Why Midlife Could Be Your Most Powerful Chapter Yet with Mel Robbins

Mark Hyman, MD

Dr. Mark Hyman is leading a health revolution—one focused on using food as medicine to support longevity, energy, mental clarity, happiness, and so much more. Mark Hyman, MD is a practicing family physician and an internationally recognized leader, speaker, educator, and advocate in the field of Functional Medicine. He is the founder and director of The UltraWellness Center, Founder and Senior Advisor for the Cleveland Clinic Center for Functional Medicine, a sixteen-time New York Times best-selling author, and Board President for Clinical Affairs for The Institute for Functional Medicine. He is the founder and chairman of the Food Fix Campaign, dedicated to transforming our food and agriculture system through policy.

He is a co-founder and the Chief Medical Officer of Function Health. He is the host of one of the leading health podcasts, The Dr. Hyman Show with 150+ million downloads. Dr. Hyman is a regular medical contributor to several television shows and networks, including CBS This Morning, Today, Good Morning America, The View, Fox, and CNN.

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Full Transcript

Automatically generated. Please forgive any typos or errors in the following transcript. It was generated by a third party and has not been subsequently reviewed by our team.

Mel Robbins
Because a lot of us are waiting around for motivation. Yeah. We're waiting to feel ready. But before the feeling, you have to have an intention about what you want, and you have to start acting as if you are gonna cause that to happen. Sitting around waiting to feel ready to take control of your health or to change your job or relationship, you're gonna be sitting around waiting until you die because if you had felt like it, you would have done it by now.

Dr. Mark Hyman
Before we jump into today's episode, I wanna take a moment to share some really exciting news with you. The doctor Hyman show has just won four signal awards. Our conversation with doctors Ray Dorsey and Michael Okin about rethinking Parkinson's, well, that took home the goal for thought leadership. And our live conversation with Hallie Barry at Eudaimonia won silver for best live podcast recording. And what makes this especially meaningful is that both episodes also won listener's choice awards voted on by you, our audience.

I wanna say a huge thank you to everyone who listens and shares our episodes and supports the show. And of course, to our incredible guests and the team behind the scenes who make these conversations possible. Our mission is to empower you to take charge of your help, and I'm so grateful you're part of this community. If you haven't had a chance to listen to either of these award winning conversations, we'll include links to both episodes in the show notes below so you can check them out. Now let's get into today's episode.

So, Mel, welcome back to the podcast. So good to have you here.

Mel Robbins
It's so great to see you, and I have to say you look very handsome on that set, and you have matched the set perfectly with a a nice neutral brown sweater. You look very healthy Yes. Which is on brand for you.

Dr. Mark Hyman
It is. And you know what? Well, that is exactly the topic I wanna talk about which is how do we get better as we get older? And and I've been you know getting lots of feedback that I look better than ever at almost 67, which is confusing to me because I'm you know on Medicare.

Mel Robbins
Wait. You're 67?

Dr. Mark Hyman
Like in a month. Yeah. Thought you're 67. I'm a grandpa.

Mel Robbins
What?

Dr. Mark Hyman
That's crazy. I know.

Mel Robbins
I know. Well, congratulations on being a new grandpa, but I just wanna take a moment and say you do look fantastic. I've known you for probably a decade. Yeah. And you seem more vibrant and alive and there is a lot of vitality and energy that is radiating from you.

Dr. Mark Hyman
Thank you. I got... I've been getting that feedback, and I I think it's true. And I think it's really about not giving up on life. Like like grabbing life by the horns Mhmm.

At any age and going, it's not over. You know, I could be like retired. I have enough money. I don't need to work another day, but I'm excited about life. I'm excited about what I'm doing in the world.

I'm excited about how I can contribute to, you know, as as common said to to know where I'm gonna put my one grain of spiritual sand on the universal scales of humanity. Like, that matters to me, and it gets me about a bed every day, and it gets me in the gym in the morning and it gets me, you know, taking my vitamins and doing my things and it's not like a job for me. It's just... It's it's actually generative. And I was just thinking about, you know, both our careers where we were kind of late bloomers.

You know, you

Dr. Mark Hyman
started the Mill Robins podcast at 54.

Dr. Mark Hyman
I started mine at, you know, 59 or something. And, you know, we we keep we keep expanding, we keep growing, we keep learning, we keep discovering about ourselves, and we keep moving forward in a way that actually allows us to be enlivened. And also like us to contribute to the world in a way. And I think a lot of people think that when you get older, you you sort of... The game's over.

