Bradley Martyn Questions Christianity (EP 214)

Summary

The Bryce Crawford Podcast EP 214: Bradley Martyn Questions Christianity

Date: August 3, 2026
Host: Bryce Crawford
Guest: Bradley Martyn

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Episode Overview

This episode features a candid, in-depth conversation between Bryce Crawford and fitness influencer/gym owner Bradley Martyn, delving into Bradley’s life story, questions about Christianity, struggles with faith, and broader topics around modern religion, discipline, authenticity, and personal pain. The discussion moves organically from childhood trauma and gym culture to profound explorations of death, morality, and skepticism, all with a mix of humor, directness, and vulnerability.

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Key Discussion Points & Insights

1. Bradley’s Early Trauma and Life Motivations

• Bradley's Father's Suicide:
  • Bradley lost his father to suicide at age 6, which deeply shaped his childhood and emotional life. This singular event drove much of his internal questioning about life, purpose, death, and faith.
  • “My father took his life when I was young. So, six...I found the gym and was like, oh, this is like, the one thing that helps me not think about that.” (00:00)
• Impact on Relationships and Leadership:
  • Growing up without a father made him acutely aware of what he lacked and intensified his independence, competitive drive, and emotional barriers.
  • “I struggled with allowing people into my life...The only thing I know how to be is me.” (10:04, 12:43)
• Gym as Therapy:
  • The gym became both a safe space and a vessel for channeling his anger and pain, giving him a sense of control in an otherwise unpredictable world.
  • “There was one thing I could do, was like, oh, I could get better at this. Like, I am in control of this.” (14:11)
  • “The gym is sort of never enough. You don't really fill that up.” (15:23)

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2. Authenticity, Social Media, and Influence

• Online Authenticity:
  • Bradley attributes his success to his authenticity—sharing not just workouts but candid reflections, often filming videos in the quiet corners of gyms (e.g., behind trash cans).
  • “What they appreciated was the things that I said more so than the things that I did.” (11:22)
• Influence on Others:
  • He acknowledges that he became a form of “father figure” to many young followers who resonated with his honest storytelling and struggles.
  • “People would message me online, like, what...they appreciated was the things I said.” (11:56)

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3. Handling Pain & Seeking Fulfillment

• Motivation Through Anger:
  • Bradley admits much of his drive (especially in the gym) stemmed from anger and a need to prove himself after feeling perpetually left behind or lacking.
  • “Anger...being upset that I didn’t have things that I thought other people had that I should have had, that I didn’t have.” (13:49)
• Hobbies and Escapism:
  • Gym, video games, collecting Pokémon cards, and spending time with his dogs are recurring themes for distraction or comfort.
  • Memorable story: Bradley lost potentially millions of dollars’ worth of original Pokémon cards due to childhood ignorance about their future value. (25:18-26:53)

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4. Faith, Church, and Religion

4.1. Bradley’s Skepticism and History with Religion

• Early Catholic Experience:
  • Forced into Catholic church and school as a child; found it boring and hollow, fostering deep skepticism.
  • “I grew up Catholic, went to a Catholic school, and my relationship to church was just like, what the am I doing here? Why do people have to give money? This is kind of stupid.” (30:06)
• Pain and Resentment Toward God:
  • The loss of his father intensified Bradley’s questioning of why bad things happen—fueling distance from faith.
  • “I was like, this is, like, why did this happen to me?” (30:06)

4.2. Questioning Death, Heaven, and Hell

• Fear of Nothingness:
  • As a child, death seemed like endless nothingness, which terrified him.
  • “That's the one I struggle with the most...I thought that, like, it was just. There was nothing. It was nothingness.” (31:40, 33:37)
• Struggling with Religious Answers:
  • Skeptical of religious narratives; sees many doctrines (heaven/hell, afterlife) as ways to comfort people rather than as proven truths.
  • “People created all these things around religion...to be more comfortable with the idea of death.” (33:08-33:35)

4.3. Bryce’s Response and Christian Perspective

• Experience of Loss and Encounter with Jesus:
  • Bryce shares his own story of depression, the loss of his grandfather, and a supernatural encounter with Jesus that changed his life.
  • “I prayed...Jesus, if you're real, take away my anxiety and depression...I haven't had the crippling anxiety and depression since that day.” (34:05)
• Christianity as Relationship vs. Religion:
  • Bryce emphasizes that Christianity isn’t about works but about trusting that Jesus paid the price for humanity’s sin and offering a relationship with God.
  • “Every other religion says God’s on his throne. Work your way to that God. And Jesus comes down from heaven…He shows us how to live…” (47:22)
• Morality and Human Nature:
  • Points out that if God didn’t exist, morality would be subjective—argues Christianity posits morality as objective and reveals humans are inherently broken or sinful.
  • “If God does not exist, then morality is subjective, Meaning you have your truth and I have my truth.” (40:28)

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5. Debating Human Goodness & Society

• Are People Inherently Good or Bad?
  • Bryce: “You don't have to teach a four year old to be selfish... No one is inherently good except Jesus.” (37:54)
  • Bradley: Pushes back, arguing people are generally good, but self-serving; society corrupts or “proves” people otherwise.
  • “I think people are innately good and then they're proven or they're shown through society...” (39:21)
• The Role of Religion in Shaping Morality:
  • Bradley remains skeptical that any religion or holy book can be taken at face value, given the historical manipulation of religious institutions for power.
  • He draws comparisons to history—Crusades, colonization, modern mega-churches—to press his distrust of organized religion as pure.

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6. Skepticism Toward the Bible and Religious Institutions

• Problems with Scriptural Authority:
  • Bradley struggles with believing in documents authored by humans, given that “history is written by the victor” and prone to manipulation.
  • “If God himself wrote this book, I'd be like, yo, I'm all ears. I think because humans wrote it and transcribed it...it still feels like of human sort of nature.” (60:26)
• Bryce’s Manuscript Argument:
  • Bryce presents the case for the Bible’s historical reliability—its authorship, manuscript tradition, and corroboration by non-Christian historians.
  • “You have 40 different authors over 1500 years from three different continents...Over 66,000 cross references.” (49:34)

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7. Branding, Authenticity, and “Christian Products”

• Bradley Challenges Christian Branding:
  • He presses Bryce on whether their “Praise Hydration” drink (with overt Christian symbols and marketing) isn’t just exploiting the Christian audience for monetary gain.
  • “That’s exactly what this is doing...word for word, it says, Praise Hydration with a cross.” (75:00)
• Bryce’s Transparency:
  • Bryce affirms the intent is genuine—he integrates faith into all areas of his life, even business—and reveals they’re doing charity work with proceeds (off-camera).
  • “The same way fitness is your life...Jesus is for me. So everything I do from the core of me is I want Jesus to be involved.” (75:18)

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8. Relationships, Sex, and Fulfillment

• Sex Addiction and Seeking Validation:
  • Bradley admits to a period of sex addiction tied to insecurity, lack of fulfillment, and seeking validation through short-term relationships.
  • “It was me just trying to feel like, oh, I shouldn’t be alone...never really feeling like it was enough.” (82:26, 84:32)
• Views on Marriage and Commitment:
  • Skeptical of the legal/governmental institution of marriage but values lifelong partnership and real, intentional commitment.
  • “Having a union and being able to grow with someone and being able to build your life with someone. I think that's the reason why we're here, dude.” (85:39)
• Bryce on Christian Marriage:
  • Shares his commitment to a Christ-centered marriage as a foundation for longevity and love.

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9. Social Media, Insecurity, and Public Perception

• Dealing with Insecurity:
  • Both reveal insecurity about perception—Bryce around gym culture, Bradley about public judgment online.
  • “I have a big insecurity on like what people will think of me in the gym.” (93:06)
• Bradley’s Advice:
  • Over time, he’s learned to let go of seeking universal approval and encourages being true to oneself for long-term fulfillment.
  • “You can’t live being like, I want to just make everyone like me. It’s not ever gonna work. It’s not ever gonna happen...” (97:10)
• Father Figure Role:
  • Reflects on how, despite his doubts and skepticism, he incidentally became a father figure to many online.
  • “It's kind of funny. I became the father figure in a lot of ways.” (99:10)

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Notable Quotes & Memorable Moments

• On Loss and Seeking Answers:

  “What do you mean, not coming back? Because you don't think it's like a six year old...everything felt temporary.”
  — Bradley, (08:16)

• On Authenticity:

  “The only thing I know how to be is me. And so in every version of what I did, it was just like, this is just who I am and what I'm doing and what I enjoy or what I think.”
  — Bradley, (12:43)

• On Religion and Hypocrisy:

  “You guys are telling me to live my way, my life one way, but you're, like, doing this stuff Monday through Saturday. So if God's like that, I don't want it.”
  — Bryce, sharing his own faith journey, (34:05)

• On Bible’s Human Origin:

  “If God himself wrote this book, I'd be like, yo, I'm all ears. I think because humans wrote it and transcribed it...it still feels like of human sort of nature.”
  — Bradley, (60:26)

• On Skepticism and Social Media:

  “It just does not matter what people think of you. It doesn't. It matters what you think of yourself...if you're true to yourself, other people will see that, be encouraged by that...”
  — Bradley, (97:26)

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Core Timestamps of Key Segments

• Bradley’s Childhood and Loss: [00:00] – [05:22], [08:02] – [12:00]
• Why the Gym?: [13:49] – [15:48], [16:07] – [17:57]
• Pokémon Cards Story: [23:01] – [26:53]
• Experience with Religion/Church: [30:06] – [31:38]
• Debate: Human Nature (Good/Evil) & Morality: [37:54] – [42:31], [69:11] – [70:36]
• Bible, Christianity & Other Religions: [49:34] – [53:12], [60:26] – [65:14]
• Branding & Authenticity of Christian Products: [75:00] – [80:40]
• Sex, Marriage, and Fulfillment: [82:24] – [88:41]
• Insecurity and Social Media: [93:06] – [97:26]
• Father Figure Reflections & Closing: [99:10] – [99:48]

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Closing

The episode ends with Bryce offering a sincere prayer for Bradley, showing respect and warmth regardless of theological disagreements, and both men expressing appreciation for each other’s openness and vulnerability.

"Jesus, thank you for this day, God. Thank you for our conversation and thank you for Bradley and his time...Guide us all. We love you, Jesus..."
— Bryce (99:30)

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Episode Takeaways

• Radical Honesty: Both guests model vulnerability regarding pain, skepticism, failure, and longing for meaning.
• Complexity of Faith: Bradley represents a sizable modern skepticism toward organized religion, demanding authenticity and substance over style.
• Christian Response: Bryce demonstrates how to integrate personal experience, apologetics, and empathy in responding to doubt.
• Mutual Respect: Despite disagreements, both maintain friendly, nonjudgmental dialogue—offering a template for tough religious conversations today.

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For listeners new to the show or issue, this episode is a rich, engaging exploration of the intersections of pain, faith, skepticism, and authenticity in both digital and real worlds.

Transcript

[A]

My father took his life when I was young, So I was 6. My mom telling me, your dad's not coming back. What do you mean, not coming back? I was so fixated on what? What is this? What's the point of this? Like, why did this happen to me? I found the gym and was like, oh, this is like, the one thing that helps me not think about that.

[B]

So what shaped you then?

[A]

Probably anger. There was one thing I could do. I am in control of this. The gym is sort of never enough. You don't really fill that up.

[B]

What do you think happens when we die?

[A]

That's the one I struggle with the most. Where did he go? Yeah, I thought that, like, it was just. There was nothing. It was nothingness. And I think that was the thing that really scared me about it.

[B]

Where you at with God? Hey. Before we get into today's episode, I want to share two quick things with you. First, if these videos have meant anything to you, if they've encouraged your faith or helped you see the gospel a little bit more clearly, I just want to ask you to subscribe. A lot of people tune in every single week and haven't hit the button yet. It only takes two seconds, and it helps us keep putting these conversations in front of people who need them. And the second thing, this one I've honestly been really excited to say. I'm officially announcing our ministry's biggest live event to date, Open Heaven Live podcast tour, happening November 8th this year at the Pavilion at Toyota Music Factory in Irving, Texas. This is going to be a night centered around worship, faith, real conversations, and genuine community. I believe God is going to move in a powerful way, and I would love for you to be in the room. Tickets are on sale right now. You can head to Bryce crawford.org tour or just click the link in the description below. And please only get your tickets through my official site or that link below. I recommend not buying from random resellers online. I believe this is going to be a really special night, and I hope to see you there. All right, let's get into the episode. What's going on, guys? Welcome back to another episode of the Bryce Crawford Podcast. I'm Bryce, and today I'm with Bradley Martin. Let's go. Hello. How you feeling?

[A]

I'm feeling good. This is a really nice setup.

[B]

Oh, thank you.

[A]

Yeah, it's very nice.

[B]

You know, I've only ever seen you one other time in person from afar. I got to say, you're a very handsome man.

[A]

Wow, that's very sweet of you.

[B]

Yeah.

[A]

Start with, like, nice comments.

[B]

Yeah, I'm just trying to love bomb you before we get into this stuff. No, I saw. We were at. We were at the Brain Risk fight in Vegas.

[A]

What, recently?

[B]

Yeah, like, a couple weeks ago.

[A]

Oh.

