Ted Dhanik -I Found My True Self By Being Authentic Online & Offline

Summary

---

Podcast Summary: "We're Out of Time" – Ted Dhanik: “I Found My True Self By Being Authentic Online & Offline”

Host: Richard Taite
Guest: Ted Dhanik (entrepreneur, former MySpace and adtech exec)
Date: September 16, 2025

---

Overview:

In this candid, engaging episode, host Richard Taite sits down with Ted Dhanik—serial entrepreneur, MySpace veteran, and advocate for authenticity—to discuss his journey through Silicon Valley, the adtech boom, influencer marketing, and, ultimately, self-discovery. Together, they tackle deep topics like mental health, drug culture in tech, spiritual well-being, and the necessity of aligning your offline and online selves.

---

Key Discussion Points & Insights

1. Ted’s Origin Story, Cultural Identity & MySpace Era

• Indian-American Journey: Ted reflects on Indian cultural perceptions in the US, humorously noting how “Indians are trending now” ([01:16]), and how he “spent 35, 40 years trying to figure out if Indians were actually cool or not” ([01:27]).
• Early Tech Career: Ted’s background in Silicon Valley and work at NextTag (a LendingTree competitor), leading to his key role at MySpace as VP of Strategic Marketing (“VP of Fun”) ([02:53]).
• MySpace & Iconic Moments: Stories from the MySpace days, including insights on the company’s sale to News Corp and the cultural zeitgeist of that era ([04:34]–[05:39]).
• Networking & Industry Friendships: Anecdotes about Tom Anderson (“MySpace Tom”), Rich Rosenblatt, and the tight-knit dot-com founders’ network ([05:27]–[12:36]).

---

Quote:
“I was head of strategic marketing. My title is the VP of Fun.”
— Ted Dhanik ([02:53])

---

2. Tech Boom, Dot-Com Culture & Drug Scene

• Dot-Com Culture: The 1990s tech boom—a mix of rapid scaling, wild office parties, drugs, and “entitlement” in Silicon Valley ([07:52]–[11:43]).
• Substance Use: Candid discussion about the prevalence of drug use in the scene (“the parties were insane in the office... This is before the whole MeToo movement. So there’s like crazy happening everywhere.” ([08:34]), and how Ted himself abstained ([08:25])).
• Mental Health: The dangers of substances like meth and the importance of early intervention ([10:21]–[11:01]).

---

Quote:
“There was so much ecstasy out there...and then there was a study that said MDMA created black holes in your brain, but recently they said it was actually meth, not MDMA.”
— Ted Dhanik ([09:28]–[10:21])

---

3. AdTech Entrepreneurship, IPOs, and “Tall Poppy Syndrome”

• LowerMyBills, Engage:BDR, and Iconic Reach: Ted shares the business evolution from lead gen for personal finance to building and scaling ad-exchanges and influencer marketplaces ([11:44]–[32:49]).
• Bootstrapping to IPO: Building Engage:BDR from scratch to $1M/month revenue in 30 days, rolling up companies for an IPO—done “selling a dream” ([14:17]–[17:32]).
• Australia’s “Tall Poppy Syndrome”: Facing culture shock after taking his company public in Australia—a society where standing out leads to criticism, impacting even his personal life (“they literally call it Tall Poppy...their mission is to take you down.” ([19:47]–[21:28])).

---

Quote:
“I bought a Bugatti...and the next day I get smashed. The stock would get smashed because they write a story about me...In Australia, they have this thing called Tall Poppy. It’s a syndrome. They want to chop down everyone who stands out.”
— Ted Dhanik ([19:47])

---

4. Burnout, Identity, and the Power of Authenticity

• Losing and Reclaiming Identity: Ted discusses how the grind and public-company pressures caused him to lose touch with his own sense of self, leading to a three-year sabbatical focused on critical thinking, spiritual renewal, and wellness ([21:29]–[23:22]).
• Purpose-Driven Work: Contrasts earlier startups (which “added huge value for everyone”) versus later ventures where purpose was unclear, emphasizing the importance of making a positive impact ([24:08]–[25:35]).
• Defining Authenticity:
  • The “clear sign” you’re not living authentically is if people say, “You’re so different than I thought you’d be” when meeting offline after seeing you online.
  • Ted’s transformation: “I am just one person now. My identity is clear. I am not associated or affiliated with any other identities or with any other group.” ([55:37]–[56:29])

---

Quote:
“What defines me back then was different than what defines me now. Now, strip away everything...in your last moments, what value did I bring to anyone else in this world?”
— Ted Dhanik ([54:07]–[54:29])

---

5. Trends & Realities in Influencer Marketing

• Evolution of Influencer Campaigns: Brand spending shifts from mega-influencer endorsements to user-generated content (UGC), often from micro-influencers or even everyday consumers ([26:05]–[29:26]).
• Affiliate Models Rise: Brands increasingly use cost-per-acquisition deals with content creators, giving “stay at home moms” affiliate links and a cut of sales ([29:27]–[30:42]).
• Self-Serve Marketplaces: Challenges of getting influencers to adopt self-serve platforms—most still want full service ([30:59]–[32:21]).

---

6. Wellness & Spiritual Self-Care Journey

• The Five Pillars of Ted's Self-Care:

  1. Wellness
  2. Fitness
  3. Health
  4. Spirituality
  5. Sleep ([33:07])

• Transcendental Meditation:

  • Deep personal commitment to TM, learning from Denny Goodman (Santa Monica TM Center), and gifting the practice to others ([34:17]–[39:01]).
  • Letting mental “noise” flow rather than resisting it—a lesson in acceptance ([39:01]–[39:38]).

---

Quote:
“TM is so different...they literally tell you, let the noise be loud. Who cares? Let it roll. If you don’t, you’ll be clogged up.”
— Ted Dhanik ([38:00]–[39:01])

---

• Psychedelic-Assisted Therapy:

  • Experiences with ketamine therapy and microdosing psilocybin mushrooms for emotional reset, identity clarity, and mental wellness ([40:34]–[43:10]).
  • Ted’s ownership of a microdosing mushroom company (Asante).

• Biohacking:

  • Hormone optimization, strict sleep hygiene (“Eight hours is good, but timing matters—circadian rhythm can’t be changed.” ([44:54]–[45:26])), and detailed lab tracking every 45 days ([48:08]–[49:31]).
  • Nutrition focus—mostly carnivore, avoiding inflammatory foods (lectins/oxalates), and emphasizing simple, whole foods ([46:07]–[47:08]).

• Emphasis on Spirituality Over Religion:

  • Raised Hindu but identifies as spiritual, not religious.
  • “Hinduism...says all the gods are within us...The answers are here, not outside.” ([50:26]–[52:20])

---

7. The Defining Trait—True Consistency Between Online & Offline Selves

Ted’s final insight: lasting value and fulfillment come from authenticity, from being one integrated person, and delivering value to others.

---

Quote:
“You just need to be who you really need to be. And when this happens, you really start to highlight the differences between you and the rest of the world.”
— Ted Dhanik ([56:28])

---

Memorable Quotes & Moments

• “I want to be able to add value that changes or improves someone's life...the only fulfillment we truly get is by doing things for other people.” — Ted Dhanik ([25:19])
• “I lost a big part of myself during all of that...the purpose was the business, unfortunately.” ([23:03]–[23:06])
• “What happened before was that my identity was a collective identity...I needed three years to recalibrate and refine, re-identify who I am.” ([22:58])
• “I am one person now. So my identity is clear.” ([56:18])

---

Notable Timestamps

• [00:04]: Ted on inauthenticity & the drive to be truly himself
• [02:53]: MySpace memories, VP of Fun
• [07:29]: Silicon Valley stories & early lead-gen business
• [09:28]: The Bay Area's house music & drug scene
• [14:17]: Building Engage:BDR & the “selling a dream” acquisitions
• [19:47]: Tall Poppy Syndrome and Australian culture shock
• [21:29]: On burnout, recalibration, and sabbatical
• [24:08]: What makes work fulfilling (& what doesn’t)
• [26:05]: Macro trends in influencer marketing
• [33:07]: Ted’s “Five Pillars” of self-care
• [34:17]: Meditation practice—TM and its impact
• [40:34]: Ketamine therapy and psychedelics for wellness
• [46:11]: Nutrition philosophy—carnivore, whole foods, avoiding lectins/oxalates
• [50:26]: Spirituality, religion, and embracing an internal locus
• [55:37]: The test of authenticity: “You’re so different than I thought you’d be”
• [56:18]: “I am one person now. So my identity is clear.”