Like, okay, I'm on Medicare now. Okay. Well, I should be like doing shuffleboard in the Miami Beach, you know, like my grandfather. But I'm not, and I and I think, you know, you're not either. You're just getting going, it feels like to me.

Mel Robbins
Well, I think it's extraordinary just for the person who's listening or watching us right now to really put into context that the majority of the people that know me only know me because of what I've done in the last three and a half years in my late fifties.

Dr. Mark Hyman
Yeah.

Mel Robbins
That's a very important thing because you said that part of it is realizing that you don't need to give up on the game, and here's the thing, you get to set the rules about what game you want to play. And I'm gonna take a guess, Mark, and say that if you're listening or watching this right now, if you're a fan of Doctor. Hyman's, it's because you want a little of what he's got. You want to know the the the mix. No, I'm dead serious because the thing about podcasting that most people don't really think about is there's very few forms of media in today's world that you have to intentionally commit to.

There is an intentional act by the person who is listening or who's watching who's here with us right now to press play on this instead of some other type of show that you might pass the time in the background or whatever. It's not really contributing to your life other than distracting you and making you laugh a little bit which has value. But if you're choosing to listen to this or to watch this, it tells me something about you. It tells me that you want to feel better. You want to do better.

You want to have the vibrancy and the energy that Doctor. Hyman has. You are a person who is interested in learning. And so just that intention and spending your time trying to educate and empower yourself about small choices that you can make in order to extend not just the years of your life, but the quality and the vibrancy of the years that you are living those, you know, the rest of your life. That's why somebody's listening right now.

And so, I think it's really cool that as busy as you are, and as, you know, you are pulled in so many directions that you are taking time to create a show that allows people to educate themselves and to feel inspired, and you're also setting an example, Doctor. Hyman. So, you know, I think it's really great that that we're gonna talk about some little things you can do today that, you know, you may not look as good as Doctor. Hyman, you could always just put on a sparkly shirt like I'm wearing to exude energy.

Dr. Mark Hyman
I think you're fine. Oh my God. Yeah. I mean, right back at you, Mal. I think the same goes for you as well.

And I think, you know, as I'm thinking about what you're saying, I think a lot of people as they get older, lose motivation, they lose purpose, they lose like sense of possibility in their life and what's ahead. And I'm curious about how how do people reconnect to that? And you've done it, I've done it, and I know how it's coming about for me, but I'm very curious how you coach people around this. Because you know you went from being a lawyer, a public defender, to being a life coach Yeah. To being like a media Yeah.

Personality in your own show to end up doing your podcast. And so like you really and now you're incredibly best selling book, Let Them has really laid the groundwork for how people can think about having a a life that's more generative and less caught up in drama and chaos and no just misunderstanding of how the world works. So how how do you coach people on on the idea that that it's not too late to have a happy life? Like you can't... You don't have to give up at any age.

Mel Robbins
Well, first of all, just throw whatever number your age is out the window. It doesn't matter. It truly doesn't matter. It doesn't matter if you've never climbed a flight of stairs. It doesn't matter if you've been unemployed for a while, if you've let yourself go because you've been busy taking care of everybody else, if you're recovering from some kind of diagnosis.

It truly doesn't matter because one of the extraordinary things and you know this because you're a medical doctor, Doctor. Hyman, but you know after interviewing more than 400 world renowned scientific and medical experts on my show, one thing that I know to be true is that the human design your body, your brain, your physiology has this incredible capacity to change and grow and get stronger and more vibrant for the rest of your life. If you are breathing, it is not too late.

Dr. Mark Hyman
That

Mel Robbins
even if you've never lifted a weight and you're 92 years old, if you start picking up the big tomato cans

Dr. Mark Hyman
and

Mel Robbins
you start doing some bicep curls, that little bit of tension on your muscles, your muscles will respond. You're designed that way. And so I think the very first thing that you need to ask yourself is what do you really want? Like forget about the rearview mirror, forget about the past. Starting today and moving forward what do you want?

And if you don't know the answer to that question then I'm gonna push you a little bit because if you can't answer it in the positive, you absolutely can answer it in the negative. If there are aspects of your health that you no longer want to live with, I'm tired of feeling fat, I'm tired of being out of shape. I'm tired of being winded when I climb up the stairs. I'm tired of beating myself up. Knowing what you don't want is a terrific place to start because then you can just flip it as dumb as it sounds and says, well, if I don't want to constantly feel like I'm out of breath then clearly what I want is for the rest of my life I want to be the kind of person that puts my health first.