[B]

And then we just saw you pop out of the blue nowhere with Tekashi six nine. And he came out and started singing in the middle of the ring. We were honestly really confused.

[A]

Where the were you at?

[B]

I was somewhere in there. I was sitting. Me and Chris were over there, and we were hanging out. We were so invested in the fights because I'd never been to an actual fighting event before. Like, I've never been to UFC or boxing anything, and so that was kind of like my first ever fight, and we were just, like, loving it.

[A]

Yeah, it's an interesting first. Interesting first fight event, for sure.

[B]

Yeah, that was. I mean, the Ray J knockout was kind of crazy, though.

[A]

Yeah.

[B]

Yeah, that was actually pretty crazy.

[A]

And then he got got. He, like, got beat and was like. I thought we had a plan. I was like, what the is going on?

[B]

Yeah, that was actually really insane.

[A]

Yeah. I don't know. I don't know. Maybe they planned it. Maybe he was just mad he lost and then he's, like. Had to come out with, like, something.

[B]

You know what's kind of crazy is I thought. I thought. I read something online that he was, like, having some heart issues and had, like, four months left to live. And then he goes and does a fight.

[A]

Yeah, I mean. I mean, we could take it all the way back to Kim Kardashian, and we can go all the way there if you want. It's all about cloud. It's all about viralness.

[B]

I didn't know that he was the one that did that.

[A]

Sure, buddy, I'm not even kidding. Sure, buddy.

[B]

I'm not even kidding.

[A]

Yeah, so he was one that did that, but that was, like, the inception of, like, viral and make viral content to, like, stay popular.

[B]

Is that kind of how he got,

[A]

like, how people know he was? To be fair, he was already a really well established singer. Like, he was an artist. That's kind of like how I'm assuming they found him.

[B]

But he was in the hip hop scene, right?

[A]

Yeah, he was. He was R and B. He was more of a singer.

[B]

Oh, okay. Yeah, I've never. Yeah, I'd actually never heard of any of his.

[A]

Yeah, he was here and then. And then she. Him on camera, and then she went like this and just kept going. Like, if we could just keep going as far as, like, Clout, like money. She just kept going, oh, my. Because her mom's a genius, I guess. And set the whole thing up and like orchestrated her entire life. Could you imagine having a mom that was just like, all right, you can this guy on camera and then we're going to make you go viral and then we're going to build billion dollar brands with you and your whole family that your sisters.

[B]

I'm not going to lie, I've never really thought about it like that. But exactly what happened is it really? Yeah.

[A]

Kris Jenner is a genius.

[B]

Do you know them?

[A]

I don't know them, no. I've met a few of them in different settings, but I don't know them.

[B]

What kind of settings have you met?

[A]

I met Kim at the airport. She was with her gay. Some probably like makeup artist or something. And then he was like, he said something sly to me because I was walking in front of him like, you

[B]

tried to flirt with you?

[A]

Yeah. And then I turned around, I was like, oh, it's Kim Kardashian. And then that was it. And then I met Kylie at some like, weekend party thing in like West Hollywood. It was like a Halloween party. And. And Abel was dressed up as like Professor Clump and that we were leaving.

[B]

Wait, who's Abel?

[A]

The weekend.

[B]

Oh, okay. Okay.

[A]

Yeah.

[B]

Dang. You know him on a first name basis?

[A]

I. I don't. I mean, I don't know him like, he's not the homie, but like, I've met him a few times. He used to train at my old gym with like his trainer, like late night and.

[B]

Oh, that's sweet.

[A]

Yeah, when it was closed.

[B]

Oh, okay. Cool.

[A]

Yeah.

[B]

Dang. Well, thanks for coming on.

[A]

No, yeah, yeah. I mean that. Yeah, of course. That what, what I just said has nothing to do.

[B]

Thank you guys so much for watching. Appreciate you guys. Yeah, it's a great conversation.

[A]

I know the weekend this guy. I'm out of here. No, I'm kidding, bro. I'm just.

[B]

You just.

[A]

I just start talking. I could just talk forever, so.

[B]

No, I like it. Well, I'm excited because we'll probably go

[A]

all over the place, podcast. God, I talk so much.

[B]

Well, before we get into a bunch of stuff, you know, before you were became a fitness influencer or started a gym and all that stuff. What was life like for you growing up?

[A]

I mean, I was pretty basic. Yeah, like normal. Your dad, like 6 years old takes his life pretty normal, right? No, no, not normal, but that's what life was like. It was like sort of. I don't know, I think, really, because I. My father took his life when I was young. So, six, I've talked about this many times, but when you ask me what life is like, I tend to just think about that sort of moment because everything following that was just like, I was so fixated on what. What is this? What's the point of this? Like, why did this happen to me? Why is my life this way? Those sort of thoughts. So majority of my life was like, in that space.

[B]

Yeah.

[A]

And then, you know, you asked before I became a fitness influencer and all this, then I found the gym and was like, oh, this is like the one thing that helps me not think about that. And so that's why I just like, oh, I want to be there as much as I can. You know, you asked me that question about being a fitness influencer. That wasn't even in my mind when I was then, you know, so long ago now. None of this was like a thing. It wasn't social media, Instagram, podcasting, All this wasn't real, wasn't existing, rather. So I was just like, oh, I'm going to go to the gym. And this is the only thing that makes me feel somewhat sort of calm in my mind. And then that's all I did pretty much. Wait, that in video games, where you.

[B]

You play video games?

[A]

Bro, I'm the best ever.

[B]

What do you like to play?

[A]

Anything. I play anything. I played everything.

[B]

Do you like Fortnite?

[A]

See, that's this. That's just. That's. I did. When it first came out, it was very fun. Like, the first map, the first version of it, and then they just sort of ruined it with, like, bots. And you just join lobbies with, like, computers. And now.

[B]

Yeah, I mean, I never really played a lot of video games. I always love Fortnite.

[A]

You look so Fortnite.

[B]

I'll take that. I didn't.

[A]

You build? You like building, huh?

[B]

No, I do the no build.

[A]

Oh, good, you're a real one, then.

[B]

Yeah, because it's kind of like. So I. My, like, first ever video game was, like, Call of Duty three. And then. Wow, is it holy.

[A]

You heard of Halo?

[B]

I didn't like Halo.

[A]

God didn't like Halo.

[B]

And then I. So I played that. And then. And then I. There was a time where I would play a lot of Rainbow six Siege.

[A]

Yeah, play a lot, too.

[B]

But. But when I'm saying, like, a lot, for me, like, someone that plays video games consistently would be like, you don't play a lot. Like, I would Maybe play video games for like 30 minutes.

[A]

Oh, yeah, no, you're not a gamer.

[B]

And then I'd be like, I can't, my head hurts.

[A]

Yeah, I would like play video games for like four or five, seven hours.

[B]

I honestly don't know.

[A]

I wasn't in the gym. I was playing video games.

[B]

Just because you like, just because you like them.

[A]

I think it was another distraction. Like I said, it was just like I could just focus on this thing and I like the competitiveness. Yeah, I like trying to be better.

[B]

Can we talk a little bit about when you were 6? Because I don't want to just skip over that. I think that's a big deal. It's a big part of your story. I mean, like, can you kind of take me into those days leading up to the night?

[A]

I mean, I don't really know about leading up to. It's more like just the reaction to it when you find out.

[B]

So what, what exactly happened? Like, not trying to be crude. Did you find him or did somebody else find him? Like, what happened? Because I knew that about you, but I don't know, like details.

[A]

Yeah, I mean, I don't really talk so many details about it. The thing that really stands out in my mind is my mom telling me, like the realization of it when you're like. She's like, your dad's not coming back. And that was the. I just, that sort of rung in my head just seemed like forever. I mean, it's not really there anymore now because I've sort of dealt with it for the most part. But that was the moment where I was like, what the does that mean? What do you mean? Not coming back? Because you don't think it's like a six year old. Everything prior was just like, you can scratch your knee or you hurt yourself playing some sports. I play a lot of sports growing up. And it's just everything. Everything felt temporary.

[B]

Yeah.

[A]

You know, obviously, like, you don't think of the, the finite. You don't think that like this is going to be done. Because your perspective on life is so just like everything is new, everything is happening. And I think at that age when you're told, like, oh, this person's gone forever, you struggle with understanding what that means. Yeah, you don't have the idea of what forever means in your mind at that age.

[B]

Did. Was it, was it hard growing up without a father?

[A]

I mean, it was like the hardest part would be seeing, you know, going to graduation or going like certain events that I, I could draw back to thinking like, you know, seeing other people's reactions and interactions with their parents and they're mostly in this case, father figures where I would just kind of be like, oh, I don't have that. And just be constantly reminded that I don't have what it'd be like someone coming to a sporting event and watching, like me watching their dad interact with them and being like, oh, I don't have that. Or you know, get graduating, seeing the dad, like congratulate the guy after and be like, I don't have that. All those sort of moments are the things that really stood out in my mind.

[B]

Yeah.

[A]

Where I was just like, this sucks.

[B]

How has that shaped you into wanting to be a leader, a friend, maybe a father in the future? Like, how does that shape you?

[A]

I think it a lot of stuff up as far as, I mean, I know my relationships, you know, in my older age or more so like you, you approach them with a lot more fear, which is why I was interesting. I was talking to you, you were like, yo, you got married at 21 or 22 or something. Yeah, yeah, I said, I was like jokingly saying, like, I missed that boat because it was so much harder for me at this point. Now I'm, I'm sort of good. But trying to have relationships with people was just like impossible. Just felt like, you know, if you get too close to someone or something, they're, they're eventually just going to leave you. In the reality in life, like, that's just kind of the truth. No matter what. Like, not everyone's going to leave you. But nothing is permanent. Nothing is forever. Right. But I struggled with allowing people into my life that was like, I would say the biggest struggle that sort of prolonged throughout my life. But to answer your question, as far as like wanting to be a father figure or that sort of thing.

[B]

Yeah.

[A]

It would have happened over time and sort of unknowingly through like my social media experience. Because on social media, the thing that made me popular outside of, excuse me, outside of just making content that was like fitness related and people wanted that sort of content. I would always speak about my life and I would share, you know, moments of my life where I'd share, I, you know, things that I thought of or things that I went through and I would share in a way that was just very candid.

[B]

Yeah.

[A]

Like I'd film a YouTube video working out and then I would start talking about something. I would always, I remember I would always talk behind like by like trash cans at gyms for some reason, ice, because that was always quiet to film.

[B]

Wait, so you.

[A]

Yeah, no, it sounds crazy, but I'd work out in a gym, and then I'd. Like, sometimes I talk in the gym, but a lot of times I would talk after topics and it would always end up being by, like a trash can.

[B]

Well, that's why it's so funny, because I feel like someone that's making videos are like, let me try to find, like, the best. The best scenic view. Yeah, no, it's like a green can.

[A]

I was just trying to find the. Where it was quiet and it was quiet by the trash cans.

[B]

Yeah. I mean, respect.

[A]

And then I would talk about life or, you know, things that I'd experience at that point. And I think, again, going back to answer your question was those were always the things that eventually when I would show up to, like, expos? Or people would message me online, like, what. What they appreciated was the things that I said more so than the things that I did.

[B]

Yeah.

[A]

And that's when I was like, oh, this is like, it kind of all started to make sense now. But that was, you know, that took 20 years because he died when I was six. And then around 26 is when I was like, oh, people are actually appreciating this. And then. And there's, like, value in what happened with me for everyone else.

[B]

Yeah. I just. From what I know about you online and from the short interactions here, there's, like, authenticity about you, which seems to be the truth of what you're saying. Like, that's why people gravitate towards you.

[A]

I mean, I get. I just, the, the, the, the benefit that I had to all this social media stuff was that it's kind of interesting. Like, I also didn't have a father to show me what's right and wrong, in a way, in a sense. And then also on social media, I didn't have examples of, like, how to be or how to show up or what to say or what to do or, like, what was going to do. Well, cause, you know, nowadays a lot of podcast, because you got a podcast and it does well and you do it consistently, and they go, I want to do a podcasting because he does it and I like him for all good reasons or whatever. I never really had those examples. So when you talk about authenticity, I was just like, oh, I'm just. The only thing I know how to be is me. And so in every version of what I did, it was just like, this is just who I am and what I'm doing and what I enjoy or What I think. And I would just put that out there.

[B]

Wait, so what shaped you then? Like, you know how, you know, like, you know, typical. Typical father thing is like, oh, here's how to change a tire. Or here's how to, like, put your money here. Or here's how to, you know, hey, don't be a knucklehead. Don't do that. What? What if you didn't have that, what then was shaping you the way you viewed the world? Morality, probably.

[A]

Anger. Yeah. Dang anger. Like, being upset that I didn't have things that I thought other people had that I should have had, that I didn't have. And so shaping me, I mean, that would have been the thing that would. It would bother me so much. And I felt like I wanted to prove that I was good enough to have the things that I didn't have, even though I couldn't ever force that to be the case.

[B]

Yeah.

