly without many times someone thinking, Okay, what does that really mean? I want to be successful, or I want to, to live a fulfilled life or, because it's different for everyone, it's not the same for two different faithful. So that's, that's really important. And I want to also now connect this what we're saying and with, you mentioned, the discipline, which obviously is a prerequisite, because some of the, the actions that you will need to take will require a change in your mindset. And tell me if that is your experience with, you know, the people that you work with that we need to make some subtle changes in the way that we think in order to be able to take these actions to have the clear destination. You know, there is that phrase that says the same thinking that brought you here where you are or created the problems that you have now can't be used to solve the problems and take you to the next level you have to change your your thinking and all that you do that help others change their thinking and their was in that sort introduction, I gave a view it was the body, mind and heart world, I suppose you mean the same as the soul or the spirit? Can we talk a bit more about the mind and you know, the willpower, the discipline, the self discipline and cultivating a VAT in order to be able to progress towards, you know, this clear destination that we said?

Frank Rich  23:12  
Yeah, yeah, I mean, the mind is such a such a powerful thing, right? You know, well, within the mind, you have your conscious mind, you have your subconscious mind, then you have your own unconscious mind, right. And I think a lot of people they think just in terms of the conscious, right, like, what am I actually able to control, have conscious awareness of and make those decisions. But the subconscious mind is so much more powerful, right? Like this is a part of us that is working that we're not in full control of and then the unconscious, we don't get too deep into that. So let's just speak here, to the conscious and then sub subconscious mind, the subconscious mind is it has, so it processes 11 million data points per second, the conscious mind processes 40 data points, not 40,000,040. So what this means to people listening is that when you look out in the world, what you see how you live and what you experienced this world to be is happening and 11 million to 40 ratio, subconsciously versus consciously that means you're not in control of how you're perceiving the world. In many times, you're not in control of your initial reaction to things this is all happening at a subconscious level. So when you're changing somebody's mind, you need to think about changing their subconscious programming. Because changing your conscious thoughts is easy, right? I want to think about picking a bottle of think pick bottle up pick bottle up that's a conscious thought that leads to a conscious action. Very easy to do, right? Because I'm in the moment I'm consciously aware of what I'm doing. We want to change somebody's life though. We want to produce a transformation within them and through them. We need to change the way that their subconscious mind works. Well. How do you change your subconscious mind? It's through your conscious actions. So listening to the words you speak, you speak about yourself. We all have this internal dialogue. If you drop something on the floor? What's your first response? Are you an idiot? Are you stupid? Because you drop something? Or did you just have an accident where you slip something? Very little things, right? But it reveals a lot to you about how you think about yourself. And your identity is nothing more than how you perceive yourself to be showing up in the world. So how do you change that though, right? That was the question. You need to be conscious. And you need to be aware and super intentional about reprogramming the subconscious thoughts. One thing I think that is powerful for most people, is if you don't have a daily journaling exercise, at the end of the day, start doing it. This is what's known as metacognition when you spend time every day, thinking about what you've been thinking about. So we have anywhere from 11 to 50,000 thoughts that run through our head, right, you look at different research and data reports, they'll say 11,000 will be on one research 50,000 on on another one, but it's a big range. All that matters is there's a lot of thoughts that are coming into our head that we don't even pay attention to. But if you get into the habit and practice of 510 minutes at the end of the day, drilling on your thoughts, what was I thinking about today? Like when I was at the gym, and I saw the blonde chick? Why did my thoughts go there? Right, I work with the guys that are struggling with porn addiction. So a lot of what I talked to is those guys, right? But when somebody when when, when I was out with with my wife after work, and we were having dinner, the way that I responded to what she said to me, why did I react that way? You know, like is was this triggered? Because I was tired. And I was stressed was this triggered? Because she she pulled something out of me that I know is there. And I need to change. So I think a lot of people can make a lot of headway in transforming their life if they just spent time thinking about what you've been thinking about. Because what that's going to do is now when those thoughts begin to randomly appear, you're going to be aware of them. You think, Oh, I was joking about that two nights ago. Let me spend some time here in this moment and think about this. Let me process this in real time. Let me change the way I would initially responded. So you want to change how you're acting, you want to change how you're responding. You got to get underneath these things and begin to get clear on how you're thinking throughout the day. But I think you can change your subconscious mind by your by your conscious thoughts, and you intentionally drive into it. So the journaling would be one. Living in a state of gratitude is incredibly powerful. as well. This is something that we coach, a lot of our men is having a morning gratitude practice, because what it does is it shifts your perspective, right? You know, a lot of people wake up the day, they're stressed emails already coming in. They're like, I got it to do list of 1000 things to do. Oh my god, it's so overwhelming like this life is crazy. I'm never gonna get out of this hole. Well, if you just pause for a moment, and you're like, I'm just happy to be alive. God, thank you so much for another day. How would that change your state now moving into your day, we're all stressed, right? There's a lot of things, I got six podcasts. And next three and a half days, I don't know how I'm gonna get all this done. There's a there's a long calendar sitting in front of me, I can be stressed, I can be overwhelmed. Or I can be grateful that people actually want to talk to Frank. And people want to hear what I have to say. So by by starting your day, from a place of gratitude, you've now shown up in the world is like, I'm just happy to be here. And I'm grateful for this life. And what's cool is there's this part of our brain called the reticular activating system. It sits here in the prefrontal cortex and what it does, it filters out what's not important to us. And it shows us what is really important in our lives, right? You know, we've all experienced this, when we buy a new car, we're going out we're test driving different things, you know, you're shopping at Ford, Chevy, you're driving the red Mustang here, there, you sign that paperwork, you pull the card off the lot, literally, you're seeing that same car everywhere you go. And it's like, no, those cars were always there, you just turned your brain on the scene that those are important. So if you start your day with things to be grateful for, as you're navigating your stressful life, things to be grateful for, are they going to appear more regularly to you. So I think two things that people can do to change their mindset is having a gratitude practice first thing in the day to frame that perspective, how we're going to open to the world and ending the day in a metacognition practice, where you think about what you've been thinking about. And it's not going to radically change, like overnight, the first practice of gratitude is not going to like feel like you're showing up as a different person. But consistency compounds, right. So if you do this for 30 days, 60 days, 90 days, you're now showing up in the world, and there is going to be like Aggies, he's he's the nicest person to be around his energy when he walks into the room. He's so infectious, like I want more of him. So that would be two things there. I think that could could really help a lot of people.