---

Final Thoughts

This episode delivers an honest look at the rollercoaster of tech entrepreneurship, the cost of chasing external goals, and the liberating power of living as your authentic self—on and offline. Ted Dhanik’s openness about his journey from outward success to inner alignment offers a blueprint for fulfillment, blending business acumen, self-examination, and spiritual wellness.

---

Where to Find Ted

• Instagram: @Tedskilla (T E D S K I L L A) ([56:52])

---

This summary omits advertisements and non-substantive intro/outro sections, focusing exclusively on the rich, candid, and practical content of the conversation.

Transcript

[Richard Tate]

Business executive and entrepreneur Ted Danik joins the we're out of Time podcast.

[Ted Danic]

When people see you online and they meet you in person, they say something to you, wow, you're so different than I thought you would be. I just thought that that was normal. And then it started to hit me. It's like, I'm inconsistent. That means that I'm not authentic. I am one person now, so my identity is clear. You know, I want to be able to add value that improves someone's life.

[Richard Tate]

We want to extend a heartfelt thank you to our listeners because of your incredible support. We're out of Time has reached number one on Apple's mental health podcast chart, number two on health and fitness chart, and number 26 overall. We couldn't have done this without you. Thank you for being part of this journey with us. Thank you for listening to the we're out of Time podcast with Richard Tate. If you haven't already, please follow the podcast rate and review. And if you're getting value out of we're out of Time, share it with someone else.

[Chris]

You know, if someone has a problem with substance use disorder, please call one call placement. That's 888-831-1581. And if we can't help you, we'll make a referral to someone who can. Please, we were out of Time, Ted. Hey, how do you pronounce your last name, ma'?

[Ted Danic]

Am? It's Danic.

[Chris]

Danic.

[Ted Danic]

Yeah.

[Chris]

Okay.

[Ted Danic]

I'm from India, so, you know, there's.

[Chris]

A lot of smart Indians.

[Ted Danic]

Yeah, we are.

[Chris]

Are we allowed to call them Indians? We. What do you call them?

[Ted Danic]

Why? People can call them Indians? Yeah, we can call them a bunch of other things, but, you know, like, we're. We're trending, by the way, right now, just so you know, Indians, we're trending.

[Chris]

Indians are the best people ever.

[Ted Danic]

It's. It's been, you know, it's time. You know, I'm 49 years old. I spent, you know, like, 35, 40 years trying to, you know, trying to figure out if Indians were actually cool or not. And then five, seven years ago, people started telling me that we're cool.

[Chris]

You know, it's always been cool.

[Ted Danic]

It's crazy. You know, Like, I don't even have to talk about yoga or meditation anymore.

[Chris]

You know, I got a guy, one of my good friends, Gary, who is now 75, and at 18 years old, he went with his buddy. They were from Chicago, and they went to India. Gary came back, his buddy didn't. Oh, his name is Rodnath Swami.

[Ted Danic]

Wow.

[Chris]

And he is the most godly man I've ever met.

[Ted Danic]

Wow.

[Chris]

Right? You guys have always been cool.

[Ted Danic]

Thanks.

[Chris]

You were the last person to get the. Get the memo.

[Ted Danic]

You know, I don't go to India often because they have enough Indians there. They don't need one more, you know? So I just been kind of avoiding it, but I guess it's probably time. I need a chaperone. And we use one of my white friends. They're really from. Probably from Venice, you know.

[Chris]

Right.

[Ted Danic]

That really want to be. You know, they want to go to India. Everybody wants to go.

[Chris]

Everybody wants to go to India.

[Ted Danic]

Everybody wants to go to India until they get there and then.

[Chris]

Right.

[Ted Danic]

Kind of like, whoa. You know, it's kind of. It's a humbling thing. Thing. But, yeah. Back to you. Circling back to your question. I was involved in MySpace since the beginning.

[Chris]

What you do there?

[Ted Danic]

I was head of strategic marketing. My title is the VP of Fun.

[Chris]

VP of Fun.

[Ted Danic]

VP of Fun.

[Chris]

Now, Richie Rosenblatt, you know Richie.

[Ted Danic]

I know Richie. And he did really well after the Demand Media and a couple other things.

[Chris]

Isn't he the one who started Facebook?

[Ted Danic]

No, he was involved in MySpace.

[Chris]

I mean, that's what I meant. MySpace. I'm sorry.

[Ted Danic]

No, it's okay. Different Jewish guy. So it was basically a company before MySpace. It was called Euniverse, and then Euniverse became a company called Intermix Media, and this guy named Brad Greenspan involved, and then Rich Rosenblatt and a couple others. So they were part of the parent company of MySpace at the time.

[Chris]

Right.

[Ted Danic]

So that's how Rich was involved. I did a lot of work with Rich after that, too. So.

[Chris]

He's a great guy, isn't he?

[Ted Danic]

He's just a nice guy.

[Chris]

He's just. He's. But he's always been that way since he was a kid. He was the sweetest gu ever.

[Ted Danic]

Do you know him for a long time?

[Chris]

Yeah, we were in the same pledge class at ucla.

[Ted Danic]

That's good.

[Chris]

So. Yeah. And then he went on to start his own fraternity, which I thought was the greatest thing ever for a kid. He was 18.

[Ted Danic]

Wow.

[Chris]

And he started his own fraternity, so he's always been. I always root for him. All right. How was it at. At MySpace?

[Ted Danic]

You know, these questions are very similar to the ones I recently. I was interviewed recently for a documentary. So we did. Did you remember Van Toffler?

[Chris]

I don't think so.

[Ted Danic]

Okay, so he ran MTV during the MySpace era for about 20 years. He was the president there. Okay, so if you remember the whole thing, they were trying to buy MySpace, Viacom's trying to buy MySpace. And then that failed and the CEO got fired as a result of that. And then we ended up selling to News Corp, which is a big mist. But anyway, so Van was involved, and so he. We shared a lot of the pop cultural events during that time. And so he started a documentary business many years ago, and they've done really well. And so he reached out to Chris, Chris, Josh and a few of the original MySpace guys as well, and basically asked them if they would do, like, the authorized documentary for MySpace. And they agreed to do it. So they reached out to me and I was the only one that was really close to Tom, you know, and still am. So couldn't get Tom on board.

[Chris]

Who's Tom?

[Ted Danic]

MySpace Tom. Okay, yeah.

[Chris]

MySpace Tom, MySpace Tom.

[Ted Danic]

Okay, yeah. And couldn't get him on board. But he, you know, he's a very private guy. You know, he doesn't really. He doesn't want any, any, any attention, you know.

[Chris]

Right.

[Ted Danic]

So. So yeah, we did the, you know, we shot for a bunch of hours a few months ago and. And they interviewed lots of really interesting people that were on MySpace and were discovered by MySpace, like Dane Cook and so many others. And it was a really interesting, you know, event as far as, you know, kind of recapping all the stuff that happened. We had to find all this media, all these videos, all these photos, all this stuff.