[A]

But in my mind, it was like, nah, I'm good enough. I'm gonna prove it. Whether it was just to myself or, you know, a lot of times it was outward to try to prove it to other people. Because I would find myself in situations in the gym with, like, older men who are also in the gym who became sort of like father figures where I'd want to prove that I was, like, strong enough. Like, I was good enough at a bench press, or simple, like, stupid. When I was, like, early teens, like, 17, 16, like, oh, I can do this. Wait, because that guy does it. Like, it was just dumb. Like, I always wanted to prove myself. And I think that's why I got so locked in the gym. Because it was. It was a. There was one thing I could do, was like, oh, I could get better at this. Like, I am in control of this. And I think that's why I liked it so much. Cause I was. I felt so out of control, out of a lot of other things in my life.

[B]

So your discipline in the gym came from hurt, anger, for sure. Competitiveness, Almost like. Almost like comparison, but not in the way that people use comparison. It's just like, oh, that guy is, like, 20 years older than me, and I'm, like, bench pressing his weight or whatever, trying to.

[A]

Or. Yeah. Trying to prove that I could. Yeah.

[B]

Was that just like a. Do you still feel like if you're in that space right now, do you feel like you're on, like, an endless hamster wheel? Like, do you ever feel satisfied? Does that make sense?

[A]

No, I think the gym is sort of that kind of place where it's sort of never enough. Kind of the vibe that a lot of people start to get when they train and they. They. Whether they make, you know, physical progress or strength progress, it sort of feels like you could always get better. So. Yeah. I'm trying to think in hindsight. No, it was just kind of like, never enough. So you don't really fill that up, right. Yeah, it's just kind of like, where do you move and how do you. Do you find different goals to sort of go after like, that?

[B]

And you've. You started working out, like, in what, high school? Middle school?

[A]

Yeah. I played sports all my life, and I was like. I played football like the little kid, Pop Warner, Pee Wee, midgets, this whole thing. And then played one year in, like, high school, and then I was just, like. I realized in high school that I just like the weight room more than I like playing football.

[B]

Yeah.

[A]

And again, it probably goes back to just the idea that, like, I could just be in my own head.

[B]

Yeah.

[A]

Not worry about anything else, because obviously, when you play sports, you're a part of the bigger picture, and you got to play with the intention of being good for the whole team. And in my mind, it was like, oh, I just, like. I just, like, get it under a barbell and not having to think about anything.

[B]

Dude. See, I. Okay, wait, hold on. Before I go there. What. What position were you in high school?

[A]

I was a DB and receiver. I was a lot smaller, obviously.

[B]

Okay.

[A]

I was fast, too.

[B]

I. I played one year high school, too, so I did eighth grade football, and I did freshman year, and they put me on D line. I was 115 pounds, 510.

[A]

Sounds like a bad coach.

[B]

It was. It was brutal. It was.

[A]

Or maybe they didn't have enough people.

[B]

Oh, we had plenty of people, so

[A]

they had bigger people, but they. Maybe you were just that good.

[B]

So I was on jv, and then I got to be in one varsity snap because we were beating the team so bad. But they had this guy who's actually in the NFL now who was ginormous on this other team, and I was on the kickoff return.

[A]

He smoked you?

[B]

He. Dude, he nailed me. It was bad, but. But that's besides the point.

[A]

No, that's pretty entertaining.

[B]

Yeah. I mean, it was.

[A]

I wish there was footage of that.

[B]

It was tried there. There might be. My huddle highlights were bad. My huddle highlights were like, me over there on the sideline.

[A]

There's got to be footage of that because you're young. There's probably. It's probably on an iPhone somewhere.

[B]

Dude. It probably is somewhere. I don't know where I would find it, but it's definitely a. If you can find it, find it and send it to me, because I would love to see it.

[A]

Yeah, it'd be funny.

[B]

Now, with the gym stuff, you said that you like getting under there and lifting heavy stuff. See, that's my. My pain with the gym. I hate that. Like, you're just telling me I'm just gonna sit there and go like this with heavy stuff, like, the whole time like that. That sounds so. Like, for me, with my personality, it just seems so boring of, like, me doing, like, this back and forth or, you know, this with the weights. Heavy stuff.

[A]

Yeah, but it's kind of like. It's interesting you say that, right? Because I know how I'm gonna relate this to, like, religion or something like that. But, like, life is difficult. It's hard. It's supposed to be hard. And I think that's like, the perfect representation of life, is that this. It's hard. Makes you good.

[B]

So I. Hold. Let me clarify. I do work out. Even if it doesn't look like you're

[A]

sounding like a right now, I do work out.

[B]

All right?

[A]

I'll be honest with you.

[B]

I work out now.

[A]

I don't like doing heavy heart stuff. I want my life to be easy.

[B]

Okay? It's this guy.

[A]

Talk about Jesus. I want my life to be easy. To cross and walk that.

[B]

Like, he did. He did do that. Come on, bro. I'm not gonna lie. I think about that in the gym. Yeah, that gives you the motivation. Because I'll be like, anyways, I have a specific morning routine that, like, I have to do, and if I don't do it, then I'm like the, like, more prideful, selfish, like, eat quick. Quick to be, like, frustrated version of myself. And one of those things is the gym.

[A]

Carry the cross.

[B]

Yeah, I gotta carry my cross in the gym. In life. And so I'll, like, go to the gym. But when I, like, am down there or, like, when I'm heading to the gym, like, in my mind, that thought is like, this is boring. But then when I leave, it's like, I got a gold star.

[A]

It's so funny because, like, I cannot relate at all. It was the only thing that was fun to me besides video games.

[B]

I. I'm like, joyfully jealous of that. Like, I want to get there one day.

[A]

You need anger. Yeah. You need. You need pain. No, that's what you need. That's what gets you There.

[B]

Well, you know, I actually did. I was doing zilla, like, fitness thing last year. I actually gained a bunch of muscle and I'd been doing it for like four months. But then I travel a lot and then I had to stop doing it with travel, and then I just stopped doing it. And then I got skinny fat again, which. That's like the worst. So now I'm. I've been back.

[A]

Well, that's good.

[B]

Thank you.

[A]

Yeah, I know I'm talking, but the biggest thing is consistency. That's all it is.

[B]

So where does your physical discipline come. Come from then? Like how if someone wants to be

[A]

physically disciplined, where does my physical discipline.

[B]

Well, you've been in the gym for a while, so I feel like for you, it's kind of like one of those things where it's like. It's almost like subconsciously embedded in you. Like the gym's a part of your habit. It's, you know.

[A]

Yeah, I mean, I. It's like I've been going to the gym in the morning my entire life. If I don't go, it's kind of weird.

[B]

Wait, what? What time?

[A]

Wait, normally right now? 11 o'. Clock.

[B]

What. What does your actual morning routine look like?

[A]

I wake up, I feed my dogs, and I go straight to the gym.

[B]

How long do you work out for?

[A]

Maybe like an hour and a half. I mean, sometimes two hours. Depends.

[B]

What's your bench press max?

[A]

All time or currently? Currently maybe like 475.

[B]

Oh, my gosh.

[A]

All time was like, 505.

[B]

That's like.

[A]

That was so cool.

[B]

It's like three of me.

[A]

No, it was great. I mean, dude, it's fun. I don't know why. I. I understand why people don't like it because it's hard, but it's still fun.

[B]

Okay, but that's. Okay, that's. That may be where. Where my disconnect is. I don't necessarily not like a gym because it's hard. I don't like it because to me, it's boring.

[A]

I think. You don't like because it's hard because I was.

[B]

That does not bother me. I don't like it because, like, in the moment when I'm headed to the gym, I'm like, you're telling me I'm gonna lay on a bench and go like this?

[A]

Yeah, it's hard.

[B]

That's not like, hard in my mind. That's just boring.

[A]

You know what was boring to me?

[B]

What?

[A]

Going to church.

[B]

All right, we'll get into that in a minute.

[A]

Going to church. Was so boring.

[B]

All right, well, before we get there, after you work out. You work out what time?

[A]

Typically 11 now, but even actually. Yeah, but that's crazy. My schedule has always been kind of like 10. 11.

[B]

Dang. Thanks for coming with us on your gym, you guys.

[A]

My day up.

[B]

We just, we.

[A]

Just kidding.

[B]

I'm kidding. We just caught you slacking. No, you said 11.

[A]

I was like, it, I'll do it then. I'm going to go to the gym.

[B]

Okay, cool.

[A]

Yeah.

[B]

Okay. So you get up, you go to the gym. You're supposed to be working out now, but you, you're with us.

[A]

Yeah.

[B]

What happens after you work out?

[A]

Most days?

[B]

Yeah.

[A]

Depends what I'm working on. So right now I'm working on the, the gym in Miami. So there's like a lot of phone call stuff for design work because we're like sort of at that stage of it.

[B]

Oh, you're launching a second location.

[A]

Yeah, Miami.

[B]

Oh, that's cool.

[A]

Yeah, we just signed a lease or opening one in Miami, which I'm really excited about cuz I'm working on for like not working on it but trying to get it done for like the last three years and it's really difficult to find locations. We finally have a really good with a ton of parking, so I'm exc about it. But to answer your question, yeah, it's. It depends what I'm working on. But typically it'll be like phone calls after that. I'll do all that sort of like meetings and things like that. Zoom calls and. And then. But me personally, because I can kind of do all of my phone, like I'll just either go spend time with my dogs or like take them to the park or go on a hike or something basic or just let them swim at the pool at my house.

[B]

Do you have like a hobby that you like doing that maybe the average person doesn't like doing? Like, do you collect something? Do you?

[A]

I like Pokemon cards. Do you?

[B]

I, you know, I had a kick a Pokemon for a little bit and I had to stop.

[A]

Why?

[B]

Dude, it just got like. I just realized it was just an endless loophole for me.

[A]

Everything is kind of that way though.

[B]

With like the Pokemon though, it was kind of an endless loophole.

[A]

And then you gotta catch them all.

[B]

But that's the thing, you can't catch them all if they keep inventing random Pokemon more.

[A]

So like I like the collector side of it because it's actually funny. I have a great story. I I aging myself here, but I was probably like the generation when, like, they first came out.

[B]

Hey, wait, hold on. I just got this. Really? Before we start recording, you go. I don't really want to talk about.

[A]

Well, I don't talk about my.

[B]

Probably like five times in this podcast. You like, shoot, I'm aging myself right

[A]

now because of the. It's because of the time period of social media. Like, to explain things, I have to explain it properly.

[B]

Did MySpace exist when you. When you were.

[A]

Yeah, bud. Oh, yeah.

[B]

Oh, my gosh.

[A]

Yeah. Yeah. That wasn't. I don't even want to say when that was, but I had my. I had the top friends. I had a song on that. Yeah, MySpace existed and it wasn't a. It wasn't just a music thing because then it became a music thing and now I think it's dead. But anyways, like I was saying, I. I remember going to a zoo camp. It's like a San Francisco. I'm up in the bay. And then, like, I think during the summer it was like a zoo camp. My mom would send me there and there was this other kid who was like, dude, I got all these. Another young kid. I got all these Pokemon cards. And I was like, I remember talking to this kid like it was gold because he had all the. And you gotta think Pokemon cards were not worth what they are now. Today. They're worth like hundreds, if not millions of dollars, depending on cards that you have. Whatever $400,000 a card and. But I remember being a kid being like, oh, this kid has all the money in the world. Just because he's telling me about these cards.

[B]

Yeah.

[A]

As my little kid, mine was like, oh, my God. And he would like. Long story short, he would, like, tell me he was going to get me all these cards. And I was like, oh, my God, I'm have. I'm going to be so rich. But it wasn't even worth money then.

[B]

I just.

[A]

The cards were so cool to me. Anyways, long story short, he was lying. He never got me any cards. He just like capped the whole summer camp. Never came out with the cards. But I would. I would buy a lot of these cards. I'd have a lot of these cards. And I never played the game. I just bought the cards and put them in a thing. Put them in, like a binder.

[B]

Yeah.

[A]

So I had like. I'm telling you, it was either first or second edition. Like Charizard, Alakazam, Blasto, everything.

[B]

Yeah.

[A]

Hologram. First edition, second edition.

[B]

Where's that binder?

[A]

Now, this is. This is where the story gets good. So those cards now how I would have had them would have been probably mint, because I just literally took them out, put them in the thing, and I just would, like, look at it. Yeah, I never touched them.

[B]

Yeah.

[A]

I remember just thinking like, oh, they're just so cool. I just like to look at them and then fast forward now there's like, certain cards that worth, like, Charizard first edition, like, mint. It's like PSA 10, whatever is worth like $400,000. Yeah, I probably had five of those.

[B]

Oh, my gosh.

[A]

Now, but you wouldn't know, right? Because this is like gambling. You never know what's going to happen in the future. You know, I grow up, they're still in that binder. They eventually just sit in my garage at home, where. You know, where I grew up, my family. I think, like four years ago, I called my mom and I'm like, yo, where's that binder? It's this white binder. Tons of cards. Where is. Because they're like, oh, they're worth all this money now. I'm like, where's that binder? She's like, I don't know. I mean, she's had cleaned out the garage a few times. That just. Gone. He's gone, bro.

[B]

She definitely got like 10 bucks for it. On a yard.

[A]

Nah, she just probably threw that away.

[B]

Really?

[A]

That's probably worth like $10 million.

[B]

I swear to God.