Agi Keramidas  29:18  
That's fantastic. Thank you very much this reflective journaling is a it's so important. And also of course the gratitude. May I add to that I will add a third one and actually ask you about the third one because it's it's one of your your things and that is as I mean as a tool to improve on our mindset and that is physical exercise training our bodies so can we connect that as well now and then of course there is a and you do have a quote on your website from Socrates which was it's also one One of my favourite quotes about not being an armature in the matters of physical training, because it is a disgrace to live one's life without realising how beautiful and powerful the body can become. So let's say, tell me about, in particular, the physical training and maybe with aspects of physical training, because many people do physical exercise in one form or the other. But I suppose you will agree with me, not necessarily all kinds of exercise will produce that. And that's a improvement in your mindset.

Frank Rich  30:45  
Ya know, I've loved that quote. And it's been it's been on the site, and it's been in my email signature for for years now. Right. And there's, there's gratitude built into that quote, through Socrates, right. It's like, we're grateful just to have this one body. Think about the only one we have, like, people, people will spend 1000s of dollars a year maintaining their car and won't spend a nickel maintaining their body, your car could break down, I could go buy a new car today, if I really wanted to, right. This is the only body that that I've been given. So I think a lot of people have just their priorities misaligned. Like they care more about the car sitting in the park in the driveway than they do about the body. That's going to take them everywhere that they're gonna go for the rest the rest of their life. No, you said it, man. You know, it's all training created equal. No, I have a background as a bodybuilder, right. So for me, it was hypertrophy focus. It was strength training. It was high intensity cardio, I use lifting and training as a tool to build my body muscle, you know, muscular wise, like that was that was the goal. I think they can all work. I think I think movement is medicine, though. So I think you know, I'm not here to tell people. If your type of training is not proper, I think it would go back to what we talked about at the beginning, though, right? Is know who you want to be know what body you want to have, know what life you want to live, and then get the training that's in accordance with that. You say you want to be a mirror, right? So right now I'm training for a half marathon, right? It's something completely different than I've ever done. I spent 10 years trying to build as much muscle as I possibly could. Training like I did for a decade to get ready for a marathon wouldn't make a whole lot of sense, right? But But knowing that I want to run a half marathon in six months, I was able to go out and find the guy that has worked with bodybuilders before. And it's helped them prep to run half marathons and marathons. So if you know who you want to be, it's easy to get the training that's going to line with that. But yeah, I think everybody's gonna have some type of physical training built into, you know, built in built into life. What does that look like? I'm not here to tell people, I think you got to know who you want to be in order to get clear on that. But I think some type of physical training, whether it's powerlifting, whether it's yoga, pilates, I mean, there's so like, there's there's so many great things. I mean, I have friends that that like they go out in their backyard, and they throw sandbags around, and they, you know, they climb on trees and stuff like that incredible shape, incredibly fit. Are they big and muscular, as big and muscular as they want to be because they know who they want to be. And they built their training around that.