Because here is a truth, if you don't have your health, you don't have your life. Your health is the defining factor probably more than just about anything else when it comes to your sense of satisfaction of your life, your ability to participate, how you feel about yourself. And so if I could urge you to do one thing as you're listening to this, it's to ask yourself, what do I really want? And, how do what kind of person do I want to be for the next decade of my life? I'd start with intention and your identity, not who you've been.

Oh, I've always been kind of a lazy person that didn't do this Saturday. Oh, I could never get a handle. No. No. No.

Is it that you want looking forward? And talk to me about the kind of person who does that because a lot of us are waiting around for motivation. Yeah. We're waiting to feel ready, but before the feeling you have to have an intention about what you want and you have to start acting as if you are gonna cause that to happen. Sitting around waiting to feel ready to take control of your health or to change your job or relationship, you're gonna be sitting around waiting until you die.

Because if you had felt like it, you would have done it by now.

Dr. Mark Hyman
Yeah. That's so true, Mel. I think, know, we we kind of focus on what we want going forward, and and I think, you know, to highlight what you said, it... It's never too late. I didn't start lifting weights till I was 59.

When I was 50, couldn't do 10 push ups, I couldn't do one pull up, and now I'm crushing it.

Mel Robbins
Wait. Can you say that louder for You couldn't do a push up at 50?

Dr. Mark Hyman
I couldn't do... I had 10 push ups, it would crush me, and then I'd be sore for a week, and then I wouldn't do it anymore. And at 50 at 50, I couldn't do one pull up. And now I can do like 15 pull ups, probably 75 push ups, and I'm like, I'm getting older.

Mel Robbins
75? Now you're just bragging. Here he goes. That's... But see here, but here, I'm joking, but here's the thing.

I can't do I can't do 15 pull ups, and I can't do 75 push ups, but here's what I can do. I can do a dead hang for thirty seconds. I can do about 20 push ups, you know, elevated against a bench, but even hearing you say you went from basically zero and being a twig that I could snap in half It was. My pinky finger. To a dude that could...

Yeah. Yeah. A dude that can do 75 push ups. Yeah. That proves the point I'm making.

Yeah. If you get clear about what you want, I wanna be stronger in this decade. I wanna have energy to dance at every wedding. I wanna put my suitcase in the overhead by myself as I get older. Yeah.

I wanna be able to my grandkids that just changed his board.

Dr. Mark Hyman
Yeah. I wanna be able to play with him.

Mel Robbins
Yes.

Dr. Mark Hyman
And I'd be like...

Mel Robbins
Yes. And this is also really important. So we've already talked about you gotta get clear about your intention, what do you want? You've got to start to think about, okay, the kind of person that has what I want, what kind of person is that? What do they do during the day?

What are the what are the habits that that person has? And then the third piece of this is you start acting as if you're already that person even though you don't feel like that person. And it's not gonna feel easy. You should expect it to feel hard. This comes from Doctor.

K, who's a Harvard trained psychiatrist who taught me more about motivation than just about anybody else. He basically says, When you think about motivation in the brain, we're basically all driving a car, stepping on the brake, wishing it would drive forward. And what we don't understand is that our brains are adaptable, they can change, but really they like to do the thing that's easy.

Speaker 4
And

Mel Robbins
it's never going to feel easy to do something you've never done before. And so it's very important to understand that when you go, Okay, I actually would like to be able to do 10 pushups. Oh, I'd like to lose some weight. What is a person who's done that? How do they start acting?

Doctor. K's advice is to basically say, I know I don't want to do this. I'm doing it anyway. Yeah. Because I'm the kind of person who does this hard thing because I want to feel stronger in my life, and I know that this is the only way to get it.

And marrying this sense of identity, not who you've been in the past, but who you're becoming is a really big part of this because I think the other mistake that I've made in the past, Mark, is, you know, I hear somebody like you going, Alright, I took my control of my health at 50. I started doing all this stuff, and I'm like, Oh, I should do that. Oh, I should do that. Oh, I should do that.

Dr. Mark Hyman
Yeah.

Mel Robbins
Well, if you don't have a deeply personal reason

Dr. Mark Hyman
why

Mel Robbins
you want to, you're not going to do it because you are basically tying the difficult thing you need to do, whether it's cutting out sugar. I mean, could be a million things that that you want to do to feel better in your life. You're basically tying it to a punishment that there's something wrong with you. I want you to change the source of motivation to something personal that's like, no, I have a vision for the kind of person I wanna be, and I realize that's not gonna fall out of the the sky and, you know, no unicorns flying into this room and stabbing me in the face with the horn on their face in order to hit me with the magic dust to make me do this, I realize that there's a deeply personal reason why I want to do it. I want to share with you some interesting research.