[A]

I am not kidding. I know it sounds like clickbait. I'm not kidding. But I. But who would know? Like, I wouldn't have known. My mom would have known. No one would have known that there was going to be like, this whole thing now. But, yeah, I would have been a Pokemon millionaire, but I'm not. It is what it is, you know, you win some, you lose some.

[B]

That was a big loss.

[A]

Huge loss.

[B]

Well, hypothetically, if you think about it, like, if you only spent like a couple hundred bucks back in the day, it's only like 500 loss.

[A]

Yeah, yeah.

[B]

If you think about like that, makes you feel a whole lot better.

[A]

Yeah, for sure. Well, it's just the gambling side of it. It's like you just don't. You would never know. It'd be like if I knew, you know, they'd be like, oh, man, what would you tell your younger self if you could? I would have been like, buy bitcoin. I'd have a trillion dollars if I spent all my money on bitcoin when it first came out.

[B]

Well, I just remember growing up, like,

[A]

I'd be elon Musk rich right now.

[B]

Yeah. If you invested in bitcoin, dude. Bitcoin. I don't know anything about crypto, but I. I do know about baseball cards. That was, like, my gig when I was younger, so I didn't know. I went in an antique store because my favorite player is Chipper Jones from the Braves. And I remember, like, watching. I used to watch this highlight reel before, like, every little league game I would play, and they would have this, like, rookie card of him on the highlight reel. And I found it in an antique store for, like, five bucks. It was worth, like, a hundred bucks online, and that was, like, my first. Oh, you can make money with baseball cards?

[A]

Yeah. I mean, a lot of antiques and a lot of, like, collectibles is, like, tons of money in that.

[B]

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[A]

No.

[B]

Okay. Yeah.

[A]

I mean, it's just like, I just like spending time with my dogs. I go to the gym, I work, and then I spend time with my dogs. And then maybe I'll work out some more, like do some cardio or Something.

[B]

Okay, cool.

[A]

Yeah, it's pretty boring.

[B]

No, it's like, just chill, you know? Yeah, it's not boring.

[A]

Yeah, I don't know. I just don't. I don't. I don't know. I like really basic. Like, I like camping. Like, I'd like to just drive. I have a van. Like, you could sleep. It's like a sprinter van all night. You could sleep in it. And I'll just, like, go places and just disappear.

[B]

That's fun.

[A]

With my dogs and just sit and do nothing. It's actually really nice.

[B]

Yeah. There's like, something beautiful and restful about that. I like that.

[A]

So closer to God. Yeah.

[B]

Where are you at with God, Jesus, Christianity? You mentioned church was born, which I can understand. I mean.

[A]

Yeah, I've just had a. I've always had a really tough relationship with it, I think, because I was. I was sort of pushed into it at an early age. It was like, you know, I grew up Catholic, went to a Catholic school, and my relationship to the. To church was just like, what the am I doing here? Why do people have to give money? This is kind of stupid. And then I would laugh at, like, funny while I'd be at church because, like, you read the thing, it'd say, like, missile. And I just thought that was hilarious. And I would get in trouble for laughing at stupid. And I was just like, this is not dumb. But it just. It just felt like. I don't know. I think, because what I would. What I would hear about Jesus and God and all this stuff, and then, you know, you're in church and people's reactions to certain things are like, these people are just kids to me. Like, what. Like, what's godly about this? What's. What's Jesus ish about this? Like, I don't know. I didn't. I felt sort of forced into it, I guess, at a young age. And then I think I had resentment to how, like, my life panned out. And I was like, this is, like, why this happened to me. I had a lot of that mentality, like, in relationship to my father. So it was hard for me to really be attached to it. I would say that, yeah, that's. That was like my younger brain. And then my older brain is, like, looking at life. All the most terrible things that have happened have been on the name of some sort of, like, religion or some sort of conquest that we have to do this to spread this word. And, you know, these people believe something different than us, and we believe we're right. So they're wrong. So we need to take their. Or kill them. It's just kind of like there's nothing godly about any of that. But it was all in the name of God.

[B]

What do you think happens when we die?

[A]

That's. That's the one I struggle with the most because I. I always had. I think even since I was young. I think the thought of my father dying made me think really early on, like, what the does that mean? Like, so what is death? What is life? What's the purpose of this? Like, what happens when we go, like, where did he go? And, yeah, I still don't really have that figured out. I mean, I don't think anyone truly does. I think a lot of people believe. And, you know, obviously that's what having faith is, is believing that, you know, either what you read or what you believe, what you're told or what you're supposed to believe is what's going to happen. And I think I just have a really hard, like, logical, analytical perspective on things. And I sometimes get sort of burnt out with the. With the idea that, like, you know, there's this heaven and hell. And I don't think that it's necessarily untrue, but the way that we're sort of taught it seems to just not make clear sense to me. And I think maybe that's just the way it is.

[B]

What's your understanding of heaven and hell?

[A]

Well, the idea that, you know, if you do good things, you do certain acts, you treat people a certain way, you know, like the golden rule, like that was kind of the thing that I always, like, always stood out in my mind was treat people how you want to be treated. And that would be like the most important sort of thing that you'd end up in a place where you wouldn't necessarily, like, see or touch your loved ones, but you'd have this sort of sense of feeling or energy or something. Something around that. But I, again, I don't know. Like, that's the thing. Like, even at this point in my life, like, I don't have a direct. This is what it is.

[B]

Yeah.

[A]

You know, I've been told so many different things, and I think it's just hard for me to get behind a lot of it because I just think about my life and I just think about life in general. And it's like people created all these things around religion. I guess my original perspective was this, that they created these ideas so people would be more comfortable with the idea of death and the idea of, like, in not being Here forever.

[B]

So do you think that it just goes all black?

[A]

That's what I thought for a long time. Yeah. I thought that, like, it was just. There was nothing. It was just nothingness. And I think that was the thing that really scared me about it. I don't necessarily believe that as much now, but I also don't. I don't have a definite. Like, this is what it is.

[B]

Yeah.

[A]

You know, I can't. I can't sit here and say that like, I'm certain that it's heaven and hell or I'm certain that it's nothing. And I think that's why it's still a little scary. But I think I also just got to a certain point in my life where I'm like, it.

[B]

I don't.

[A]

I don't know.

[B]

Yeah.

[A]

What do you think it is?

[B]

Well, well, I believe in heaven and hell, but the definition that you said, a lot of people have, and I. And I would say according to the Christian perspective, it's like a false definition. But a lot of people have that definition. So it's not like a, you know, you made some grave mistake. But. So I believe in heaven and hell, but that's because my entire worldview comes from Jesus and the Christian perspective. But essentially, heaven and hell is eternity with God, and hell is eternity without God. So heaven would be, you know, there's like, minor details about, oh, you know, there's going to be Gold Road or whatever, and you're going to have. I don't know if you ever hear a Christian be like, I'm going to get a mansion in heaven. You know, that seems to be a thing, but it's not good works that get you there. And that was my hesitation with religion. I grew up in Christian school, I grew up in church, but I rejected God because of hypocrisy. So the same way you were like, these people are kind of mean to me that were going to your Catholic mass was like, I felt that way with church. I was like, you guys are telling me to live my way, my life one way, but you're, like, doing this stuff Monday through Saturday. So if God's like that, I don't want it. And then my grandfather passed away in the eighth grade. And I remember blaming God for killing my grandfather. And that was like a big thing for me. And so I had really bad depression and anxiety from, like, the eighth grade till about my junior year. And a few months before I was planning on taking my life, we had a religions class at my school where the teacher was supposed to teach you why the other religions were false. But I would go home and research that they made could be true because I was trying to figure out how to fix my depression and my sin issues and all this other stuff. And I just came to the conclusion that if we live in a broken world and I can't fix my broken heart in a broken world, then there's no way I could work myself to any sort of heaven because we keep, you know, people release all these self help books and we haven't cured anxiety and depression and all this other stuff. And so when I was 17, I was going to take my life and I went to. It was on Christmas Day of 2020, and so the only thing open was Waffle House because they don't close on holidays. And so I went there for my last meal at nighttime and no one preached to me, no one said anything to me about Jesus. I've never done a drug, I've never had a sip of alcohol. I had a supernatural encounter with Jesus and he stopped me from taking my life. And so I prayed a prayer in my car. I said, jesus, if you're real, take away my anxiety and depression, because this is why I want to take my life. And I haven't had the crippling anxiety and depression since that day. So it's been over five years. And that was like my foot in the door. But what I realized about heaven and hell was that truth of I can't do good works. Like really in reality, no human being is good. If you think about it, everyone's made mistakes. Like, I've made mistakes you don't know about. You've made mistakes that I don't know about you. So deep down, like, no one is inherently good. We can do good things. You know, like your car can break down and I can change your tire and you can be like, oh, that was a good deed. But like, no one's inherently good except Jesus. And so from the Christian perspective, it would say, Jesus paid the price that we deserve to pay for our sin. We've done wrong. Justice system is like, I murder you, I got to go to jail, because that's justice. Jesus would say, you've done wrong, but I'll take your punishment. I'll die so that you can live. Because we're all going to die and then we're going to stand before God. And if we put faith and trust that what Jesus did on the cross was enough to pay the price, we put faith in Jesus, it's forgiven. As if we've never done anything wrong. And we get eternity. Jesus, if we say, reject God in this life, I don't want him, I don't need Him, I don't want anything to do with him. It breaks God's heart. But he respects your choice because he doesn't force you to believe in him. He respects your choice. And hell is an eternity separate from God.

[A]

You don't believe that people are inherently good.

[B]

No. Because you don't have to teach a four year old to be selfish and throw a temper tantrum when you ask him to share his toys. You don't have to teach people to be gravitated towards sin. Like, isn't it crazy that all the media in the movies promote sin? Bad stuff. The stuff that sells is like, like all the romance movies right now are people that cheat on their significant others. Just about all of them are. It's like no one like who made that cool.

[A]

Yeah, but it's like when you say that, you're sort of talking about societal things, like things that are imposed on us, you know, like you're speaking about a movie, for example. Right. Like you're talking about a place. A place. Hollywood. Right. It's trying to sell something. Right. And typically, I mean, we even talked about earlier this whole Ray J. And Kim Kardashian thing. Like they know what works and what sells. And just like on social media, what's gonna do better than other is gonna be the thing that's, it's, what's gonna be more viral is. Oh, it's, it's bad. It's, it's, it's crazy. It's not good. Because people are sort of drawn to this negative side of things, I think more than they're drawn to the good side of things. Which maybe kind of counters my point about innately good. Because I was going to say that I, I think people are innately good and then they're proven or they're shown through society that like they feel like they need to do certain things. Because you said another thing earlier that was interesting about. You didn't say this. My mind thought it though. People all do things that I think they think are good based on their perspective or their angle of which they're coming from.

[B]

Yeah.

[A]

I don't think people are like, I want to just go do bad things to other people. I think it's just this like constant war between like what someone wants and what they actually need. And they're, they're, they think that in their actions, whether from the outside, we say they're good or bad, I don't think anyone's thinking I want to do bad things to people. And I think that's innate. I think people have that. I think you gave the example of like, a kid who's like, doesn't want to share their toys or whatever. I don't know how we're drawing that to the rest of society or the world. But I guess what I'm trying to say is I think everyone does what they think is good with what they know. And society, there's obviously so many more layers to what then what you know is based on what you learn and what you're taught or what you're shown or what you constantly sort of giving information to is like, okay, then this must be good, because I'm getting this reaction and I'm seeing this someone does this good. So if I do that good, then I'll get the same reaction. Like, I think humans are just creatures of that sort of nature.

[B]

I, I see what you're saying. Like, I was, I. There's some habits that I have because I was raised in the south and I was raised by the family that I had and things like that that maybe you wouldn't have because you were raised in San Francisco and you had a different family and stuff like that. But in regards to morality, if God does not exist, then morality is subjective, Meaning you have your truth and I have my truth. And if that's the case about morality and I think murdering people is okay, I think murdering people, I don't think anyone thinks that. But that's the moral argument is if God doesn't exist, there isn't a standard but yourself and myself. You can't tell me that if I think murder is okay, you can't tell me it's wrong.

[A]

Right. But I don't think, I truly don't think anyone thinks that that's okay.

[B]

Okay, so then that's where the Christian would say, every human being has been given a moral code written on their heart because morality comes from God. So I would arguably say, so what

[A]

about when God in society was unknown and, you know, people lived in tribes and they lived in places where, you know, they looked at the stars and things that were sort of more tangible, at least at that time. And they, you know, the way the stars move is the way they're going to grow their crops or the way the stars move is how, like, their life's going to, like, whether it's going to rain or it's going to. There's going to be storms they're sort of depending on what the earth is telling the people. Were they not good? Because, like, obviously that's a religion thing, became a thing a lot later in human history. Like, we're talking about thousands and thousands and thousands of years ago where people did exist and they did live their lives. And, you know, in certain ways, whether, you know, we look at it and go, oh, the sacrificing thing or whatever the they did was bad from our perspective. Perspective now, what we know and what's known and what's normal. But, like, do you believe that God created them?

[B]

I believe God created all people.

[A]

So before he was known, before it was written, before it was tracked, and it. Before it was like, you know, this prophet or this, you know, disciple, whoever wrote this piece in the Bible and put it here, like, was God not imposing any sort of, like, good and evil on them?