[Chris]

Do you have a big. You have a big capital event?

[Ted Danic]

We did. We did do. We did well, but, you know, I did well, too, but I did well before that as well.

[Chris]

First thing I saw was that Bugatti, that black and white, that black and red Bugatti.

[Ted Danic]

Sure.

[Chris]

Do you have a Bugatti?

[Ted Danic]

Yeah. It's trouble. It. It caused a lot of problems, that car. You know why? Because. So I'll give you my track record. So there was. I started my career in the mid-90s in Silicon Valley. I'm 49. I was working right. During college and out of college I was working for Dot com, you know, like really quickly, you know, just fully immersed pretty fast. Became one of the few, you know, a dozen people in the country that had a specialty in business development, for one thing, and then ended up being.

[Chris]

What was it? It was the one thing.

[Ted Danic]

Do you remember LendingTree?

[Chris]

Sure.

[Ted Danic]

So I was one of the guys that replicate. I was the first guy to replicate LendingTree in a company called Next Tag. Back in, it was a comparison shopping engine sold for a billion half of it sold for a billion dollars many years later. But it was a price grabber competitor, you know, back in the days, which is also gone too. So we created a lead business inside of there to. To mimic basically to completely compete against Lending Tree. And we took them for a run as well. So I was the guy that did that and then.

[Chris]

That's genius. So you developed the whole lead gen.

[Ted Danic]

The. The consumer. Consumer personal finance. Lead gen side for. For the business.

[Chris]

Yeah, it's genius.

[Ted Danic]

So that it was a big business. It got to like, you know, at that time, like half a million bucks a day, you know, it was pretty good. And then I got recruited by lower my bills.

[Chris]

Well, let's go. Let's go back.

[Ted Danic]

Sure.

[Chris]

You're in. You're in Silicon Valley at this time at the height of it. And you ain't the 2000s, but it's 90s. This was in the 90s. Oh, so this was right when it was blowing up, Right before it fell out.

[Ted Danic]

Yeah, it was okay.

[Chris]

What were the. The drugs must have been off the hook at that point.

[Ted Danic]

Yeah, I mean the only. Okay, so that's the reason why I stopped all of that stuff too and left. One of the reasons why I was.

[Chris]

I mean, because the, the drugs. Tell me about the drug scene in.

[Ted Danic]

This, you know, like, I don't. I wasn't exposed to that side of it because I didn't even drink alcohol, you know, and so we don't do it.

[Chris]

But you knew of the culture.

[Ted Danic]

We knew about it. It was crazy. The parties were insane in the office environment. This is before the whole MeToo movement. So there's like crazy happening, you know, everywhere we'd see it, employees.

[Chris]

That drives me nuts. Does that drive you nuts? It's stuff that you did 20 years ago. Okay. Which was totally acceptable, by the way, that now all of a sudden a bunch of Karen's are getting, you know, all uptight about something that didn't age well. That's disgusting.

[Ted Danic]

Look, I had a discussion yesterday and I'm not like trying to get political here at all, but I'm just saying that like, I have some friends that are liberal and they're super feminine, you know. And like guys, you know, so there's a little bit of correlation. I can't really tell. I don't have any super masculine, non. You know, super masculine liberal friends, you know, like super emo, you know, it's crazy. That's when the Bay Area got really. Around that time of the dot com boom got heavy.

[Chris]

Barry.

[Ted Danic]

A house music scene Became really prominent. That's the house music scene in the San Francisco was numbers between Chicago and San Francisco, they were the top two in the country. And what came with that ecstasy, right? Mdma. That's right. So, you know, we had the best house music. We had the best music, and it was happening, you know, pretty much every night of the week. And, you know, and, yeah, there was a lot of ecstasy out there, you know, and. And then there's. And then there was a study that came out around that time, like 2001 or so, and it was. And I just heard or watched an episode, a documentary that that was false, that it created mdma. Created black holes in your brain. Everyone heard about this back then, but this recent documentary said that it was meth that created the black holes, not mdma.

[Chris]

Right.

[Ted Danic]

It's out of. Sigh of relief, you know, I was.

[Chris]

Just like, well, the meth, what it does is it eats. It eats your brain. Right? It does. Because, first of all, you're up for so long, right. That you have the hallucinations.

[Ted Danic]

Sure.

[Chris]

So there's that whole thing, but the constant exposure over time just eats away.

[Ted Danic]

Just.

[Chris]

It literally takes. Takes you away from yourself. I mean, you just. You have nothing left.

[Ted Danic]

Yeah. I mean, I've never had an experience with that, but I knew people that did, and they never came back.

[Chris]

Never. They don't come back. At a certain point, they don't come back, which is why you got to get them early.

[Ted Danic]

Yeah. Yeah. So, you know, the. The dot com boom was, you know, it was great. And, you know, we had. You know, we had a lot of. We had a lot of great momentum in the Bay Area. And I was, you know, I was just really over the whole entitlement, you know, like, there's a lot of entitlement there. People that didn't deserve to make what they made, you know, they were just there. That's right. You know, and these people that were in higher positions didn't know what the. They were doing, and they were just there. And it was weird. It's just they. You need warm bodies. And by the way, those warm bodies get massaged at lunch. It was the craziest thing ever. Everyone's making, you know, crazy money, so I wanted to get out of that whole vibe. I wanted to be.

[Chris]

Is that when you went to.

[Ted Danic]

That's when I went to lower my bills. Yeah.

[Chris]

What about bdr?

[Ted Danic]

I'll tell you about that later. Okay. So I came. I was recruited by a company here, a startup, really early company called Lower my Bills. You know Man Coffin. No, he's a Santa Monica guy too. You know, he's. He was an incredible, really, really smart guy. And we were based in Santa Monica the. We're at the Yahoo center, you know, for years, you know and then. Yeah. So I built the same business, continued to build the lead gen personal finance business that lower my bills. And then we sold it. We got to over a million bucks a day in revenue. Sold it to Experian. Did really well after that. Joined MySpace Tom, you know, Tom invited me to be a part. MySpace Tom be a part of it.

[Chris]

Is that his name? MySpace Tom, MySpace Tom.

[Ted Danic]

It's his legal name. Just kidding. Tom Anderson.

[Chris]

Okay.

[Ted Danic]

Yeah, no, he's my space time. Yeah, he's an incredible guy. I mean if you ever meet him, you'll understand why he's the smartest guy I know and most honorable, you know, highest core values. It's just a. Incredible dude, you know. Yeah. He's never had any alcohol, no drugs, nothing.

[Chris]

That's somebody I reset for you.

[Ted Danic]

Wears the same clothes every day, you know, just a nice.

[Chris]

Well, you know why they do that?

[Ted Danic]

Yeah. Yes, yes.

[Chris]

Why do they wear the same clothes every day?

[Ted Danic]

Well, it's a simple thing. They don't want to put invest mental energy into it, you know, and become like your wardrobe. That's exactly, you know. Yeah, so I get it. I'm a little different, but whatever. So. And that's why we compliment each other. We've been best friends for a long time, you know, so. So was on MySpace until 2008 and then I left MySpace in 2008. Our earnouts ended and I wanted to be. I wanted to solve a problem. So around 2007 I was tasked with solving a problem for MySpace. We had 7 to 10 billion ads a day that were going under monetized. So I created a self serve platform at lower my bills to sell remnant inventory. So I decided that hey, you know, we need a self serve platform at MySpace to monetize the remnant inventory. You know, created a platform called My ads and we sold inventory through there, ad inventory and did pretty well. And then so I realized that there's a bigger opportunity for this and probably every other publisher on the, on the, you know, on the Internet at the time. So I left in 2008 with the blessing of upper management to build a technology to help MySpace monetize better. That was Engage BDR.