You may know this, but for all the women who are listening or watching, or if you're watching and you've got women in your life that you love, share this with them. There was this fascinating study that they did around motivation and women exercising. And I don't remember who did it. We covered this on the podcast recently, but I found it to be so cool that when in this research study a certain group of women were making the reason why they were exercising personal time. Not because they needed to lose weight, not because, you know, they got to get their hormones in check, but I exercise every day because it's the only time I get for me.

It's my time. The dog doesn't need me, the kids don't need me, I don't have to be at work. This is the time I protect for me. It's not about losing weight, it's not about getting healthier. They were more motivated, more consistent, and actually started to feel like they were looking forward to it.

And it makes sense because when the reason why you're doing something is tied to a deeply personal thing for you. Yeah. Now you're tapping into the internal intrinsic motivation for why this matters to do it, and that helps you on those days that you just don't want to.

Dr. Mark Hyman
Yeah. I mean, it's true. We have so much resistance to changing things and do things that are good for us. It's often particularly around health. It's why America's, you know, ninety three percent of us are metabolic and healthy, seventy five percent overweight, chronic disease affects six out of ten of us.

I mean, it's it's quite a tragic place we're in. I mean, $6,000,000,000,000 we're spending on mostly preventable disease, and people walk around feeling like crap. I call it FLC syndrome when you feel like crap, and there's a more serious version which is FLS. And a lot of people have it, And yet and yet the doorway to to health is is is pretty straightforward. It's not complicated.

And yet, there's such a resistance. But you you also famously said that motivation is sort of kind of a fallacy or it's kind of garbage, and that there should be another approach.

Mel Robbins
It's garbage.

Dr. Mark Hyman
And I and I kind of want you to expand on that, and I I often think that, you know, it goes back to this this idea that you have to act into the feeling, not feel into the acting. And a lot of people wait to have a feeling Yes. Before they act, instead of moving toward a trajectory they want, even if they don't feel like it. And I I've been there. I I had a really life changing experience, almost died a year and a half ago, had back surgery, lost 25 pounds, was in a wheelchair.

I couldn't walk without you know, anybody holding me up or a walker. And I literally had to start from zero, and and I did not feel like doing anything. I just felt like laying in bed, taking drugs, and watching TV. But every day I would go k That

Mel Robbins
sounds like my twenties.

Dr. Mark Hyman
I mean, I don't mean illegal drugs, I mean like the painkillers I was on. I mean, I just like numbing out. Because what state I was in was so bad. I... My hemoglobin was seven, I lost half my blood volume, I was exhausted, I was depressed.

My hormones were in the toilet. My testosterone was like a 100, which was like a 90 year old guy. I was just... I was a mess. And I and I literally had to get up, you know, with help, and I would go to the gym.

I would get my physical therapist and work with me. I'll be laying on the floor, and I put a little band around my knees, and I would just open my knees a little bit. And I could do a few, you know, knee spreads and and that was it. And then I would do the next thing, and the next thing I just did every day, and I didn't feel like it. But I I I and I don't...

I felt like that was my motivation, But I hear you saying that you know the way we think about motivation is wrong. So, want you to kind of help us understand what you mean by that.

Mel Robbins
So, you can waste decades of your life waiting to feel ready to do something. And let's just take an example we can all relate to. The alarm goes off first thing in the morning and because you've gotten out of bed every morning of your life, it should technically be pretty easy when the alarm goes off just to roll right out of bed. But have you ever noticed that there are just those mornings that the alarm goes off and instead of just rolling out of bed, what do you do? You lay there and you think about how you feel about getting out of bed.

And that's the trap that when you stop and consider how you feel about doing something, it takes less than five seconds for you to talk yourself out of it. And this is the most normal human experience. It's this habit of hesitating in the smallest moments when you know what you should do but instead of doing it you stop and think how do I feel about doing it. You know you could be at work and you're in a meeting and you have something to say but instead of saying it you stop and think about whether or not you should say it and then you talk yourself out of it. And so, you know, there there are big decisions in life like getting married, signing contracts, things that have implications to them that you should stop and think about and you should consider the right decision.

But 99 of the things that you've got to do day in and day out particularly the things that impact your health, we tend to in those moments either do the easy thing because that's what we feel like doing or opt out of the hard thing because we don't feel ready to do it.