[B]

Well, if God exists. So any sort of God out of any religion, for the most part, I'll just use Christianity as an example, because I'm a Christian. We believe God has always existed. So if God has always existed, and the labels that God has is he's the first and the last, he's the alpha and the Omega, He's a father, he is a lord, he is a healer, He's a provider, He's a protector, and God is good, then he gets the authority to determine what is good and what is evil. And so when he created man, he created Adam. You said you've been reading the Bible, but in Genesis, Adam and Eve, he created Adam and Eve, the first humans. And he's not forcing them to do anything. He has created them, breathed life into them, and they have a moral code written on their heart. But if you notice, like, God doesn't force them to follow him because they rebel against God. Satan comes in the garden and he's like, well, you're in paradise and you're with God, but you're not God yourself. You might as well eat from the tree because he doesn't want you to do that. And so they rebelled against God. And so that's where sin entered into the world. And that's where we would say the result of, you know, why adultery happens, why people murder, why people steal. But also from a broader perspective, like why just general suffering happens, why the fires and the Palisades happen, why wars happen, is because sin exists. And in that moment, because God didn't need us, he wanted us, so he chose to create us. God doesn't owe us anything. If we rebelled against him, he could Just let us all suffer. But the entire Bible from Genesis to Revelation, is a historical document of God trying to get as close to mankind as possible. And so, as you read the Bible, you see, okay, man has rebelled. Man has done wrong things. So therefore God wants to give them the choice, choose me or not. But I'm going to show you the way. You can choose me or not. And so, like, you know, if there's like some tribe deep in the Amazon, the Bible isn't explicit on how God's going to judge each individual tribe of 12 people with their own language. The Bible's not in their language, that kind of thing. But the Bible does say, in heaven there will be people from every nation, tribe and tongue. So that gives me hope as like a Christian going, God's going to do everything in his capacity to reveal himself to all people so that people get the option to choose him or not. You know, so like, when, like, the October 7 thing happened in the Gaza Strip, there was like a. There was a news article about how there were about five or six hundred Muslims who had all had the same dream about Jesus in the same night. And they can't. They converted to Christianity because of that dream. And so it's not like that. They need, you know, a scripture to fall down from heaven or like a ray beam of fire and something appears in front of them and then they start believing. We're just believing that God reveals himself to all people in whatever way possible. Some people go on hikes like you do, and they look at creation and they go, there has to be a mind behind this. And that draws them to the Lord. Some people have a moment like me in Waffle House. Some people are raised in church all their life, and that's how they know about Jesus. Praise God. But as a Christian, we're trusting that he is going to judge the earth justly because we believe he's ultimately good and righteous. And we're going to trust that he's going to reveal himself in a capacity where people can believe him.

[A]

Right? So what I'm saying is, before religion was created and before it was written down, and before it was, like, you know, noted how we know it and how you know it, do you think then the people that existed before this were just, like, all terrible?

[B]

I think still now, human beings are inherently sinful. They're inherently bad. Like, I was born inherently sinful, and I still struggle. I still want to make mistakes. But we can confirm that the preservation of the narrative, the Christian narrative according to the scriptures has been Preserved because of the amount of historical evidence that we have to support it. So think like in the late 1800s and early 1900s, there were slave owners that would rip books of the Bible out of the Bible to keep slaves enslaved. And they would use that to convince them that they should continue being slaves. And as a Christian, I'd be like, that's wrong. That's not the Bible. And we were able to confirm that that was wrong because we have manuscripts that have preserved that message. But in regards to like the question, yeah, I think every human being is born inherently sinful. And we see that after Adam and Eve have rebelled against God and they chose to sin against God. The human race as we know it is all born into sin. But he doesn't leave us hanging. God provides the solution.

[A]

But did he leave the people hanging before it was written?

[B]

No. So just because something is documented doesn't mean that the truth didn't exist. You have to think like when Jesus was alive, they didn't have a New Testament, Jesus was the Messiah to come. They just had the Torah, they had the Old Testament. And they didn't have it in a leather bound Bible, they had it in scrolls. And so that was preserving the history and the message of the Old Testament. And when you read the Old Testament, a lot of it's history. You know what I mean? You're not putting, as a Christian, you're not putting faith and trust in words on a piece of paper or in an institute. Structure is important, but we're putting trust in Jesus because we ultimately believe that he is God and he saw humankind suffering so much. And this is, I say this all the time. It's my favorite thing about Jesus compared to every other religion, because every other religion says God's on his throne. Work your way to that God. And Jesus comes down from heaven, who's constantly receiving praise and glory, comes down from heaven into time and space. Born as a human being, fully God, but also fully man. And he lives in the same world that we live in. So he understands what it means to suffer. He understands what it means to be tempted. He understands what it means to be backstabbed by close friends. He understands what it means to experience life. So he doesn't just sit on his high horse and tell us that we have to live life a certain way. He showed us how to live it. Jesus himself in the gospel says, I didn't come to be served, I came to serve. So he shows us that what actual righteousness looks like according to God's character and God's law is possible through him. That's why he lived it. Ultimately dying the death that we deserve because of our wrongdoing. So that would be like, you know, like you murdered someone and then you went to trial. And then I'd be like, I'll do Bradley's time, like he can leave. You'd be like, what the heck, that's stupid. Like, I didn't murder anyone. But that's what Jesus did with us.

[A]

Yeah, like theoretically, I guess, I don't know, the religion stuff is just. Oh man, I, I guess I guess what always trips me up is it's just, it's written by men, it's written by people.

[B]

I think that's one of the more beautiful parts. You have 40 different authors over 1500 years from three different continents. And the Bible was written in Greek, Hebrew and Aramaic. A little bit of Aramaic. Four different authors, three continents, over 1500 years, writing 66 books in this leather bound thing that we call the Bible that has over 66,000 cross references, meaning it references a verse in this other book. And two of these dudes could have been 700 years apart. Over 66,000 cross references. That's something you would have to probably get in a room of 30 scholars around a conference table.

[A]

Right. It wasn't the Bible, wasn't the Bible written? And there's a lot of things that were also not included in the Bible that at some point people decided what would be in the Bible, what wouldn't be in the Bible.

[B]

There's like, you know, aspects of, not like you have some stuff like the Gnostic gospels that are rejected, that are not congruent to the narrative of scripture

[A]

according, but who's deciding what's congruent and what's not?

[B]

So you, you. So we listen to the disciples and

[A]

I'm not trying to be like mean or anything because like I, I understand it, but it's the, I like that's my idea behind it is at some point someone decided like the Bible that you're speaking to in these connections.

[B]

Yep.

[A]

That this is the Bible that we're going to make. The Bible.

[B]

Yeah.

[A]

And from what I understand in the history of it, there was a lot of other books and things that they go, okay, we're not going to put that into this Bible. And this is the Bible that's going to be the Bible.

[B]

So the Catholic Bible has 73 books in it called the Apocrypha. And then like my Bible has 66 books in it, doesn't have the Apocrypha So that's like a big debate between Protestant Christians and Catholic Christians. I don't necessarily have a problem with the Apocrypha, but other stuff, like other books outside of those two that I just mentioned, we have so much evidence through manuscripts and Dead Sea Scrolls that what we have today is what. What that they had when they were opening the scrolls. So we have Dead Sea Scrolls, we have the Greek Septuagint, we have the Latin Vulgate. These are just fancy terms for, like, old historical documents that we have to confirm it. But sometimes, like, there's a passage of scripture. I'll give an example. Maybe this will help. In John Chapter eight, it's this woman caught in adultery. And in my Bible and in a lot of Bibles, it says, the earliest manuscripts we have of John chapter 8 does not contain the story. That doesn't mean that the story isn't true. That might mean we have a manuscript from 30 AD of John chapter 8 that doesn't contain that story. We have two that doesn't contain it, but we have 500 manuscripts from 35 AD that contain that story. So because we have an overwhelming amount of evidence that that story is true, it's just the earliest ones that we have, even though we only have two, for example, but we have 500 just five years later with it, we just put that nuance in there and say, hey, that's the case. There's like two passages in scripture like that, but they also keep it in there not just because of evidence, but because it aligns with Jesus's character. So you would read that passage with caution, but everything else in the Scriptures we can confirm. There's a cool. Like, there's a cool museum in D.C. called the Museum of the Bible that has like a. A ton of, like, cool manuscripts and fun stuff in there that's like, you know, that helps confirm it and stuff. If you're ever in dc, it's kind of a cool.

[A]

Yeah, I've definitely been searching on this one. This sort of. It's just. I don't know, my relationship to it is just so different and not. Not saying it's right or wrong.

[B]

It just.

[A]

It just feels like every religion, I guess the idea that every religion believes that they're the religion, then I'm just like, it's just a bunch of people.

[B]

Well, sometimes it's different, you know, like, you know, Buddhists and Hindus respect Jesus not as God. They think he's a good teacher. And they don't have a problem with Christians. And they do enough Good maybe if you do more bad than good, it's a bad day. Muslims would say that we're people of the book for the first half of the Quran. Second half, they'd be like, they would want us to convert to Islam or we'd be doing something wrong. But it's working, working. And they only see Jesus as a prophet Christianity. Jesus is God and Jesus.

[A]

But you see what I'm saying. Like, there's just billions of people that believe something else, whether it's right or wrong. I don't. Again, I believe in God. I believe in much of the story of Jesus. And I still can't get over the fact. Just when I just think logically, you still have billions of people that believe something completely sort of separate as far as like, you know, what happens and you know, in their book and in their religion that how are we determining that we're right and they're wrong?

[B]

Well, we're so like, I can't prove that the God of Christianity is the true God. No one can prove it. But you have to look at evidence. Like, where's the overwhelming amount of evidence?

[A]

But you're looking at your evidence. That's the thing where it gets confusing in my mind because they're looking at

[B]

their evidence even outside of Christianity. Like, for example, let's talk about Jesus, death and resurrection. There are so many non Christian historians that wrote about Jesus dying on the cross and being buried and his tomb being empty. They wouldn't say he was resurrected because they're not Christian, but they were like, yeah, three days later, the tomb was empty. And the way that they record it being cloudy and dark and the veil being torn. You have guys like Cornelius, Tacitus and Pliny the Whiny and all these guys who still today, historians today look back at their historical texts for more than just Christian affirmation. These guys are writing the same details that we have in the scripture. So it's not just a. You can only look at Christian sources. There's tons of non Christian historians that write about the life of Jesus. He was a man of his word. He died on the cross. His tomb was empty on the third day. And so even, even, like with, even with like my Muslim friends, this is

[A]

going to sound so blasphemous. But it's like, how do you know? Somebody just go take his body out of that bitch.

[B]

Okay, that's great.

[A]

I'm sorry. Like, I'm not trying to be mean at all.

[B]

Again, we have to look at overwhelming amount of evidence. If they took his Body, where did it go? Where would they have put it?

[A]

I don't know. They didn't like that mother so much, they put him somewhere else.

[B]

So they had a guard, a Roman guard guarding the tomb and had a ginormous rock in front of the tomb that was too heavy for someone to just naturally move it by themselves if someone conspired. So that was a common theory back in the day, was like, oh, Jesus followers totally robbed his body. They totally robbed his body. Here's the problem though is even after Jesus, according to the Bible, resurrected, ascended into heaven, these guys died for the fact that he rose from the dead. If you knew something wasn't true, there's no way you would put your life on it. No way. Like, if you were lying to me about something and then I held a gun to your head and I was like, I'm going to pull the trigger if you're not telling me the truth.

[A]

It's, you know. Yeah, you're right. But then it's so funny. Before we even started this podcast, we were talking about, we were joking about like drinking the Kool Aid. I was making a joke and the Jim Jones singing, that guy, like in my town, like some kid that I grew up was like, that was his uncle. But you're right in most cases. But there are cases where like, for example, these people were willing to go go willing to drink Kool Aid and die.

[B]

But we're talking about their die.

[A]

I'm not saying that's what's happening.

[B]

No, no, for sure. The gospel accounts is they're dying on beh half of Jesus's life. They're trusting that what Jesus did was true. So if you like robbed his body or you knew he didn't resurrect because the Bible would say, and through eyewitness accounts, the disciples, Jesus appeared in his physical body, resurrected to the disciples, they saw him and then over a period of 40 days, he revealed himself and ascended into heaven in front of 500 eyewitnesses early in the morning. So they weren't drunk, they weren't hallucinating. Historical documents outside of just the Bible describe this. So in an instance where like you have a Jim Jones and he's like, you know, love bombing them and convincing them to drink this Kool Aid and all that stuff versus you have these guys that their lives and their livelihood and their families are being threatened and these guys die the most gruesome deaths possible, like Peter, who was like one of Jesus's right hand disciples, got crucified upside down, you Had John the Baptist. Sorry, not John the Baptist, John the disciple, who was exiled to an island because they didn't want to try to boil him alive. And he lived, and then they exiled him. Imagine, like being boiled alive and then living and then thinking that they could punish you again and go, nah, nah, I had it. You know what I mean? So you have these guys that laid their lives down on the line for Jesus and for the like, for the validity of it. And so, yeah, I'm trusting in the evidence. And like, you know, people. People believe things for two things, experiences. I had an experience that night at Waffle House, but that's not enough to sustain me being crazy for Jesus, you know what I mean? Like, that could die out. That's like just. That's an experience. And so that's kind of where I land now. And the ultimate thing I found was peace that I look for everywhere else. Like, I couldn't find it in porn, I couldn't find it in girls. I never did drugs or alcohol, but I was a people pleaser. I tried to find it in sports, I tried to find it in friendships, and I never had peace. And the first year of me being a Christian was the hardest year of my life, but I had peace. I just had something that I couldn't find everywhere else but in Jesus. And that was a big. That was a big deal for me because I was just on that quest for love, on that quest for peace, and I found it in him. And maybe, maybe, honestly, that might be why it may be hard for you to wrap around sometimes, because, you know, you had that experience when you were six years old and you kind of didn't understand why your life panned out the way it did rightfully so. I mean, that's an intense experience, and you don't understand why. And one of the labels that the God of Christianity has is being a father. That was one of the hardest things for me to grasp when I became a Christian. I was like, what do you mean God's a father? He's God. What do you mean, he's a father? What do you mean? He's a friend. That was hard for me to grasp. But as I continue to grow in Jesus, when I continue to grow and understand that that helps me in my relationship. Because, yes, Christianity is a religion. There's structure to it, but it's also a relationship with the one that created you and designed you, and you invite him in every aspect of your life and things like that.