[Chris]

Wow.

[Ted Danic]

So created Engage BDR.

[Chris]

Did you own BDR?

[Ted Danic]

I was, I was the founder, chairman, CEO. I had two other partners on it.

[Chris]

Or Was it sold?

[Ted Danic]

No, no, I sold it. So that company started.

[Chris]

No partners?

[Ted Danic]

No, just two partners. My, my operating partners, you know, and I was largest shareholder and you know, any founder, zero at the time. I'll go through all of that. So we started the company 2009. We did over a million a month in revenue within 30 days. Super profitable. Did hundreds of millions profitable right away. Right away, within the first month. Never raised the dollar of equity or debt until the IPO. So ran it for. Since from 2009 to 2017. Raised no money, had no debt, nothing on the balance sheet. It was all incredible. Like I said, hundreds of millions of revenue, and then decided that we need to start acquiring. So I started buying companies with paper, no cash, you know, just selling a dream, you know, and like, explain that. Like Robbie Lee, do you know, Robbie.

[Chris]

Explain that for, for the audience, though.

[Ted Danic]

So I was.

[Chris]

Bought it on paper. Explain that.

[Ted Danic]

Yeah, so I was selling a dream. So I would go to these companies that were strapped for cash, that had a pretty good business. You know, they just couldn't raise money. It was a weird time, you know, it's always a weird time, right? Hard to raise money for people that aren't seasoned right. So kind of leverage that and say, hey, look, we can inject as much capital as you need, you know, we, we will. You'll. You'll roll with us in the ipo. You know, you're going to be able to be finally liquid because you're in this. Trapped in this private vehicle with no liquidity. You know, you couldn't sell your shares if you wanted to.

[Chris]

That's right.

[Ted Danic]

So we gave them, they sold them a dream of like, hey, look, here's our, you know, here's our prospectus. We're going public soon, you know, and we're audited. We're ready to go. We, you know, had the S1 filed and everything. We're like, oh, we're going to do this. And you know, they say, oh, how do we get on board? You know, like. And so it was more of, like, us telling them the facts and giving them the data and then them saying, we want to be a part of it. So I rolled up a bunch of companies as part of it, and they're all periphery, you know, technologies that would help us grow and, and help us, you know, drive customer, you know, customer lists and, and, and supply lists and stuff like that. And, and we did that. We did it. We put it all together, rolled it all up, and then it was time to do. Time to do a Listing and then the market fell apart in the US so that time, this is 2008.

[Chris]

9.

[Ted Danic]

No, this was 2016. 15. Okay, there was 2. There were 2 companies listed publicly traded in our sector. There was only two at the time. Ad tech companies are only two. There was one called Rocket Fuel and another one, I forgot what it was called. And they were trading at like 100 times revenue at one point, you know, and then they had gotten smashed down so hard that they were trading at 0.1 times revenue around the time we're ready to roll, you know, so we're, hey, this is not going to work for us. This valuation doesn't work for us. You know, everyone's, all the bankers are telling us that, hey, your comps are terrible in this industry right now. You should wait. And it's like, we're not waiting, you know, we're going to go. So I went, you know, I had my cto, my CFO had just finished a few listings in Australia right before, you know, he became my cfo, right? So he was CFO of two publicly traded companies in Australia. I said, should we take a meeting in Australia? He said, I can get it done in a week. I said, okay. So we took some meetings and we got the valuation we wanted in Australia. And what valuation it was, it was less than 110 times revenue. 10 times revenue, something like that. Okay, that's revenue at the time. So that was great because over here is 0.1 times revenue. Like, it was insane. So then I did a road show and you know, I did a 10 day road show, got rid of that, got rid of the US stuff, just took it to Australia, did a 10 day road show. We did like 10 meetings in a day. First day, it closed the entire round, you know, like everything. And then we opted to keep going. So we modified the offering and we ended up raising like, you know, throughout the, the, the whole, the project. We ended up with like 80 million bucks or something like that.

[Chris]

Would you sell for?

[Ted Danic]

Oh, okay. So later we ran it for, it was public from like 17 and then in 22, we, we just merged with another, another private company over there. So ended up liquid with my shares and I ended up being taken out from there, but I actually still have shares in the other and the other vehicles. So it's, you know, it's one of those things where public company life was for me at the time, it was so hard because there's so much exposure. The whole Bugatti thing, paparazzi would shoot me. And the next day I get smashed. You know, the stock would get smashed because they write a story about me saying, you know, that, oh, this guy's, you know, overpaid and all this stuff. You know, it was just. It was.

[Chris]

Why would this stock take a hit because you own a Bugatti?

[Ted Danic]

Well, in Australia, they have this thing called Tall Poppy. It's a syndrome. So it's kind of like, you know, over there, the culture is very different. So over there, it's like they want to chop down everyone that stands out. It's crazy, man. It's a real, real crazy thing out there. So they really. They don't want. Nobody stands out. You know, nobody is flashy. Nobody's this that. They hate you if you're that way, you know, so they started. You know, they started to hate me.

[Chris]

So just tell them. It was an investment vehicle. You don't drive it. This isn't something you drive. Well, you just doubled your money in a couple of years.

[Ted Danic]

I did. I did. Sorry. Interviews and we. And they asked me about that, and it's so crazy. And I would say, hey, guys, do you remember?

[Chris]

I've.

[Ted Danic]

I've had other ventures before this, you know, Like, I made money. I've been making money since the 90s, you know, like, this is not. I didn't buy this car with the money I made from this company. I've. I have investments, I have real estate. I have. I've had exits. I've had, you know, I made money, you know, so it's just there, they're just so. They hate anyone that stands out. It's crazy. They want to cut them down. They literally call it Tall Poppy. They will call you when they see you. They call you a Tall Poppy, and their mission is to take you down. It's really crazy. So I got, you know, I got.

[Chris]

We're not moving to Australia.

[Ted Danic]

Yeah. But other than that, the coffee is great. The people are great, you know, and I had a lot of fun. Every time I was going. I was going there every six weeks for years. And, you know, it was. It's a beautiful place. It's really great.

[Chris]

Tall Poppy.

[Ted Danic]

Yeah, it's. It's wild. Anyways, so that. That ended, and then. So now, like, you know, for the past three years, I've been on this critical thinking sabbatical, right? Because we ended up in a position where we're, you know, there's like, one. There's always like one out of a dozen to 50 people. You end up being one of those people in, you know, on. In the Industry or on the planet that has the ability to think a certain way and has solutions for this specific type of problem.

[Chris]

Okay, so you're neurodivergent, which means that.

[Ted Danic]

You.

[Chris]

You'Re gifted in certain areas and you're weak in other areas. Where are you weak?

[Ted Danic]

Yeah, I think that where I'm weak is, I think when we're working, you know, when we're working on these things, that we're just becoming fully consumed and our purpose for life is fully, you know, like, it is diminished and distracted and it's like, what is it? You know, you start working, your. Your purpose becomes work, you know, and that's how we, that's how culturally we're built. Indians as well too, you know, so I lost a big part of myself during, you know, all of that, especially in the public company side. It just, it was really draining and it really killed me. And will I do it again? Of course, because I've, you know, what do you do with the experience? Right.

[Chris]

Where are you weak?

[Ted Danic]

I think I needed three years to recalibrate and refined, you know, like re identify who I am.

[Chris]

And that's not weakness. That's, that's, that's regeneration.

[Ted Danic]

No, no, it is now, but where I was weak during that era was the identity. I lost my identity, you know, my personal identity and the old, all the spirituality, everything was just, you know, it was kind of gone. Because the purpose was the business at the time, unfortunately.

[Chris]

Well, that's how it works when you have a startup, man. That's just the way the world works, Right? You know, you got employees, they expect to be paid. Yeah, okay, we got to figure out how to pay them.