Agi Keramidas  33:19  
That's a great answer. And it's very interesting what you said about running the half marathon because my thing is running. And I ran the London Marathon last year. However, my let's say my weightlifting skills are not not that great. So I have found in the channel of running and exercising with running my own. And it also needs a great deal of discipline to be able to do that consistency in that discipline, especially when you train for an event. But even even without that the discipline the consistency to show up three times a week or whatever you decide to do five times a week and move and exercise and whatever in whatever way you want that consistency, that self discipline, I believe spills across in other areas of your life as well. The more discipline you are in this, you will tend to become more disciplined in your other behaviour. That's how I I look at it anyway. I don't know if you agree with me. No,

Frank Rich  34:30  
I agree. I agree. 100% And you know, language that we would you know, use around that is how you do one thing is how you do everything right. This is why the guys that specifically come into you know our coaching programme. They're here to solve a specific problem like we have a company built around coaching men that are struggling with pornography addiction. They come in here thinking that all I'm going to do is help them keep their hands and eyes off of pornography, but I know that that's not the case, right? You're chasing porn. geography because there's other areas of your life that we're not fully aligned in. So we solve their problem by porn with pornography addiction by getting a line by by living with integrity in every single area of our life. Because it's how you do one thing is how you do everything. If you say, I'm going to stop looking at pornography, if your man that walks and lives in integrity, you will stop looking at pornography. So we need to identify the other areas in your life where you're saying, you're going to do things, and you're not actually showing up. And we'll solve those problems by you beginning to show up, build the confidence that within yourself, Oh, when I actually say things that I'm going to do, I live them out. So you build now a positive reputation with yourself that when Aggie says he's going to do something I can count on him. This is why I love being friends with Navy SEALs, right? Navy SEALs are people that when they say they're going to do something, it gets done. And most often not, it gets done at the highest level. Those are the type of people that I want to surround myself with, because that's who I want to be. I want to be the guy that when Frank when they call on Frank to get something done, there's no doubt that it's going to get done. And it's going to be done at the highest level. And this is in service of others. But most importantly, this is in service to myself because there's this relationship that we have with ourselves and if we most people treat themselves like shit, right? The conversation like we talked about the the internal dialogue, the beating themselves up and negative self talk. They're not treating themselves and not prioritising sleep, they're not prioritising health and not prioritising recovery, they're not prioritising training. This is this is your relationship with yourself, you're basically telling yourself, you're not important. You're not important to get a good night's sleep, you're not important to have a mission that you're working on, you're not important to take care of your health. So I don't I don't remember the original question here because I went on a tangent, but hopefully something here.

Agi Keramidas  36:51  
Absolutely didn't. I will. You mentioned also that, because I said about spilling over the self dismissed.

Frank Rich  37:03  
Yeah, the alignment with everything in your life? Yeah. It's how you do everything, bro. I mean, that's that's true as it can be

Agi Keramidas  37:09  
a struggle. Yes, it certainly is, no matter how one tries to deny it. It's even the little things. When you overlook a detail, it means that there are other things that you do as well. And I liked very much how you said about negative aspects of our life or behaviour spilling over the other areas without us realising that it's coming from there. And I also, briefly I want to ask you a couple of questions about pornography and pornography addiction, since this is the thing that you really help the most with your coaching. And it's it's not a topic that is discussed for months, at least, as far as I am aware, I haven't maybe been in the circles of people discussing it, but I don't think it is discussed as much as the issue exists. So if I were to ask you, so how prevalent from your experience this pornography addiction is? And in a word really, or two? How does it affect someone who and their life and their relationship? And no, and forgive me that this is not a question that you can answer? Very quickly. So but it is, it is a topic that I certainly didn't want to leave out of the conversation. So