Dr. Mark Hyman
And

Mel Robbins
I believe that your whole life comes down to these five second windows. These windows where you know what you should do. I should I should really order the salad with the grilled chicken or the salmon because, you know, I listen to Doctor. Hyman's podcast and it's just listening is not making me healthy. I really got to apply some of this stuff.

And so you're there. And then you're like, ah, screw it. I'll have the beer and the burger, and I'm gonna get the truffle fries, you know, add the extra cheese. And that was your feeling ordering it. Can you have that occasionally?

Of course. But your life is the accumulation of the decisions that you make, and what's exciting about understanding this five second window is that if you know you're always gonna kinda hesitate, that's just how we're designed. If you can move within five seconds and make the harder choice or make the healthier choice, those hard decisions and choices going to the gym, getting out the door for the walk, putting down the brownie, and you know picking up the zero calorie seltzer, cutting out the alcohol. All the little things that we know we need to do but we never feel like doing it. Like I've often thought, you know, Mark, just imagine if you did all the things you don't feel like doing.

You'd have everything you've ever wanted.

Dr. Mark Hyman
Probably.

Mel Robbins
Like for real. And I can only say this because I used to be 1000% driven by my feelings. And then I was also pissed off and upset that I didn't have the results that I saw other people getting whether it was getting out of debt or it was being in better shape or it was being a calmer more peaceful in control person. And the reason I didn't have the things that I wanted is because I was losing the battle every day all day long with my feelings. I let my feelings dictate my choices rather than stopping and going, okay, what do I want?

Let's get intentional about what you want. Answer the question because if you don't know what you want, you're always gonna be lost. You cannot hit a target without creating one. And so when you answer the question, what do I actually want? And then you back up and you say, well, I know how I act, but how does a person who has those things act in their day to day life?

And what are some different choices that I know I'm not gonna feel like making that I could start making so I start acting like that person now. That's the formula. Like, that's it.

Dr. Mark Hyman
And you talk about this five second rule. And and so how does someone catch themselves in the moment instead of ordering the burger Yes. Or the salmon and the broccoli? Do you practically So

Mel Robbins
do I think it's it's a great question, and this is why being intentional is really important. Because if you don't know what you want, you actually are on autopilot in those moments. And so really getting clear with yourself. If I think about the next ten years of my

Speaker 4
life,

Mel Robbins
what do I want my life to look and feel like? What are some things I want to experience? What kind of person do I want to be? What are some of the goals and the changes that I want to make that would make me healthier and happier. I mean, you know, because the fact is you get one life.

Why wouldn't you allow yourself to enjoy it? You get one shot at this. Why wouldn't you wake up and start to take it seriously, especially if you're getting older like me and Doctor. Hyman? I mean time is like an ice cube on a kitchen counter.

It's melting. One minute's there, the next minute it's like puddle on the counter. What the hell are you waiting for? And so, I hope you wake up and get serious about the time that you have left because when you get clear about what you want, not only can your body change, not only can your health change, but the world has a funny way of rising up and supporting you in the changes you're intentional about. So, five second rule is very simple.

I invented it to help me get out of bed at a moment in my life where I was 41 and my husband and I were $800 in debt, leans on the house. I had lost my job. I had a million reasons to be mad at the world and upset with myself and my husband, and I became a person I didn't recognize. Like you in the post surgery, only I did it to myself.

Dr. Mark Hyman
Yeah.

Mel Robbins
And I couldn't even blame doctors on it. Like, was the dummy that bankrupted myself. And so I was drinking myself into the ground, I didn't know what to do, and I realized that nobody else was gonna come and fix my life. And if I wanted to keep this house that was about to be foreclosed on, if I wanted to keep my family together, if I wanted to become a different person, it was on me. And it started with getting out of bed even though I didn't want to.

I wanted to lay in bed and fall back asleep and avoid what I needed to do. And so, in that period was inspired by watching a rocket ship launch across a TV screen, and it's a dumb idea, but this is what happened. I just started counting backwards first thing in the morning, five, four, three, two, one, and the moment I hit one, I had to move. That was the deal, and it works. And the reason why it works, I know this now, is because when you start counting backwards, five, four, three, two, one, the moment you start counting, you've actually already decided to do the hard thing.

And the counting backwards is such an intentional action that it silences all of the noise and feelings and organizes your attention on the action you need to take. That's why it works. Yeah. And so that's what you can use. And there's one more thing I'll add to this because it just normalizes this moment where your feelings take over.