[Ted Danic]

Exactly. No, I get it, I get it.

[Chris]

So how do you go into something without being all in? You must be a lot smarter than me. Because if you can have balance in your life, right, and start something, which by the way, starting something from nothing as you know, is the single most romantic thing and the.

[Ted Danic]

The world. Right?

[Chris]

Okay.

[Ted Danic]

Yeah.

[Chris]

So how do you have the balance okay, if you're starting something from scratch? Because I mean, other than seeing my kids, like I get nothing but 20 hours a day, 18 to 20 hours a day of work.

[Ted Danic]

Yeah, yeah, yeah. No, that's how it is. It's how it was always, you know, and I realized that, okay, so all of that stuff is great. I think it's awesome if the value for someone is there. Meaning, look, the business that we were in my space, huge value for everyone, right?

[Chris]

Right.

[Ted Danic]

Huge value. Right. Lower my bills, huge value for consumers. And you know, huge, huge value for banks, clearly. Ad tech. Last company Programmatic Advertising, Ad exchange. Where's the value? Who's the value for? I don't know, advertisers and you know, and publishers. It's like whatever cares, who cares about them, right? So it wasn't really something that was, you know, we were so romantically involved around and it became a business that the purpose kind of failed us. You know, the purpose was like, yeah, it's like, okay, clearly we're trying to like figure out why we're doing this besides making money, you know, and that's not a good business to be in, you know, like I don't like that sector anymore. I'm not involved in ad tech anymore because I just feel that, you know, I want to be able to add value that changes or improves someone's life, you know, somehow. Right. Because we've learned that the only fulfillment we truly get is by doing things for other people. That's really where the only fulfillment comes. I can't really do anything for myself to be fulfilled. Right. I'm not going to get another Bugatti. It's not going to make me fulfilled. You know, it doesn't do for me.

[Chris]

I can't believe the first one did.

[Ted Danic]

Doesn't do anything for me. Right? It doesn't, right. So who cares? Like all that can go away tomorrow, don't matter. Right. But what does stick with you is the value you bring to someone's life and you inspire positive change or you help them get to the next level or whatever it is. Right. Whatever that is. And it's clear that's where the 15 to 18, I don't know about 20, but 15, 18 hour days are warranted because your purpose is so strong. Right.

[Chris]

As a leader in ad tech and influencer marketing, what trends are you most excited about or concerned about in how brands reach consumers today?

[Ted Danic]

Great. Some huge shifts happening right now and we saw it from like whole MySpace world, you know, like originally we were, we're doing like, you know, we're just running ads on all over the site for brands and you know that shifted to these influencers getting big and running their own brand campaigns really early. You know that started and then, and then you kind of fast forward to Instagram and how Instagram influencers getting paid for distribution and content and, and that was early. And then they have brands involved running ads from their, you know, whitelisted their ads from their pages. That's effective. And then now what we're seeing is less money is Being spent on distribution, meaning these big influencers are, you know, there's less money being spent there. So if you have a influence with like 2 million followers, brands are preferring to get UGC campaigns done. User generated content. So user generated content could be content from any, anyone. Doesn't have to be even, it doesn't even have to be an influencer. It could be like, you know, stay at home mom with like 10 followers, who cares, right? They're just buying the content and they buy the content with the rights to run the content on ads, right? So basically they'll be using the content to run their own ads, basically. And a lot of these.

[Chris]

That's a new thing.

[Ted Danic]

That's a new thing, yeah. So UGC generally with influencer campaigns were comprised. There was two components.

[Chris]

Why is that a good thing? Why is that a workable thing to get a house, a mother who has a video of her kid with ice cream all over his face?

[Ted Danic]

Well, there's some product that's being, you know, being promoted in the video. And so that that piece of content might have just costed them like 200 bucks, you know, like nothing. And they can use that piece of content in an ad and run their own traffic. You know, these user generated campaigns are com. You know, generally the influencer campaigns are comprised of two components. One was the, the videos, right? They would do content for the brand and then the other side was the distribution. So an influencer with like 2 million followers, it's like fast forward to like a, the Kylie Jenner's, right? They have like hundreds of millions of followers, right? So that is different because they do a deal with her and then they get this huge reach too. And then the content side of it. So basically they've taken it apart. Now brands is there's basically just saying that hey, we want to buy the content. And they pay literally like 200 bucks or 100 bucks or sometimes 50. Like whatever it is, they buy the content and then they run it in their own ads. And by the way, this makes media buying more effective because the media buying side is like, do you remember the ads before they were just like, you know, like static ads, like a banner or something like that. Now they're videos and it's a real person, you know, and a lot of times it's someone using the product and it's a testimonial. And so we have one more layer beyond this which is really interesting. So imagine like, imagine putting out RFQ or RFP request proposal.

[Chris]

What's an rfp?

[Ted Danic]

A request for proposal, okay, for ugc, user generated content on a bunch of platforms for you know, like a segment of like let's say moms, right? And it's a baby product, right? It's a baby bag or something like that, right. So all these moms, they, they don't have to do, they're just home chilling with their kids, right? And you know, so they're filming this content and they're just really trying to, they're all trying to become influencers right now by the way. It's really crazy. So they're filming this content and then now the brand says, hey, by the way, we're going to give you an affiliate deal. We're going to give you a percentage of sales that you generate, right? You get a code, here's your code. Whoever buys this, you know, you get a piece of it now. So what they're doing now is this is called cpa, right? Cost per acquisition. Old school, you know, affiliate marketing stuff. Now they're saying is instead of paying anyone for anything, we're going to do affiliate deals with these small micro influencers. They have to create the content and they have to put it up on their pages and whoever buys will happily pay for that, you know, that sale. So that's kind of where it's evolving to now. So that side of the world is, is growing really fast.

[Chris]

All right, the influencer marketing space has matured. What were the biggest surprises you encountered building iconic reach? In 2009? Did you have more businesses than I had sobriety dates?

[Ted Danic]

Iconic Reach was one of the first self serve platforms out there for Instagram. Mid tier, mid and long tail influencers. Essentially what we're trying to do is have these influencers like 20,000 followers, 5,000 followers, up to, you know, up to 50,000 followers and have, we had hundreds of thousands of them sign up on this platform to basically sell their, sell their posts or inventory. And then advertisers would come to the platform and choose, you know, either groups of influencers, a range of influencers or one by one and basically upload their creative. Here's what we want to, here's what we want to run. Here's the, you know, the copy of the, the content and, and here's the prices, you know, for each one. And so that was like one of the very early marketplaces for brands to be able to buy posts, essentially buy posts on Instagram. It did well for a while, but it was early, super early for, for self serve. Like the market didn't really understand self serve, really well, the brands wanted full service still. You know, we're just like, hey, no self serve. They wanted full service. So we're doing all the work for them still. So we had account managers doing it for them. You know, on the influencer side, influencers would sign up and then they just wouldn't really follow through. They'd have brands sitting there trying to reach out to them. They wouldn't, they wouldn't log in.

[Chris]

That's still worse. These kids.

[Ted Danic]

Yeah, that was crazy. So it was too early for that. So we needed basically more roads to be paved in the self serve, self serve world. And so the behavior needed to change a little bit. And so we ended up making a full service business out of it and then, you know, basically scrapping the self service side. But, but yeah, that was, you know, it was pretty early. You know, it was like 2010, 2009. We're really trying to build a marketplace for Instagram posts.

[Chris]

All right, so I want to know something that just hit me. You're. You're like a serial entrepreneur. Okay. That's how you, that's how you live your life. What are you doing for self care?

[Ted Danic]

Self care?

[Chris]

Yeah.

[Ted Danic]

That's all I talk about these days, by the way.