Frank Rich  38:38  
yeah, no, no, I appreciate that. So how prevalent is it? You know, it's a tough one to really gather, you know, real factual data, right? Because in order to get this, you have to get men and people that are willing to admit many times their darkest secrets about their about their own life. Right. You can see some different studies out there some different research, I think, one that I saw, so that they had, I think it was 1200 to 1500 men that they that they surveyed, and so 70% so let's say 1000 Men, 70% of those men admitted to consuming pornography within the last 30 days. So this would be regular consumption of it right? So you have 1000. Now that brings it down to 70% of those men, so 700 would admit to having a regular porn consumption. So now out of that 70% of men that are regularly consuming it, somewhere between 40 to 45% of them admit to having a problem that is somewhere out of their own control. So this could probably be labelled as a compulsive behaviour, an addiction, something that I don't have full control over. So to answer your question, 1000 men comes down to seven 700 men take 45% of those men, out of every 1000 men you have roughly 300 to 350 of them that are probably struggling with a porn addiction, something that could be clinically labelled or accepted as a pornography addiction. So that's the prevalence of it right is almost half After the men, and I think that number is rapidly on the upswing, because we're living in the first generation with a group of men, young men that have had pornography in their pocket 24 hours a day, seven days a week, I'm 39 years old, the first pornography I saw was in a 2d magazine. Now at six years old, you're getting kids that are consuming the most graphic, hardcore material. So we're, we're seeing accelerate at a rate and growth that we've never seen before. But let's just say it's a major problem with probably half the men in the world today. What happens though, right, that was the next question is what is the impact on the men? Why? Number one, it crushes their heart and soul, right, you begin to become a spectator of sex and intimacy as somebody that can actually participate in it. We talked a lot about the subconscious mind, right? So you're spending hours every single day training conditioning yourself that when sex is taking place, I'm supposed to be on the sidelines as a spectator, not in the act of it. So it creates this, this this this environment within men and young boys, that they objectify every single woman that they look at, that's debilitating to the young boy's mind to his eyes to His heart, but it's also crushing to the girl right? Because now every young woman that is growing up is nothing more than a sexual object, every single man that she has ever met. So major impact on the relationship side of things, right. Another thing it does to our brain is it hijacks our dopamine reward centre, I'm sure you have a lot of understanding on dopamine, chemicals, goal associated motivation, with super normal stimulus like pornography. So it masses, it gives you this massive spike of dopamine. Anytime you get a massive spike, it follows by this dip. So it creates this sense where like, I don't want to do anything of good or aligned with my goals, because why would they want dopamine when I know I'm just gonna get super normal stimulus from pornography, but then that cycle because porn, like dopamine is pain, or pleasure and pain, so you get a massive spike of pleasure, somewhere 48 hours later is going to be a massive, you know, dip in the pain side, depression, anxiety, self sabotage, comparison to others, you know, self limiting beliefs about themselves, it creates this cycle within men where they're chasing pornography to make them feel good, then they're riddled with guilt and shame, because they're like, I don't actually like this. And now I'm depressed about what I'm doing. And I don't think I'm actually a good person, their sexual performance issues. So there's a there's a term now this is a new term, P ie D, porn induced erectile dysfunction. We're seeing young men in their 20s, when their hormones should be thriving, they should be the most thriving period of a young man's life. He can't get erections he can't sexually perform, he can't get aroused with real women, because he's been training himself that I'm supposed to be on the sidelines. spectating it. So there's a lot there. But I think, you know, roughly half of the men are struggling with it. And there's a major impact both on men, on women, on girls on relationships, and on society at large.

Agi Keramidas  42:49  
Wow. To be honest, I'm shocked at the number I wasn't expecting to hear such a huge number. Thank you for your answer, and how you managed to condense it into a few minutes. So that's, that's amazing. begin taking on that. And people who have listened to this conversation so far, and find that there is more that they would like to learn or do hopefully, about this, what is the place you want to direct them? And then I want to ask you also some quickfire questions. But I want to go through that, because I think we will find many people that would like to know more about much more than we had the chance to cover today anyway.