And I know that you're tired of talking yourself out of the things that you want in your life. I know you're tired of arguing against the changes you wanna make. And, you know, I'm gonna point everybody to the most famous tagline in the world. It's Nike, just do it. And the reason why that tagline just do it is so powerful is because of one word, and it's not the word everybody thinks it is.

See, imagine if the tagline had been do it, like that that that's like not inspiring. That's an order. The word that makes that tagline so universally powerful is just. See Nike knows every athlete stands on the sidelines and wants to get in the game, but what are they doing? They're questioning, They're doubting.

They're hesitating. They're talking themselves out of it. Just do it. The just acknowledges how universal self doubt is, how often your emotions rise up to block you from the things that you're capable of, and the really sick joke on all of us is the fact that your feelings come first and they're always gonna be there particularly when you're doing something new. And just do it and five four three two one reminds you that it's your actions that change everything.

It's your actions that push through the fear. It's your actions that move you through the self doubt and it's the actions that start to not only build your confidence and a bit of momentum but they prove to you that you're becoming somebody new.

Dr. Mark Hyman
Yeah. I mean, it's it's really important what you're saying because just to unpack a few things that you said. You you said earlier that, you know, health is the foundation for building the rest of your life because you feel like crap, it's gonna be hard to do anything. So that's number one. And number two, you kinda hinted without saying it that that it's important to create a life vision or a design for your life so that you have somewhere you're headed towards rather than just another day.

And that is what kind of will drive you forward even when you don't quote feel like it. And that'll help you to, you know, act on things even if you don't actually feel like that. And that is so important about your health. And I think for so many of my patients, said to me, Hyman, I didn't know I was feeling so bad until I started feeling so good. Because often people walk around normalizing feeling bad.

And some of this is a disease, some of it's just feeling like crap or brain fog or tired or gut issues or whatever it And second, you know, the Right. Patients have said to me, they didn't realize how close they were to feeling better. Like most people are just a few days away from feeling better. You know, I've created something called a ten day detox where

Mel Robbins
Oh my god. I love that.

Dr. Mark Hyman
Yeah. It's amazing. And people just

Mel Robbins
actually I love that.

Dr. Mark Hyman
Transform their health. And I think people don't know how close they are to feeling better if they just make a few changes. And so I I think your process of of helping people understand, you know, what their intention is, where they're going, and then moving in that direction is so key. And the hardest part is really to get started on your health. And I think, you know, I think, you know, healthy behaviors are things that had to become habits.

And it's not a one off. It's not, you know

Mel Robbins
Mhmm.

Dr. Mark Hyman
It's not just doing one walk once a year. It's it's the little daily compounding interest that really makes a difference of what you eat, of how much you exercise, and how you exercise, of your sleep, and how you navigate stress, your your... How you navigate your thoughts, the whole let them let me kind of theory that you have which we'll get into is so important because that... And so much unnecessary mental suffering. And and so those are really foundational things.

So I guess I wanna help help us understand from your perspective how people can start to really create these sustainable behavior changes and how knowing information about their body, like through function health, for example, which you've you've done your labs, your husband's done your labs, you've learned things about your body to help you stay motivated to do things. How do how do you start to build a life where you where you actually continue to stay motivated to do these healthy behaviors?

Mel Robbins
Okay. So big question.

Dr. Mark Hyman
And

Mel Robbins
here's the way that I think about it. First of all, I'm just gonna come clean and tell everybody that I am a very negatively motivated person. Meaning, I'm typically somebody, a lot of people are like this, that needs quite a bit of

Dr. Mark Hyman
pain

Mel Robbins
before I actually get the gumption to change something.

Dr. Mark Hyman
Mel, one second. Have theory based on that which is most people don't change

Mel Robbins
Talk to me.

Dr. Mark Hyman
Because they have NEP syndrome. NEP syndrome is not enough pain. So I've used that.

Mel Robbins
Yeah. Not enough It's true. You have to... Like some of us like, let's just be honest. Like sometimes you have to get to a point where you are so sick of your own b s and you're so sick of yourself that you've had enough.

And so I just wanna... For those of you that are listening that have been finding it very hard to find positive reasons to take better care of yourself, you can allow things to get worse before they get better, or you can force yourself to start feeling better before they get worse. And what I will say is there has not been a day in my entire lifetime where I have wanted to or been motivated to exercise. Not a single day.

Dr. Mark Hyman
So how do you do it then?