[Chris]

Good given to me. So.

[Ted Danic]

Not because it's trending, it's because I feel like, you know, the three year sabbatical away from critical thinking, you're really just trying to be painting contrast between my previous life and now. The only things I really care about are wellness, fitness, health, spirituality and sleep. Those are the five things that. That's all I really care about. My five pillars. The five pillars of that breed. Self worth. Right. So I have a book, it's called Winning by Osmosis. It'll be, it'll be out the next few months. But basically I talk about, you know, I talk about this stuff there. And I think that spirituality is really broad. I think my version of it, it's not like the whole Venice thing, you know, like everyone's like wearing the hats and stuff. You know, they're super spiritual and the capes and the ponchos and stuff, it's different. Spirituality is endogenous for me. Right. So it's endogenous. Endogenous is internal. Right. Everything's internal versus all things external. Right. You don't need symbolism really, to things.

[Chris]

Things don't matter.

[Ted Danic]

Things don't matter. Right. You don't really need symbolism to prove you're spiritual. You know, that's also exogenous. Right. I'm from India. These are meditation beads. They're blessed by Hindu monks. And I grew up Hindu, you know, so it's kind of like, you know, it's not really symbolism. It's just like, hey, that's just. This is kind of who I am. And, you know, Chris Palm. Chris Pan.

[Chris]

Chris Pan.

[Ted Danic]

Chris Pan.

[Chris]

I don't know.

[Ted Danic]

He has this company called My Intent, and he makes these bracelets, and everyone has them. He's one of the early Facebook guys. Real nice guy. You should meet him. And mine says peace. So while it's all really. Peace is invaluable. Right. It's very hard to get. So that's all I really want or really care about, but self care from that standpoint, really spiritual. From practicing TM for about a dozen years. Transcendental meditation. The guy that, if you want to learn TM from here, he's here in Santa Monica. Denny Goodman, you know, the TM Center. He's been teaching TM for about 48 years. He was the right hands of Maharishi. He's opened thousands of TM centers around the world. So he taught me TM years ago. And then I send people to him, you know, every month still. I gift it, the private courses to people that need it, you know, and it's beautiful. Yeah, Send it to him. Send them to him. And he takes care of them. And it changes lives. And then there's Santa Monica.

[Chris]

People don't understand. Let's. Let's do one at a time.

[Ted Danic]

Sure.

[Chris]

People don't really understand the benefit of meditation.

[Ted Danic]

Sure.

[Chris]

Okay, let me talk a little bit about that and kind of educate the viewers.

[Ted Danic]

Okay, so benefits of meditation, I think, look, we have this internal dialogue, right. Like we all do, you know, all the time. Whether it's positive or negative self talk. There's all kinds of self talk going on all the time. Right. And in this era, a lot of it happens to be negative for a lot of people. You know, this is probably one of the toughest years for a lot of people. I've had a lot, you know, I have a lot of discussions with people. I just, you know, I have surveys all the time. There's a lot of things going on from, like, stuff that's outside of our control, like the fires, like the political stuff, you know, the ICE raids, the, you know, all the happening. And then, you know, financial crisis that everyone's in. You know, no one's making money like they were before, you know, like insurance companies not paying, you know, like, whatever. It's just. It's just a very it's like 2020 has never been eclipsed yet. You know, we haven't, we haven't recovered since the pandemic starts. Right. It's true. Like I haven't made the kind of money I used to make before 2020 and I still haven't made that kind of money. You know, it's, it's really, it's not, it's not like a surprise. I mean, something happened. Anyways, so meditation for me, there's a lot of traffic. I'm one of those people that are, you know, when you try, you know, when I try to meditate and you know, this is what's going on for years I try to meditate, there's so much noise and traffic that I would just give up because I'd be like, oh, I'm not doing it right. Because you have these apps like calm and all these other apps that are trying to teach you how to meditate. They're literally telling you to quiet the noise. So I thought, hey, I'm not cut out for this because I just can't quiet the noise. Right. So then I met Danny Goodman. One of my friends gifted me, you know, a TM private thing. And I did not know that it was going to be with the man, you know, to, you know, basically the right hand to Maharishi, the guy who created the TM practice. And if there's anyone you want to learn meditation from, it's him. And by the way, he's in Santa Monica. You know, that's like a God and.

[Chris]

Right here, that's a God shot. You're definitely going to give me that because. And I got something I could, I could really improve on because I've got a practice.

[Ted Danic]

Yeah.

[Chris]

But it's not, it's self taught practice.

[Ted Danic]

So. And then I got a better one for you too, right after that. So this one. So Danny taught me, he gave me, looked at the Vedic astral chart and he said, you know, there's some, there are sounds that are in Sanskrit that are associated with my Vedic astral chart. Right. So gave me a sound, it's unique to me. And that sound, we're not supposed to repeat it, but that sound, I chant it during my meditation. In my head I'm chanting the sound. So as I'm chanting the sound and all by, but not out loud, no, no, yeah, gone. And all this noise, all this traffic is there, it's there, it's there, it's going, going, going. And TM says don't quiet the noise, let it flow. Because if you don't, you're going to be like, you're gonna be clogged up, you know, you gotta let it. You gotta let it go like clouds. Just let it go. Let it go. Let all of the noise and the traffic, just let it flow. Like, let the traffic do its thing. Let the noise, let it be.

[Chris]

So what are you doing with it? You acknowledging it or.

[Ted Danic]

I'll tell you what happens within 10 minutes, right?

[Chris]

It's.

[Ted Danic]

It's gone. The noise is gone. And by the way, so is my chanting. Chanting disappears and I'm gone. I'm in this super deep subconscious state. Within 10 to 15 minutes, my meditation will go for like 45 minutes to an hour, sometimes even longer. Right?

[Chris]

Really? You're up to that?

[Ted Danic]

Yeah, but I'm telling you, that's.

[Chris]

That's. That happens first time, dude, that's the best. That is the best time you can spend at the beginning of the day to jumpstart your day.

[Ted Danic]

Of course. It's great. It's fantastic. And I. I've been missing a lot lately, but I need to. I need to get back into it. But I'm saying that TM is so different from, you know, other practices that they literally tell you, let the noise be loud. Who cares? Let it roll. Because definitely we have a lot going on. And you say if you don't let it flow, it has to come out somewhere, you know, and beautiful, right?

[Chris]

Next one.

[Ted Danic]

The next one is. Since I got really deep in the meditation, I said, okay, look, what I'm doing is. It's called subconscious diving, right? I'm really, like, understanding, like, I'm fine. And after a while, you start finding things in your subconscious that are like, whoa, you know, like, I need to work on this, I need to work on that. I need to figure this stuff out. You come out with to do lists, right? So then one of my friends, he owns a company called Better you, Better you Health. He's in West Hollywood. He's like. He's got a telemedicine. Telemedicine business.

[Chris]

Great.

[Ted Danic]

Nationwide. And he's got doctors in every state, basically. And they're doing ketamine therapy through, you know, through the phone. Right? So. Wow. Yeah. And then.

[Chris]

That is dangerous.

[Ted Danic]

No, no, it's actually fine. It's actually fine. It works really well. So I did that. I did a few of those and I started talking about it publicly in videos, you know, and then, so MySpace. Tom, my best friend, he's like. He wanted to make sure that it was safe for me. So he started reading the science. So he read the studies. And the study was for six sessions, intravenous, though not, you know, better. You gives you lozenges and you, you know, you do with the lozenges and they're fine, you know, journey for an hour. You're surfing your subconscious. It's really profound and it yielded really crazy results. And I'll talk about the results in a bit. But the study was intravenous, six of them, one every 48 hours. And that's to expand neuroplasticity. And I'll talk about the science around ketamine. Your brain is really crazy. But. So Tom wanted to, you know, he found a clinic in Santa Monica called Golden Afternoon. He did, you know, he did the full six pack there and it changed everything for him. He did, he wanted to make sure it was safe for me. And he read the science and the science was incredible. So he did. Made so much change for him, profound change, that he bought half the clinic. So what does the clinic do? They. There's a doctor there specialized.