[A]

It's interesting you say that, but I think If I'm looking back on my life, I would have wanted that. I feel like I would have leaned into something that felt like was a fatherly sort of figure. I think the thing that happened to me over time and just as I got older and all my life experiences with people is that people just suck and they do what's good for them, whether it's right or wrong for anyone else. And I've experienced it so many times. And then I just start to think about all these stories and, you know, where does it come from and what is it for? And if I could draw the line to everything else that humans have done over time in regards to religion, it just makes me feel like they did all these things so that they can, you know, get a bunch of people to believe this, so it's okay that they do that. And then, you know, I think about history and it's the same sort of thing. It's like, well, it's written in the person who won. It's written, you know, we know that history is written by the victor, right? So it's written by the people who want you to believe that this is the history that is true. They want you to believe that this is the true way the world worked or what happened was what we tell you. And I think, you know, not getting too into like, political today and the world today, but it's just a bunch of selfish people who want power. And I'm not saying that this is why the, the Bible was written or created or the reason why it's been sort of, you know, grown to the extent that it's grown, but I think I've just seen that happen so much that it's. It's hard to believe. And I, the, my, my biggest point with this whole religion thing was like, if God himself wrote this book, I'd be like, yo, I'm all ears. I think because humans wrote it and transcribed it, and whether it was written this many times or that many times, it just, it still feels like of human sort of nature. And what I mean by that is whether it's in sort of some sort of power struggle or control or being able to impose your will over a group of people because they should or shouldn't be this way. And then I think about it in regards to the rest of the world doing the same thing in there. You know, in Asia, it's the Buddhism or whatever and you know, the Middle East, Muslim, it's like they created their own sort of ways to quell the population for whatever makes sense. For them and their doings and whatever they need to do. Again, I'm not saying that. I'm just not believing. I think I just don't trust people. And I think that's been the hardest thing for me. When I hear about all these stories, it's just like, it's written so people can feel better about themselves and what they're doing, whether it's right or wrong. And I don't know, it just. It definitely me up. And then this is no knock on you. But then there's this. There's whole audiences that want to believe that or do believe that. Nowadays, we take it to social media. And I'm not saying this about you at all.

[B]

Sure.

[A]

I think you're a great guy, and you're very. You're very genuine when I speak to you off camera and on camera. But there are people who leverage even these sort of conversations to make money. I mean, we have products here. You got a podcast where you get paid. And it's no disrespect, because I do the same thing, but I think a lot of people propagate things that they know other people are going to be like, oh, I believe this, too. I've had this experience. I like this person. I want to watch this person. I want to engage with this person. And now you have a living because of it. And then I think about all, like, the super churches where they're like, give us all your money. And they're like, you know, I just think of, like, what's the Righteous Gemstone? It's like the funniest TV show, because I love that. What's that guy's name? Dude, the comedian, the eastbound and down guy. Danny McBride.

[B]

Oh, okay.

[A]

And I love that show, but it's like, I know that's a real thing where people are like. Like this. You know what I'm saying? The super churches.

[B]

Yeah.

[A]

And I just think it's just a bunch of people who are just like, how could I use this for my betterment? How. Whether it's the history, how it's written, whether it's, you know, my relationship to the. The Bible, and. And, you know, I'm holier than thou in these cases because I believe this and you believe that. That's where it gets all convoluted in my mind, and it just feels like it's just a bunch of humans trying to leverage some sort of law or rule so that they can do what they feel like they need to be doing.

[B]

Sure.

[A]

Because it happened with, like, the Crusades and All this, it's like you, you're wrong because you live your life this way. You know, America's a great example. Like, we came. We're like, yo, these people are savages and they don't speak this language and they don't have this religion. So we're going to make missions and then we're going to teach you that this is the right religion. And what you thought previous to us coming here was completely wrong. And that's where I'm just like, ah, this is so tough for me to get behind because everyone just does things so that they can get more out of their own life. And there's nothing wrong with that. I'm like, that's sort of, I guess, human nature. But that's what gets me. Like, what is this really?

[B]

Yeah, well, the Bible thing. Yeah, we, we believe humans put pen to paper on it, but we believe that God it's. We believe that the Bible is the inspired word of God. That's fancy terms for like, I get it, you're not. God wrote it.

[A]

But that's the thing.

[B]

Use people.

[A]

We believe. That's the point.

[B]

Yes. And we're. And we again, you know, trusting that evidence that because if, if people wanted to corrupt it, they would have done it over time. You know what I mean? So we have the manuscripts to go back to it. But I think what you said was super important about. That's the reality. I've been into big mega churches and I've met pastors and leaders that I've known that I used to watch when I first became a Christian that I was encouraged by. And they were the total opposite of what I thought they were like from videos and going to their events and churches. On the contrary, I've seen people that I've loved and admired online where they have a big church or big ministry or a small church or small ministry. And I meet them behind closed doors and they're even better than you would think. And so I do the same thing. If I get hurt by something or I don't understand something where it can be easy to generalize it. And you obviously didn't do that with me because you understand. But that's the case. There are going to be some people that make products that do things that want a big church because they want to profit off the name of God, that's going to happen. God hates that. What happened in the Crusades breaks God's heart. You know, when people use the name of God for selfish gain, it breaks God's heart. The reason that he doesn't intervene every time it happens though is because we believe that God is going to righteously judge the earth one day. And those that actually put faith and trust in Jesus receive the forgiveness of God and allow God to be in the driver's seat of their life and lead their life. Because if we have a creator, we're trusting that he knows what's best for our life instead of ourself. He's always existed, we've existed for a limited amount of time. We're trusting him and so, you know, he'll deal with that. That's why all of Christianity is, yeah, God can look at the outward appearance, but I mean men looks at the outward appearance, but God looks at the heart. You know, like I, I was at a college campus last year talking about Jesus with this dude named Cliff and he's like 70 something years old and he's older, wears the button down shirt and the khaki pants and no tattoos and clean cut hair and I've got like shaggy hair and I wear a T shirt and sweatpants and crocs and I got tattoos and this guy came out there and was like, so how is it that Cliff's a real Christian and you have tattoos, T shirt and all that? And he like generalized me, you know, Are there going to be people that actually don't sincerely love Jesus? Yes, but there are also people that do. And God again looks at the heart. And so that's why there's a passage in the Bible where in 1st Corinthians 13 it defines what love is. And at the very end it says love hopes all things. And that has been a big challenge for me as a human being that has trust issues and that has a hard time really believing the best in people. It's like my mind goes to like the worst extreme possible. You know, my mind always just like has a hard time trusting people, trust in things. I've also seen a lot of hard stuff and wicked stuff. Just like, yeah, we do social media, but really our heart is ministry. We want to see people know Jesus. Like that's why we have the conversations with you. That's why we have the conversations on camera. That's why we do that stuff. So I've seen wicked stuff in ministry and I can attest to you that stuff does exist. And I've also seen where there's a lot of it that is sincere, hopeful, faithful people that love God and want to love people. And that's just the reality with everything. You know, you said it earlier, someone Might see Bradley Martin open a gym and they're like, oh, shoot, well, I'm gonna start opening gyms because it worked for him and it might work for me. You know what I mean?

[A]

That absolutely happened.

[B]

Yeah, it probably did. And that's the case. Same thing.

[A]

Ten gyms. Something culture. Now it's like fitness culture, iron culture, strength culture. Yeah, it was pretty interesting.

[B]

We're going to sue you.

[A]

No, I'm not going to sue anyone. I mean, you can't sue anyone over that word, but we're going to sue you. Previous to that word, no one did. I think it's just a lot of experiences like that where I'm like, man, people just suck. But I get it at the same time. Because they want this.

[B]

Yeah, because people are inherently bad. Right?

[A]

I mean, that's the thing. I wasn't that way. I wasn't that way, though.

[B]

No, no.

[A]

People are opportunistics.

[B]

You have no. I get what you're saying. I just mean in general, like.

[A]

No, no, no, no, no, to your point. Exactly. And the points you try to make, which is a bit. Little. Little facetious, but I'll tell you that what I mean by people are inherently good is that I think they're good. And what I also said earlier was that I think people do what they think is good for them and that what they do, what they also do what they think is good for the people in their life. Right. So these people who see what I'm doing, oh, it worked for him. It was good. They're not doing anything bad to me by taking a name. And, you know, I might have felt like, damn, they stole my sort of swagger, they stole my sort of whatever. But in their mind, they go, it worked for him. It was good. It can work for me. It could be good for me and my family. That's not an innately bad thing in our inherently bad thing. That's just someone from their perspective, which is what I've been speaking to, thinking this is good for me. However it affected me is irrelevant. Right. Because it didn't really affect me other than my ego in relationship to thinking like, ah, man, I thought of this. Why did they copy my. So I do think, regardless, they are inherently good. I. I still think that to this day. I think people are. I think they're proven through, like, social media, society, the world, that, like, I have to do whatever I have to do to take care of myself and my family. And, you know, like I said, the younger me, when that happened, my ego was like, Ah, they stole my. But as I got older and I recognized, it was like, oh, these people just saw this as an opportunity to make their lives better.

[B]

Sure.

[A]

Which is still inherently good. And. And from their perspective, they're doing something that is good.

[B]

Yeah, it might. But again, you know, the motive might not be sincere. You know what I mean? And what I mean by that is, like, you know, you started the gym because you've. You've been going to the gym. You love the gym. It's a part of who you are. It's a. It's a ha. It's a hobby you have. It's a passion you have have. And so you didn't have to, like, muster up strength to be like, I'm gonna start a gym. I'm gonna start a clothing brand, a fitness clothing brand. And, like, I'm gonna talk about fitness stuff online. You know, you didn't have to, like, perform to do that. Whereas, like, some people may look at popular fitness guys, and then, you know, fitness is okay in their life. You know, it's something that they do, but they're like, oh, they're making a load of money and they're doing this, so I want to do it. Then we would probably both be like, that may appear good, but their motive might be money. And you never know what people will do for money. You'll never know what people will do for anything. Status, fame, or whatever. And that's just a part of reality, I believe, which is the unfortunate case. And it's kind of like what you said people, like, when we talked about this, we've been making a Christian energy drink and a hydration brand. And basically what that means is just trying to offer cleaner options, better options, and putting Christianity retail. Like, I think that we need Jesus in retail. Just want people to, like, see Jesus and know the heart behind the company is, like, pure and good, and there are people that care. And we wanted to make products like, the shaker bottle has Bible verses on the cup because so many people have a hard time talking about their faith. And if you're using this, you can literally use the cup to help talk. We just wanted to make products that would help people. And people looked at it and they were like, oh, you're just trying to, you know, do this and do that, and you just want to make a buck or whatever.

[A]

Like, it's performative.

[B]

Yeah. And it's like, okay, you can think that, like, that'. Fine, you have the right to have an opinion, but deep down, no one's going to understand that and there's going to be a lot of people that hear them be like, oh, I don't believe that that's okay. You know, but the reality of the situation is some people do things out of pure intent. And sometimes people don't do things out of a pure intent. You know, that's just the case that that just happens. So that goes with everything, the mega churches, you know, with things like that. People manipulating their authority, their position of authority to do bad things, whatever that looks like to make a buck. Like, like one of the most popular churches in my hometown when I was younger, they had a different pastor there and the pastor cheated on his wife, stole a million dollars from the church and ran. So when they brought a new pastor in, the community was skeptical because they were like, oh, what if this happens again? Right over generalization happened before, it might happen again. And the pastor there is a really good friend of mine and one of the most honorable, sincere, full of integrity, gentle, kind, open handed, whatever God wants kind of people. And I really think that's the sign of someone that, that really has a pure heart is someone that goes, if God took this away right now, I would be okay kind of deal, you know?

[A]

Yeah, I mean, I think that's the test. Right. I think that the. How you really know someone is when it, when that does actually happen.

[B]

Yeah.

[A]

How does someone actually act? How do they actually move forward from that?

[B]

Yeah.

[A]

Because, you know, it's easy to talk about pure and good intent when things are going in the direction in which you want it to go for sure. But then when it doesn't, like, do you still have that pure and good intent? You just pull a Logan Paul.