Frank Rich  43:34  
Yeah, yeah, no, and I appreciate the opportunity to hear I've really enjoyed this conversation. They really, really did. So yeah, for people on the porn side, you know, if what I said there, it's kind of like, I definitely want to learn more, I would direct you to our YouTube page. It's coach Frank, Rich, do two videos every single day, and we've done a video every day for almost two plus years now. So there's a lot of content, a lot of education, strategies, tips, resources, you can download a free book that we have there, as well. If you just enjoyed this conversation about personal development and self growth and becoming a better version of yourself, and direct those listeners to my podcast, the Superman life, we got your upcoming on a an upcoming episode. I know we're gonna have an amazing conversation around so we hosted an interview style show just like this, where we dive deep into men's personal development, mindset, faith belief systems, how to change your identity, how to biohack your performance. So that's at the superhuman life. So those would be the best few places, Youtube or on the podcast side of things.

Agi Keramidas  44:35  
That's amazing. Thank you very much. That's great. So let me ask some final quickfire questions then Frank to wrap things up. So my first one to you is What does personal development mean to you?

Frank Rich  44:51  
Personal development means to me. I mean, the development of a person at one level man, I'm No, I think, God, I would love to see personal development become like, the new education, I think I think it's something we all need. I think it should be made mandatory for everybody. But I think personal development at its core is the insights, the mindsets, the belief systems, the strategies to grow into becoming the person that you were born or created to be that best version of yourself personal development is the gateway or the path to doing that.

Agi Keramidas  45:31  
And one hypothetical question, let's say you could go back in time and meet your 18 year old self, what's one piece of advice you would give him?

Frank Rich  45:41  
Huh? It's gonna be okay.

Agi Keramidas  45:46  
Amazing. And you can see me smiling. Because it is such a very a variation of the sensor that you've given me is so common among the answers the hundreds of answers I've received in the podcast, it's,

Frank Rich  46:02  
yeah, why wouldn't want to go back and, and redirect his life where anything is going to be different. So I wanted to avoid changing the path that he went on. But I also wanted to let him know that in those moments when he felt like it was in like, there was no way out of it. In those moments of the walls, feeling like the collapsing on you in the darkest periods of your life, when I contemplated taking it all just knowing that it was going to be okay, I think for me would have really, really helped. But that's a tough one, right? Because I'm so happy with where I'm at. I'm it's such a peaceful place within my life that if anything had happened differently, I don't think I'd be in this exact same place. So I want to avoid changing the path of my life, but maybe providing a little bit of comfort and peace along the journey.

Agi Keramidas  46:49  
Yeah, that reassurance we have we need that. And one last one, Frank, if what's one book that you would recommend to the listener based on the conversation with it?

Frank Rich  47:05  
God, there's so many of them. And I'm looking behind you. And I think this is the backdrop that you have, but you know, I don't know if you can see me. I mean, there's five books here that I that I've read over the last decade, man, so to pull one out of there, but but maybe for maybe for this conversation, because I felt like we spoke a lot about taking consistent action, I think we spoke a lot about the need to stick to work through struggle and just showing up daily and not being too attached to like the end goal, the end outcome, right, like showing up daily to do these things to grow into who it is you're becoming one book that changed my life back in 2015 was the slight edge by Jeff Olson, I think is the author. So it's a variation of the compound effect by Darren Hardy. You know, Darren Hardy talks about stacking, you know, progress stacking winds day after day after day, The Slight Edge is the same, same logic came, same same concept behind it. But it radically transformed me because I stopped looking at like just the daily tasks as like, I'm getting this done today. And then tomorrow, I'm starting over than the next day I'm starting over it's like know what you do today. You stack on top of that tomorrow, then you stack on top of those two days the next day. And if you do that 3060 90 180 365 days, now your stack is as high to the roof as they could with possibly be so there's a lot of power and consistency. There's a lot of power in the compounding effect. And I think the slight edge Jeff, it does an amazing job of bringing all that home and making it really clear.

Agi Keramidas  48:30  
Frank, I want to thank you very much for our conversation for you sharing. There was some incredible value and actionable items that you share that are still that reflective journaling and gratitude among other things. They're the two that come to mind. I want to wish you all the very best with your mission and your podcast and everything that that you do to help others and any last parting words from you

Frank Rich  49:02  
know, man, I really I really enjoyed this conversation today. Augie did a great job of upholding the flow I appreciate the listeners for sticking around and you know anybody that's that's that's looking for help and has questions, please don't hesitate to reach out but this has been an absolute honour. Thank you.

Agi Keramidas  49:17  
Thank you so much for listening and I hope you got great value from today's episode. And if you'd be so kind, will you please share this episode with a friend who you think will benefit from listening. And until next time, stand out don't fit in!