[Chris]

So it's all the ketamine.

[Ted Danic]

It's. It's ketamine therapies. Yeah. But it's intravenous.

[Chris]

Okay, so he did it. So he did it.

[Ted Danic]

Yeah.

[Chris]

And he said it was safe.

[Ted Danic]

Yeah, it's profound. And the science is crazy. And he had a great experience, unbelievable experience. And lots of change came out of it. Like so much change, you know, like unbelievable. Has he a different person?

[Chris]

Has he ever done acid or mushrooms before?

[Ted Danic]

Tom is a very.

[Chris]

But that's why. Yeah, but that's why he had that experience. Go on.

[Ted Danic]

Yeah. So anyway, so he did that and it made, you know, a profound change for him. And so he bought half the clinic. And so I went there, tried. I've done like 20, 30 sessions over there as well. And it made a really, really big difference for me as far as like understanding my identity. It's like sort of subconscious diving, like surfing your subconscious and figuring out, you know, like.

[Chris]

So is acid in mushrooms? Yeah, Never done it. Right. So for people.

[Ted Danic]

Yeah, But I have, I own a mushroom company, so, you know, you've done the mushrooms? I own a mushroom brand, yes.

[Chris]

You own a micro dosing mushroom brand?

[Ted Danic]

I do, yes. Asante. Yeah, I talk about it on a lot of podcasts as well too, so.

[Chris]

Wow.

[Ted Danic]

Yeah. So psilocybin and we're strain specific. And so I've been, you know, in that I've been in the mushroom side for about four or five years now. And, you know, it really has Changed a lot for a lot of people. You know, help people get off of Adderall. I help people get off of.

[Chris]

When is the first time you did mushrooms?

[Ted Danic]

About five years ago.

[Chris]

Okay.

[Ted Danic]

Yeah.

[Chris]

So that's why. Because you're 44. 45. Right. You're going to have an experience. Right. Which is profound.

[Ted Danic]

Sure.

[Chris]

Okay. When. You know, I've been doing that for years.

[Ted Danic]

Sure.

[Chris]

Right. So for me, I just lean into it. Like, I did that toad poison.

[Ted Danic]

Yeah. Yeah. Five meo.

[Chris]

I had to do it because I wanted to see what it did. Stupidest thing I've ever done.

[Ted Danic]

You see, Was it the kaleidoscope or.

[Chris]

It's toad poison.

[Ted Danic]

Yeah, I know. Mila, what do you think? I know. Yeah.

[Chris]

It's stupid.

[Ted Danic]

Sure.

[Chris]

It was lame.

[Ted Danic]

It was lame.

[Chris]

Totally lame.

[Ted Danic]

Yeah. Brad did the ayahuasca he was telling me about.

[Chris]

Iowa is any good?

[Ted Danic]

Yeah. He hasn't changed. He did. I didn't do it. I'm like. He's like, change everything from my. Dude. You're the same dude.

[Chris]

Like, that's how people. That's how people react to it. That haven't done hallucinogenics as part of their using as. You know, dude, you always have an experience like that on that stuff. You know that. All right, next one. So you said, see, let's go to sleep.

[Ted Danic]

Yeah. So I don't have the aura ring with me now, but I track my sleep, you know, and. And you slap. Track the stages and you control what you eat, you know, and before that, and, you know, you're fasting and stuff. You want to eat, like you don't want to eat. Like, close to time, you go to sleep. You want to sleep around 10 or 11, your circadian rhythm is impaired, you know.

[Chris]

How many hours?

[Ted Danic]

Eight. Eight hours, you know, eight hours is good, you know, so sleeping later and then sleeping for eight hours is not the same thing, you know, because circadian rhythm is. Some people say I go to sleep at, like, you know, midnight or one o', clock, and I'll sleep for eight hours. You know, it's the same thing. I'm like, no, it's not the same thing because you lose your REM because it's in the beginning of it, you know, your circadian rhythm. You can't change that. So by trying to compensate for your, you know, later sleep by sleeping longer. Doesn't. Doesn't. It doesn't work. You could track it on your aura ring. It'll tell you, well, I have it.

[Chris]

Or a ring, and no one taught me how to use it. So I don't know how to do anything.

[Ted Danic]

Okay.

[Chris]

I wore it for, like, three months. And, you know, you're supposed to wear it on your left hand in your left ring finger.

[Ted Danic]

Yeah.

[Chris]

So the only thing that happened is, you know, I got no looks, no nothing, and.

[Ted Danic]

Yeah, yeah, yeah, no. So it's basically. It is. I don't know, it's.

[Chris]

Sleep is critical.

[Ted Danic]

Sleep is critical.

[Chris]

What was the next one? Meditation. Sleep. What was the next.

[Ted Danic]

Fitness, you know, fitness and wellness. I'm really focused on wellness. You know, I think a lot of it has to do with, like, skin care, the stuff we eat, you know, be really careful about what we eat.

[Chris]

One unit foods.

[Ted Danic]

Yeah. Apples.

[Chris]

An apple.

[Ted Danic]

Yeah.

[Chris]

Bananas. Yeah.

[Ted Danic]

Whole foods. Right.

[Chris]

Steak is a steak.

[Ted Danic]

Yeah, absolutely. I was carnivore for six years. I was omad. One meal a day for six years. I did all that. I changed. Now I eat twice a day now. And I'm not. I'm still mostly carnivore. I still eat some vegetables, you know, like, the whole thing about lectins and oxalates and stuff like that and the vegetables. And, you know, I'm still. I don't eat spinach. I don't eat kale. Like, why. You know, spinach is extremely high in oxalates and. And so is kale. And oxalates cause all the crystals that form stones and kidneys, and they're very inflammatory. And then as far as lectins, you know, like beans and legumes, and most of the vegetables have lectins in them. And lectins are known to cause all the autoimmune diseases known to man. And then fitness, you know, so trainer five days a week.

[Chris]

Just weights, you know, Just weights, no cardio.

[Ted Danic]

You know, I need to. But. Yeah, last. For the last six months, doing any stretching. I need to, but I don't.

[Chris]

Okay. So that's the only thing that I'm. I. I'm working out with weights, but I. I have to start stretching because, you know, dude, do you have trouble putting on your socks in the morning?

[Ted Danic]

Yeah.

[Chris]

Right.

[Ted Danic]

I'm just, like, weird. Like. Like, you're tight everywhere. Tight. It's just like.

[Chris]

Yeah.

[Ted Danic]

All the time. You know, it's bad.

[Chris]

Yeah, we need to stretch. That's our thing. Because when we're older now we're decrepit.

[Ted Danic]

And, you know, the stretching is a big problem for me.

[Chris]

It is for me, too, because I'm tight and it hurts.

[Ted Danic]

Yeah.

[Chris]

But you know how I do it now? I do it with meditation and so what I do is I just. I know it hurts, but I just get quiet and I lean into it and I do it really slow. And then I just forget that I'm doing it. And pretty soon my knee was up here and now it's down here.

[Ted Danic]

Oh, that's great.

[Chris]

It's just how I do it. Okay, so we've got sleep, we've got exercise, we've got fitness. Fitness. Well, fitness. And the nutrition and the self care.

[Ted Danic]

Yep.

[Chris]

Right. Which for me means going to get my teeth cleaned every quarter. Well, I get it every month because I smoke scars. But I try to tell people at least every.

[Ted Danic]

At least three times a year.