[B]

Did I what?

[A]

Oh, I thought there was nothing in there.

[B]

Oh, no, there was like a little bit. It's not coming.

[A]

But he did the prime. Do you remember seeing that?

[B]

Oh, no.

[A]

You were like, roast. They were like roasting him because he like was drinking the prime.

[B]

I was like, wait, what? I was like trying to get a last sip. No.

[A]

Yeah, because I didn't see anything.

[B]

Oh, okay.

[A]

But I don't even think, I don't even think that was true. I just remember this was like a clip clip with Logan.

[B]

You know, I actually been. Because you have the protein drink with it.

[A]

Yeah. It's amazing.

[B]

I haven't tried it yet.

[A]

It's good.

[B]

I've heard it's really good.

[A]

Yeah, it's really good.

[B]

I really want it.

[A]

I'm not even trying to promo it, but it's really good. Yeah. I just thought you got. You were trying to, like, Logan, Paul, me on the.

[B]

Yeah, I just. That's what I've been doing.

[A]

Because I wonder if they're gonna see it be like, yeah, there was nothing in that, dude.

[B]

I promise. There's a little liquid in here. There is a little bit. It's in there.

[A]

It was like. So do you think you could do the same thing? Like. Like, oh, I feel like such an.

[B]

No, you're Bro. Any questions on the table? Yeah, it's not gonna offend me.

[A]

Do you think you could still do the same. Same thing without making it religious?

[B]

Yeah, absolutely.

[A]

Do you think it would sell the same if it wasn't religious based on your audience?

[B]

Maybe it might do better. But I. I didn't create this because I was like, oh, I have a Christian audience. I can target them and sell it.

[A]

But that's. I'm gonna be. I gotta be really transparent. That's exactly what this is doing. Well, like, word for word, it says, praise hydration with a cross.

[B]

That's exact.

[A]

I'm not trying to be mean to you.

[B]

No, no. I know exactly what you're saying. But that's. Again, you're almost making the assumption like, that was the reason why I did.

[A]

But that's exact. It's so hard for me to see this, but it is.

[B]

But you have to understand, right. The same way that fitness. That fitness is like your life. It's who you are. It's literally attached to your personality. Jesus is for me.

[A]

Yeah.

[B]

So everything that I do from the core of me is I want Jesus to be involved. And so, like, yeah. Would I be open to making it? Sure. But without the shadow of a doubt. My first mind was like, I gotta put Jesus attached to it because I want people to see Jesus when they see this product. I want people to know the heart behind the company. So, like, this QR code on it. Anyone can scan this QR code and upload a prayer request anonymously, anything they want. And within 24 hours, a real person from our team will have prayed for their prayer. And it's an anonymous prayer request, the cup you can use to share their faith. Because one of the things we do outside of the podcast, we go into the street. Raw interactions. Hey, what do you think about Jesus talking to people about Jesus? And so many people want to do it and they don't know how to start the conversations. So it's okay. Why don't we make a cup to go with this? And that has the Bible verses on it, and it's three simple ones that would kind of lead people in a general idea of what the gospel is, that we're sinners and Jesus came down on the cross. They can use that as an example, as a way to be like, yo, check out this Bible verse on my cup, or something like that, you know, and so I can totally understand. It's not a mean question at all. It may appear that way because we have a Christian audience, but we also have a lot of non Christians that watch us as well because we talk to a lot of people that aren't Christian. You know, we go into environments of people where we're the minority, where we're going into, quote, unquote, heated environments and navigating those conversations. And so, no, I don't think that's a mean question at all. And I can understand that. But my heart is, how do I get Jesus involved? Because at the core of who I am, that's who I am. And if I believe Jesus is the truth, maybe someone who didn't like church growing up who hasn't. When's the last time you stepped foot in a church?

[A]

I went to New York recently. I was doing some live stream with Sneako and I went to a church in New York. It was a really beautiful church for right in the financial district, like right near the stock market thing. I don't know the name of the church, but it was like a very old beautiful church.

[B]

Yeah. So, like, you know, sometimes people's experiences are different. They haven't gone in X amount of time and things like that. So they may be like, well, I don't know if I could go into church, but maybe I could sit down with Bryce and have a conversation.

[A]

Wait, that's going to church and just pop into flames or something? No, I, Dude, I believe.

[B]

It's just, you know what I mean?

[A]

Yeah, I, I believe. I definitely believe in God. I just really struggle with the human, like, iterations of it and that's. And all this sort of stuff to me is like, I don't know, it just feels like it's, it's pandering to a specific audience, which is fine.

[B]

Like, you know, I could say the same thing about, you know, prime protein drink.

[A]

Yeah.

[B]

I be like, you know, you're a big buff guy. Yeah.

[A]

I mean, you're selling protein. There's a difference between, like, if, if I was like, like I'm talking about some religion and then this is the, the backbone of this protein thing would be a little bit different, I think.

[B]

Yeah, but fitness is the backbone of your Protein thing, and that's what you do. So I think, you know, branding, I don't think is inherently bad. I think a brand shows the heart, the passion, the zeal, the branding of the. Of the company. Right. And so, yeah, sure, we can make a product, but one of the things, like, with our energy drink, it has, like. Like, less than half of the amount of ingredients that most of the energy drinks have.

[A]

I love how this also become, like, a really good, like, marketing thing for you. It's pretty funny. I'm not gonna lie.

[B]

It's hilarious. It is kind of funny. But, like, you know, we're just, you know. You know what I mean? I'm just excited.

[A]

I've been doing this for so long, it's like the second I hear it, I'm like, damn. It's, like, ironic that I'm, like, challenging it, and at the same time, it's probably gonna convert better to the audience who's like, that's Brad. I'm gonna buy this because I believe in God. And I like. Like, I like that guy.

[B]

And, bro, you know what? So many people. So many people had a problem with it. And I understand, even your core audience Christians had such a big problem with it.

[A]

Yeah.

[B]

And I understand. And that's okay. And that. That's, again, because their perspective of it is he's a grifter. He doesn't have a good heart behind it, where it's like, I. I love energy drinks. Love energy drinks. But I wanted one that was, like, a cleaner, better option for, like, my body. This is so good. I wanted one that had Jesus on it, that was in your face, that you could use the products to tell people about Jesus. And it was in retail. Who knows? Maybe you have non Christians that wear a cross necklace around their neck. Maybe they see the cross on the front of a can or on the front of a box of the electrolytes or on a thing, and it reminds them of Jesus, and somehow they get impacted by the gospel, you know, so you never know. And so there is also that side to it. But.

[A]

But are you doing any charity work with this? Like, proceeds and things like that?

[B]

Yes. And I'll tell you off camera what we're doing with it, but we're purposefully not announcing it because we don't want people to think that we're trying to say that so they can blame us. As if. Oh, you're just trying to. Now do it. Good. So I'll tell you what we're doing after, which is actually really cool, which is really Cool. But.

[A]

And, yeah, I'm sorry. I'm not trying to be. I just.

[B]

Bro, I don't think you are. It's a right question. And you know what? I haven't talked about that at all publicly, so I'm glad you asked.

[A]

It goes back to all my skepticism of just the whole thing. Just all of it, man.

[B]

Well, that, you know, skepticism isn't wrong. My Bible teacher, my sophomore year was just like. I arguably think, like, God would just snatch him up to heaven because he's the holiest guy I've ever met. He would always say, always be a good, respectful skeptic. Don't just believe something I teach you in Bible class. Go look it up for yourself. And I admired that about him. I thought that was pretty sweet.

[A]

Yeah, it's definitely. I mean, I can't help but be skeptical of people, man. And not you in particular.

[B]

Just.

[A]

Just people in general, dude.

[B]

Yeah. I mean, well, you know, I just

[A]

been through a lot of.

[B]

You've experienced a lot of stuff. You've been around a while.

[A]

Yeah, I've seen a lot. I've been on the social media game. I've seen it all, man.

[B]

You have?

[A]

I've really. I've seen every version and so.

[B]

Can I ask you, like, a different question?

[A]

Whatever you want.

[B]

Okay. This is. This is kind of a random question. Have you ever. Have you ever struggled with gluttony?

[A]

Like eating too much food, specifically food,

[B]

and even pertains to gluttony?

[A]

I'm not really. I mean, post like, competition stuff, because I did like, the bodybuilding stuff, like early 20, 11, 10, 12.

[B]

That's, like, tradition, though.

[A]

Yeah, it's more so like you died. It's so hard. Then you're just like, you can't stop eating. But never really had a problem with eating. Yeah, More so the opposite. I can, like, not eat anything. Well, I typically fast, like, every day to like, 3:00pm oh, wow. Yeah. My whole life, to be honest.

[B]

So I never had, like a. Like a gluttony problem in the sense that I could never stop eating. But I had a. I have a hard time, like, wanting to eat a bunch of food. Like, you know what I'm saying? Like, late at night, I'm like, I could slam 40 McNuggets right now.

[A]

Yeah. Late at night, I definitely want some ice cream.

[B]

Like, when I first started that. That training program didn't. Literally didn't eat like, a single dessert for like, three and a half months. And then I went to Crumble Cookie cave. I ate 12 crumble cookies in my car. I didn't even leave the parking lot. Ate 12 crumble cookies.

[A]

Yeah, I went, I, I like, I ate some crumble for a little bit, but then it's just like. That makes you sick, bro.

[B]

It kind of hurts, you know, it's not good.

[A]

But yeah, no, yeah, I've never really had too much of a gluttony problem. Maybe. Like I, I'm for sure probably had like a sex addiction at one point.

[B]

Okay, wait, tell me a little bit

[A]

about, I know you'd like this.

[B]

Tell, tell me a little bit about that. How do you view sex? How do you view like now?

[A]

Now. And now it's way different. But for sure, the whole social media come up, I think. I mean, it was sort of twofold, like validation. Like I was getting so much of it, you know, popular on the Internet, getting likes, feeling like I deserve whatever I want. And then at the same time, I think it was also my, the problem that I had with having a good relationship was because I always felt, like I told you earlier, like I felt like people are gonna leave so that I was always sort of searching for more because I, I don't know, just the fear of, I guess being alone or being left makes you sort of, oh, let me, let me find other options. Let me always have something to fall back on. Yeah, that's, that's what really taught me in the, in the longer term after I had like two seven year relationships, that that's sort of an insatiable thing that's just always going to be fleeting. And it's more like, okay, how am I good with myself to be able to actually be good with a partner? So I definitely learned the hard way through to like trying to continuously have validation through having different partners and all this sort of. And never really feeling full, never really feeling like it was enough. And so I just thought about it when you thought about, you brought up the gluttony thing. But I definitely had that problem for some time in my life, like during my 20s. And you know, you just learn. I learned the hard way. I learned the hard way through like actually losing people that you're like, oh man, this. In hindsight, you look at it, you're like, oh, this could have been a really good thing in the long run. Obviously at the time it's not like I was just, yeah, I want to just be, you know, not loyal and I want to just be a bad person. It's not at all the thought that I had in my mind. There's a Lot of other details that I'm not going to, like, bore you with as far as, like, how the relationship started and where it goes, but it was me just trying to feel like, oh, I should. I shouldn't be alone and I should have this affection and just, like, constantly trying to bounce and find it.

[B]

Yeah.

[A]

But, yeah, learn the hard way. You learn the hard way, and you're like, damn, okay, this is. There's no fulfillment in this. It's like. It's just like money. It's like a never ending. It can never sort of be enough until you get to the point of, like, all right, do I. Do I love myself? Am I. Am I actually, like, happy with where I'm at in my life? Have I, like, come to the realization that, like, I'm okay with or without? And that just took a long time for me to get to for sure.

[B]

Do you want to get married one day?

[A]

I don't know. I mean, marriage, like, the way it's written and the way it's all sort of, you know, transcribed now and just. It's kind of not my favorite idea. I definitely want a partner. I definitely want to be in a. And have a real, true partnership. I want to be with someone. I'd like to spend my life with someone. I'm not looking for, like, multiple people and all that sort of thing. Thing. But marriage as it's written, you know, and you sign to the law and, you know, all these agreements and you're signing with the government. It's kind of a stupid concept, in my opinion. Not the idea of a partnership. Not the idea of a union, like, with two people. I think that's very.

[B]

You're just talking about legally, like, signing a government document.

[A]

Yeah, I think that's all. But absolutely. Having a union and being able to grow with someone and being able to build your life with someone. I think that's the reason why we're here, dude.

[B]

That's something that we talked. So I'd been having that conversation with my old roommate. Like, what does it mean to actually be married? Like, what signifies a marriage? We were just talking about practically and according to the Bible, like, is it when you sign a document, is it when someone. You consummate the marriage by having sex? Is it just saying, hey, we're married? Because if that's the case, then, like, if I was like, all right, Bradley, we're married, then we'd be married. And it's like, that's kind of stupid. So we were having that conversation and didn't really know and then Tristan Tate said something similar that you just said too, where he's like, he does. Doesn't believe in the. The. The marriage document, which I'm not. I don't know how I feel about all of it. I'm just trying to figure out what does it actually mean? Like, what is the signifier that someone's in a union? You know what I mean? That's where I'm hung up on it.