Mel Robbins
I'll tell you how I do it because I I wanna just bust the world's worst myth that twenty one days of repeating something makes it a habit. No, it does not. Twenty one days of repeating something is a streak. If it's a habit it means there's something about it that you either now enjoy so that internal resistance is gone and you've repeated it so many times that you just kind of do it without even thinking about it. Or you've gotten smart like I have and you realize you gotta outsmart yourself.

Mhmm. You gotta set traps for the old unhealthy unmotivated you. And so for me, I focus more on the environment and setting up my physical environment so that I don't have a choice. And let me let me explain.

Dr. Mark Hyman
It's like walking through that duty free shop at the airports. They make they make you go through it. You know?

Mel Robbins
Correct. Yes. Of course. Because they want it... Because what's in front of you is what you're gonna grab for.

Right. And so, like, this is kind of common sense. If you wake up in the morning and you're not motivated to exercise, here's a couple hacks that your friend Mel Robbins uses. Because I wake up in the morning, have a hard enough time getting out of bed, and I invented the damn five four three two one. I still use it sixteen years later, because here's the important thing.

There are things in your life that you need to do in order to have the life that you want that you may never ever feel like doing. I'll give you an example. I never feel like picking up the dog poop in our yard, But I would like to be able to run barefoot through the yard. I make myself do it. When I open up the dishwasher and it's clean and that puff of smoke comes out.

Right? You know what I wanna do, Mark? Because I'm a selfish jerk. I wanna shove the door back in and run away and pretend I didn't see it so my husband has to unload it. So there are things that I don't like doing that I make myself do.

Right? And the same is true for you as you're listening or watching. So you know how to do things you don't wanna do. So for me, here's a couple hacks that I have because I five four three two one and get out of bed. And one of the other traps that I set for myself, Mark, is I put my phone across the room and my alarm is on it.

So when the alarm goes off, I have a problem. I have to get out of bed to turn the alarm off. I have left myself no choice. Do you see how this works? Because I can't trust myself.

When I walk into the closet, I've set up the environment so I have no choice. I've picked out the exercise clothes and laid them on the floor of the closet because now they're right there, I don't have to think, so I pull them on. I walk into the kitchen and out on the counter is my mason jar and my creatine and my protein shot. I don't even have a choice. It's right there.

What kind of a jerk am I to myself if I don't do it? And for exercise I always pre pick what I'm going to do. Because what I've found about myself is that is that if I go to a gym either in my house or at a hotel and I do not have a plan I will walk in, do a loop and leave. I won't do anything. I'll get overwhelmed and that will become the excuse.

If I am going to walk today, I know I'm walking today and I have an audio book I'm gonna listen to. And so these are small ways. Do you see what I'm doing? Where I'm using the environment to make it easier to cue myself to make the healthier choice. If you wanna eat healthier, as dumb as it sounds, make sure unhealthy stuff isn't in your house.

Like I was just complaining to my husband last night, we don't have any cookies in this house. Like why have we stopped buying dessert? I get so mad at night.

Dr. Mark Hyman
I know.

Mel Robbins
We don't have anything sweet.

Dr. Mark Hyman
I go to like look at the ice cream and there's no ice cream. It's very upsetting.

Mel Robbins
There's no ice cream. And, you know, you you can do this within reason. But the reason why I'm being funny about this is because I think we have thought about like we have we have demonized ourselves for not having willpower or determination or motivation and then we feel bad and we beat ourselves up and we feel even worse and that makes it harder to stop because we now have all this evidence that every time we've tried it hasn't worked. And so I just got sick of beating myself up and I was like if I am going to really make healthier choices especially as my hormones are changing, then what could I actually do to make this easier and a little bit more fun? Because if it's fun and if it's easy then you're likely to do it.

Life is hard enough. And so I'd like to invite you as you're listening to think about whatever your health goal is, how could you make it easier? How could you make it visible? How could you make it more fun? How could you trap the old you?

And how could you set up the environment whether it's your bedroom or it's your kitchen or whatever it may be so that and so that you're you're you're set up for success. And I kid you not picking the workout the night before or lining up what you're gonna do for the next seven days, it's a game changer because you don't have to think.

Dr. Mark Hyman
Yeah. Same thing with food. Just like having a few meals that you make, you have the ingredients in the house, that's not something you have to think about. It's easy. It's the default choice is the healthy choice as opposed to having a kitchen full of snacks and ice cream and cookies.

Mel Robbins
Let me ask you this, Doctor. Hyman. Have you noticed that the more boring your meals are, it's the same things, same five things you're making. You know what works for you. I basically eat the same two breakfasts seven days a week.

Dr. Mark Hyman
Yeah, me too.