[Chris]

At least. Well, I try to tell them at least twice a year. Okay. But you get your eyes checked once a year. You get your, your, your blood drawn twice a year.

[Ted Danic]

It's like I do every. Every 45 days.

[Chris]

Yeah, the blood.

[Ted Danic]

I've been on hormone therapy for 10 years now. So all my hormones are managed by my doctor for a long time. He's also in Santa Monica.

[Chris]

What's his name? Brand.

[Ted Danic]

Daniel Mogadam. Yeah. So he's been managing my hormones for 10 years. Basically. We get labs every, like, every 45 to 60 days. And we're checking for, you know, basically tea, estradol, progesterone, all the other stuff, you know, that's, you know, the red blood cell count, et cetera.

[Chris]

But you do the cholesterol and everything else.

[Ted Danic]

Yeah, all of that stuff too. You know, it's really critical that, you know, we're managing the hormones because once we get to a certain age, you know, we stop producing it, you know, so it's, it's not. You could use peptides, hcg, or, you know, a variety of them, or you can CJC, CJC, 1295, all the IPAMs, moral, and I know all the peptides.

[Chris]

Epamorelin. Yeah, yeah. So we've got the wellness, we've got the meditation, and we've got the sleep. What are the other two?

[Ted Danic]

Yeah, Health, wellness, fitness, spirituality, and sleep.

[Chris]

Okay, let's get to the spirituality.

[Ted Danic]

Yeah.

[Chris]

Okay. I hate religion. I think God hates religion.

[Ted Danic]

Absolutely. I do, too.

[Chris]

Okay. But I love God. Like, I talk to God all day long. No, doesn't talk back to me.

[Ted Danic]

Yeah.

[Chris]

Okay. But when I need direction, I ask for it all day long because I don't know. Right. And I feel the pull. So I just feel the pull and I go that way and then I check in to see where I have to adapt. Right. You can't explain that to people, especially people in the corporate world, because they look at you like you're a moron. Like you're a freak. Okay. What's your spiritual condition like?

[Ted Danic]

Yeah, so it's. I grew up Hindu, so my parents are practicing Hindus. And, you know, I'm. I feel the same way about religion. I feel like Hindu. Hinduism is a tolerant. Pretty tolerant religion.

[Chris]

Yes.

[Ted Danic]

So it's more of very spiritual. Yes. And so is Buddhism.

[Chris]

Yes.

[Ted Danic]

I feel. I feel that I have. I've just been agnostic, as you know, since the beginning. Like, I didn't really understand all of the deities and all that stuff in the Hindu religion. So I just. I just, you know. Yeah, there's a superpower, you know, and we are all bound by, you know, some, you know, someone or something or some, you know, some format that is bigger than us, you know, because there's. Everything is bigger than us. You know, people are bigger than us. You know, there's like so many events in our life that we have to, you know, there are, you know, humbling, and we have to be practicing humility. And, you know, there's reasons for that, you know, so we are. For me, from that perspective, I take certain things from my background being Hindu and, you know, like, meditation, you know, obviously is one of them. And I think that's been a really important thing for me. And that kind of led to the whole internal versus external thing, you know, where we. Of always. Hinduism has always said that all the gods are within us, you know, so. So from that perspective, I always felt that everything we needed was within us, and I kind of was conditioned to that at a very, very early age. So from that standpoint, I truly believe that I am not free entirely from this. All this exogenous stuff, but I'm on the path to being free from that now. I'm not going to join an ashram or anything like that, but, you know, I do feel that. I feel that the answers are here and they're not outside.

[Chris]

Do you know what I love the most about you? The fact that you're centered.

[Ted Danic]

Thanks.

[Chris]

Right. So I look at you and I see you're centered and the world is crazy around you. Okay. And you're not judging it.

[Ted Danic]

Sure.

[Chris]

It just is what it is. Do you know that's. First of all, that's a muscle I need to build. Okay. Everybody needs to build. That is the biggest gift in the world to where you're not being run by your circumstances and you're in control and you decide what you're going to give your attention to.

[Ted Danic]

Sure. So I can get into this. Because it wasn't always like that. It was discovered through my subconscious diving. That my identity was not the collective identity. So for a really long time, I had this identity that I thought was mine. It was this identity that was a combined or a collective of my environment or potentially even people around me. Right. So I had to separate myself.

[Chris]

So. No, no, go. Go back to that. So you're. You're drinking your own Kool Aid, you're getting all this. All these good things happening, and you're. Now. Is that what it was?

[Ted Danic]

Well, it was part of it. So a big part of it was what defined me. And I never really asked that question. Right. What defines who?

[Chris]

Well, you do ask the question you're doing now. You're doing it the way the world's doing it.

[Ted Danic]

Right.

[Chris]

I got to have the car, I got to have the house. I got to have the toys.

[Ted Danic]

Sure.

[Chris]

That's where you were.

[Ted Danic]

That's where I was. And I was. Because that's society's markers for success, right?

[Chris]

That's right.

[Ted Danic]

And we all want to be successful. Right. Because that's what society's taught us.

[Chris]

Doesn't matter.

[Ted Danic]

Doesn't matter. So what defines me back then was different than what defines me now. What defines me now is comprised of just me. Meaning strip away everything. Strip away everything. Because nothing comes with you. What defines me is in. In your last moments, when what value did I bring to anyone else in this world?

[Chris]

What.

[Ted Danic]

What did I do that. What did I do that made me different from the next person?

[Chris]

You.

[Ted Danic]

What defines me?

[Chris]

So you want to leave this place better than you found it.

[Ted Danic]

Absolutely. And I think that's what we're all.

[Chris]

Here for, right, my man?

[Ted Danic]

That's what we need to be.

[Chris]

But nobody knows it.

[Ted Danic]

Yeah.

[Chris]

Huh. There you go.

[Ted Danic]

So, yeah. So that's it.

[Chris]

All right.

[Ted Danic]

So I had to figure out what my identity was. I had to separate myself from all this and then come up with an idea, you know? You know, like, the clear. I'm going to tell you the clear sign that you have an identity that is not yours. Let me tell you what it is. People, when people see you online and they meet you in person, they say something to you, wow, you're so different than I thought you would be. You're so different. And, you know, I just thought that, you know, that was normal for people forever. And people would say that to me all the time. They say, oh, you're so different. I'm like, ah, whatever. You know, like whatever. Right? And then it started to hit me. It's like, wait, what? I'm inconsistent.

[Chris]

That's right.

[Ted Danic]

Right. I'm inconsistent. That means that I'm not authentic. This is not authentic. Why do I have two identities? Like, I'm different in person and I'm different in, like, another venues. It's not supposed to be that way. So let me correct that. So then I decided that I need to fix that, but I need to figure out who the I am first to be able to. To be able to publish who I really am. And by the way, now it's been this way for a few years. When people meet me and they see me online or see me my. Watch my videos, whatever, and they meet me in person, they say that I'm in the exact same person now. I am one person now. So my identity is clear. I am just one person. I am not associated or affiliated with any other identities or with any other groups of people or with any other person.

[Chris]

That was beautiful.

[Ted Danic]

Thank you. So I.

[Chris]

Beautiful.

[Ted Danic]

You just need to be who you know you really need to be. And when this happens, you really start to highlight the differences between you and other people and the rest of the world.

[Chris]

All right, buddy, this was a great interview. What a pleasure.

[Ted Danic]

Thanks for having me.

[Chris]

No, thanks for. No, thank you. Let me ask you a question. How can people find you?

[Ted Danic]

Instagram. Edskilla.

[Chris]

How do you spell it for him?

[Ted Danic]

T E, D, S, K, I, L, L, A.

[Chris]

How do you spell Ted Again?

[Ted Danic]

T E, D. Okay, cool. See you next Tuesday.