[A]

I mean, I think then that kind of goes back to what you believe religiously, but it's definitely some sort of. Some sort of moment where you're. You're identifying that this is what you're going to be doing, whether it's consummated, it's in a church, or you're coming together, the two families are coming together, agreeing that this is what's happening. I mean, you gotta think all this, like, document type is. It's new. It's not. It's not like. Like, if it didn't exist, could people still be married? Could people still have marriages? Could people still have partnerships? Of course.

[B]

Yeah. Yeah. You know, like, even dating.

[A]

Because also. I'm sorry I interrupted. But also, even if you're married, I mean, usually you look at the stats on marriage, it's like, what, 70% divorce rate or some 60 divorce rate. 80 is initiated by the woman. It's like anyone at any point could just go, I don't want to do this anymore and get a divorce. And that's the norm. Yeah, that's statistically the norm.

[B]

Yeah.

[A]

So even if it's consummated, it's religious. You have a big show. It's a, you know, a big whatever. You go on some vacation and you get married. Italy or whatever. Like a year, six months, two years, someone could still be like, I don't want to do this anymore. I'm getting a divorce.

[B]

Yeah.

[A]

So what makes a marriage is a commitment continuously over time. Whether it's a consummation, whether you have an agreement or a written document. A marriage, if we're talking about, like, a partnership and a union, till death do us part, is just consistent effort and consistent work over time continuously. And whether you write it on a piece of paper or not, that's what you have to do. You have to put in the effort.

[B]

Yeah, I. If I had a. If you look up, like, when dating was invented, it was only invented, like, 120 years ago, and it was like a euphemism for sexual favor. Like, if you told someone, like, 120 years ago, I'm going on a date. You were like, going to hook up with someone and then. Still kind of valid today, now, would you kind of.

[A]

Yeah, it's kind of still valid today.

[B]

Yeah, it still happens.

[A]

That's what people do.

[B]

But I think one of the reasons, I mean, again, I'm a Christian, so, like, I believe that the divorce rates are so high because people don't have Jesus in the center of their marriage. And, you know, like, my wife and I dated for two years and we waited to. Till marriage to have sex. And we.

[A]

That makes me just want to go, like, what are the divorce rate of Christians? Can we pull that up?

[B]

The screen does not, unfortunately.

[A]

God, sorry.

[B]

Pull up the statistic. Can we pull that up? It just sits on us so you can only see us.

[A]

Well, that's what I'm saying. I'm so interested in that statistic because I wonder what that statistic is for that specific group of people.

[B]

Well, typically there's this theme of Christians. They get married fairly young and a lot of beautiful marriages. I know, See, because it's interesting because I had a friend, I remember I became a Christian when I was 17, and about a month in and following Jesus, I met about like 100 Christians. Some of them are still my friends today. I lived with some of them. One of the guys I met there, he met his wife, they dated for three months, got married in three months, and they have a flourishing marriage with beautiful kids. And they're just awesome. On the contrary, I know people that have been married 20, 30, 40 years who don't have Jesus in their life that are just crumbling, Crumbling. But also the Bible has some cool descriptive dynamics of, like, why marriage and imagery is beautiful, like marriage, man and a woman to, you know, Christ and believers and stuff like that. It's pretty sick.

[A]

Yeah, I don't know. I don't know enough about any of that. I really want to know the statistics, though. Did you pull that up? 33. So even Christian 33, and then the average in America.

[B]

I feel like that's not bad, though, for Christians.

[A]

And again, yeah, in comparison to that,

[B]

in comparison to the average. And. And also you're talking about people that just claim to be Christian in that statistic.

[A]

Probably, but that's my whole. That's my whole issue with all of this. That's the whole issue with all this is people who. Yeah, this is what I do. This is what I believe.

[B]

And it's like, well, you know, if you, if. If we were hanging out right now and I was like, yeah, man, I'm a Christian. And, you know, we. We have a podcast where we talk about Jesus. And, you know, I'm talking all this stuff, and then I invited you over to my house for dinner, and I'm cheating on my wife, and I'm getting drunk, and I'm telling you all these plans I have to steal people's money. You'd be like, this dude does not love Jesus at all one bit.

[A]

Yeah, he loves himself.

[B]

Yes.

[A]

Yeah.

[B]

So, you know, there is that comparison, too. That'd be like me going, oh, oh, bro, I'm a big gym buff. Like, I'm obsessed with the gym. Like, I love it. You'd be like, dude, you're out of your mind.

[A]

But. And you hate bench pressing. It's like, this guy's a. I can't

[B]

remember last time I barbell bench pressed.

[A]

So stupid.

[B]

I like the dumbbell bench press.

[A]

I think God would be disappointed in

[B]

you, to be honest, because I don't barbell bench press 100%.

[A]

I like.

[B]

I like the. The dumbbell. A dumbbell. I forgot the name because I'm so

[A]

in love with it. He's so disappointed.

[B]

I love the dumbbell. Yeah, how about. How about this?

[A]

But I was like. I read it in a book. He told me straight up, man.

[B]

He visited me in a dream with a golden three.

[A]

I was at Waffle House plates. I was at Waffle House. And he came to me and he

[B]

said, do you like Waffle House?

[A]

It's all right. Yeah, it's all right. I mean, it's not really good.

[B]

It's like.

[A]

Like, if you're like. Yeah. I mean, it's like, if you want. Just, like, super mid, but, like, it's good if you're drunk.

[B]

I think they could sneeze. They could sneeze on your food, and there could be a motorcycle on fire in the. In the parking lot.

[A]

And there's definitely a fight there.

[B]

You know, it's throwing down anything past 10am at Waffle House. It's. It's like World War III over there. It's crazy.

[A]

I've only eaten there, like, twice. No, three times. It wasn't that bad. Also that good.

[B]

We'll make a deal. I'll take you to Waffle House on a date, and then in return, you train me for the next three years in the gym.

[A]

I get one date, and you got it.

[B]

Three years, dude. It's a big deal.

[A]

Holy. Sounds like a terrible deal, bro. I mean, you should come to the gym. I don't know why you haven't oh, it's great. Because you hate the gym.

[B]

Well, you hate God, actually. God, dude, I was intimidated by you.

[A]

Me?

[B]

Yeah. Why? I don't know. You just kind of intimidated me.

[A]

For what?

[B]

I don't know. You just kind of did.

[A]

Just cuz like the content you've seen.

[B]

No, no, no. I don't know what it is. It's just like, I don't know, it happens with like random people. Like, I get nervous to approach like random certain people and I was like nervous to reach out to you.

[A]

So curious why there.

[B]

I'm telling you, there's literally no other reason other than like, I don't really understand why. But then the second you jumped out of the car, I was like, oh, I love him. You know? You didn't even say anything.

[A]

Just, I'm just regular bro.

[B]

I'm just such a regular dude, you know? But I, I, I definitely, I would go, I guess. You know, something I actually do have a hard time with is. Dang. I actually have never really talked about this before. I have a big insecurity on like what people will think of me in the gym. No one cares out of a comparison way where if I don't, if no one, like, if I'm not in the same realm that they are. You know what I'm saying?

[A]

Yeah, yeah. I think a lot of people have that. The reality is anyone who's like really in the gym and they see someone, whether they're super overweight or they're really skinny and they're like real gym bros, like, those would be the ones you'd be intimidated by, right? Because you'd probably put them at this category that, oh, they've, they figured it out or they, they already got the, the muscle or the strength. None of those people are ever going to be the people that will make you feel less because you're less than them in the gym. Him. That just is not the reality. If anything, I think all those cases, those are the people who are like more so willing to help because they've already done it and they see someone who wants to do it.

[B]

It's, it's.

[A]

I've never ever been in a situation where I've seen like some like Super Jim bro just be to some guy just because he was smaller or like fatter ever.

[B]

Yeah, people don't care. I'm thinking of like instances that I've had like, like, you know, traveling and being at a gym and like it's oftentimes the, the bigger guys that are encouraging you.

[A]

Yeah, that's What I'm saying, it's more of like a, it's like you said, it's an insecurity. It's more of your own ego, like, placing this, like, oh, someone's going to think this of me, but people are just focused on bettering themselves there.

[B]

Yeah. Yeah. But you know how, like, some people have a gym ego, but. And they're like, I have to live heavy, lift heavier weights because I'm in the gym. Like, you know what I mean? It's like they lift, they try to lift a heavier weight than they can actually handle.

[A]

Yeah.

[B]

Like, I, I, I don't have that, that kind of, like, insecurity where, like, if I looked at someone next to me and they were lifting double my weight, it's like, oh, I have to try that.

[A]

Yeah.

[B]

That does not bother me. For some reason. It's like the idea of, by the

[A]

way, more those guys do that because they're trying to, like, impress them. Be honest with you.

[B]

And I'm secure because I got wife.

[A]

Yeah. Like, they're, they're like, I gotta lift this weight because it's like I'm trying to impress the girls.

[B]

Yeah.

[A]

Even though it's typically, like, guys who'd be like, damn, bro, it was a really good lift.

[B]

How much you badge, bro? Yeah, I'm not, that's, that's not me. Me. But I definitely. Yeah, I think that's something that, that I've always had a hard time with.

[A]

Being insecure about going to the gym.

[B]

Yeah. I don't know what it is. I'm just like a, it's almost like I've always had such a hard time, even after becoming a Christian, with, like, what people think of me, you know, like, if someone makes an assumption about me online or says something about me that's not true in person or online, like, I'm the first person. Immediately my brain is like, like, I didn't mean that. I didn't say that. Pull up the receipts, you know, check the security camera footage. Like that. That's always me. So I guess when it comes to the agent, when it comes to the gym, I have that insecurity of, like, oh, I don't want to show up. And, you know, people in the back of their mind be like, oh, what's he doing here? What is? You know what I mean?

[A]

Who cares? I mean, even in relationship to the whole Internet thing, like, I've been doing this for so long. I know we keep talking about that, but I've, I definitely.

[B]

So long.

[A]

I definitely. Yeah, very Long. I definitely used to think more, oh, man, I want to be able to make everyone happy. I want everyone to be able to appreciate me and not feel like, you know, I did anything wrong or did anything bad. And I. I realized really early on that, like, it just does not matter. No matter what you do, people are going to decide whether they love or hate you, period. And they're going to run with whatever narrative they want to run with at all. It doesn't matter. You can't control it. All you can't control is how you continue to show up and people. Like, I can't tell you how many messages have I gotten over the years where people be like, oh, man, I used to think you were. You were even like, or afraid to approach me or whatever. And over time, they'll see. Oh, they'll send a message. It'll be mean, like, 2017. And then 2021, they're like, oh, man, I'm sorry I ever said anything mean. I really like your content. I appreciate. Like, it just takes.

[B]

Oh, yeah, that one thing.

[A]

And it's just like, you. You can't live being like, I want to just make everyone like me. It's not ever gonna work. It's not ever gonna happen. And you. You got to do it because, like, it's just who you are. You. You just be yourself and you'll have the success. It just takes time.

[B]

Dang. Thank you for saying that.

[A]

It's like, even in regards to all this, you know, even as I was saying about this, like, that's just. I was just giving you my perspective outside looking in, not knowing enough about your reason behind anything and knowing enough about everyone else's, sort of like, how they've done all this and then me just applying that to you. But it could be completely untrue because you could have a real reason for it, which you did and what you explained. But, like, my point in all that is saying is, like, it just does not matter what people think of you. It doesn't. It matters what you think of yourself, because what you think of yourself will allow you to do the things that, okay, this is really of me. This is really my heart. This is who I am. And the people who are going to matter are going to be people who are able to see that or are at that moment in their life, able and willing to see that, to be able to take something from it for themselves. All the other people who say, oh, this and all that about this person, and, oh, I saw this, and I think that. Or I want this guy to be this. Because I look at him like that and it's all relevant like that. Just. You don't do it for those people. You never do it for those people. You do it for yourself so that you could actually give the good to other people. Because like I was saying earlier, I don't think you came in here thinking like, oh, I just to want. Want to take advantage of people. And I think you have a genuine reason for, like, the stuff that you're talking about. That's all that matters, doesn't matter. It's just all nonsense. You're never going to avoid it. No matter how hard you try to get everyone to love you or like you, it's just not going to happen. But if you're true to yourself, other people will see that, be encouraged by that, want to be more true to themselves, and they'll find value in that, in you, for themselves. And that's. That's just life.

[B]

So thanks for saying that.

[A]

Yeah.

[B]

Yeah.

[A]

Because I. I just. I've done it. I've been through it. I've done all this. It's kind of funny. I became the father figure in a lot of ways.

[B]

You know what they say.

[A]

Yeah.

[B]

With age comes wisdom.

[A]

Yeah. You know, with pain, with depression. Yeah. With all. You just learn, hopefully, Right.

[B]

Yeah.

[A]

You don't quit.

[B]

All right, well, let me pray for you really quick.

[A]

Yeah.

[B]

Jesus, thank you for this day, God. Thank you for our conversation and thank you for Bradley and his time and allowing us to get to hang out. God, would you just continue to move in this life? Life? Speak to him through the scriptures, Speak to him through people, Speak to him through yalls, conversations together in prayer. God, be with him, guide him, protect him, Guide us all. We love you, Jesus. It's in your name we pray. Amen.

[A]

Amen.