Mel Robbins
And simplifying things so that you can make it easy and making it things that you like to eat like that. It just there's something about health and making it a little boring and routine that gives you better results.

Dr. Mark Hyman
It's true. You're saying it's so important. You wanna set up your environment to make the default choice, the healthy choice, and most people don't do that. They do the opposite. And and and, you know, so when you're when you sort of have to get up out of bed to to turn your alarm off for you, you you have your workout all set, or you have your clothes there, you have your shake and your protein shot, there, your creatine, like you're gonna do it.

And if you don't have it there, you're gonna screw it. I'm just gonna ask.

Mel Robbins
I'll get it I'll get it later. Yeah. And you mean to get it later, but then you forget, and then you're running late, and then this, and then that, and so I just find having a little grace for yourself.

Dr. Mark Hyman
One of things people don't realize is that is that they're just a few days away from feeling better, and they don't realize what they're walking around whether it's brain fog, or joint pain, or gut issues, or you know, just feeling like crap is something that they don't have to endure and live with it. These are signals from the body that they're not listening to. And I think what what I I wanna encourage most people to do is start to listen to those signals and realize that they're they're clues. They're like your car making noises you got to take it to the mechanic. It's not normal for your car to make a bunch of noises and you got to do something about it.

And I think in the same way and it's part of why co founded function health was to help people be empowered with their own health data to learn about what's going on. It's such a look and actually find solvable problems. You mentioned your husband when we were chatting earlier, know, he found something on his results that he didn't know that it's probably significantly affecting his health, his aging, his his motivation, his cognitive function, his energy, his sexual function, all of this.

Mel Robbins
Yeah. Low testosterone.

Dr. Mark Hyman
Yeah. And that's something that you know you wouldn't know unless you you say, I'm just kinda not so motivated. I feel a little depressed. I like... I don't know.

I'm not as sexually you know desirous as I was or whatever the thing is. You just normalize these things that are not normal. And I I can tell you like I like I'm sixties almost 67 like I feel better than I've ever felt. And you know, I maybe when I was 25 I felt good. But I'm like after medical school residency working, I was like this is it's incredible to see how the body can respond.

And you mentioned you know whether 90 and start picking up tomato cans, the body wants to be healthy. It's it's sort of its default desire and you know, your body having symptoms is your body's way of getting your attention and and telling you that something's off that you have to address. And I think that's that's important. And I think what you're talking about is some of the ways that people can start to, you know, to set up their environment, their life, and their intention, what they wanna be, how they wanna feel, what they wanna do, what they wanna do with the rest of their life. It's really important, and I think a lot of people walk around losing that that energy motivation and vitality, but it's really available.

And I and I can... I know that as a doctor. I know that for myself. It's just it's just so many people don't have that understanding, and they think it's them. They blame themselves.

They have deprecating self talk, and they're... Or they compare themselves to others, and they go why they're doing it. I I don't know why I can't... Why I'm overweight, why I'm tired, why I'm this, why I'm that. And I think, you know, you're you're...

You really help people engage with the the the part of themselves that that little part of themselves that actually wants to have a better life. That's kind of all. By by some of your work, it's like you're you're getting people excited because everybody wants to have a little better life, a little better health, a little better relationships, a little better you know, career motivation to do what they want in the world. And that's really, you know, that's a real gift. And and I think your your work is so much about that.

And I I just really acknowledge that for you because it's it's not easy. But it... You know, you're you're kind of pointing the way for people and giving them that opportunity to rethink how they live the next part of their life, and how they age, and and how they live like a longer... Not just longer life, but a better life.

Mel Robbins
You know, I think it's easy in life to find yourself in sort of a downward spiral, and what I like that you keep saying, doctor Hyman, is you're just a few days away from feeling better and I can actually prove that statement to you. Because if you've ever been dragged on a walk after dinner or if you've ever forced yourself out the door for a walk in the morning or maybe you have a dog so you didn't have a choice, you gotta go out for a walk because, you know, you don't wanna... You don't you don't care enough about yourself right now but you do care about your dog and so you get a when you're done with a ten minute walk, you actually do feel better. Mhmm. And that right there is evidence of a singular choice that had a material felt impact on your energy, on your thinking, on your mood.

And if it's true about a ten minute walk, I want you to really embrace what doctor Hyman's saying and what I'm telling you which is you can also create an upward spiral by the small choices that you make, the things that you remove from your life whether that's people or certain foods or certain sort of substances, the things you add in whether it's a little bit more time with friends, little bit, you know, more physical movement. And if you're doing things and you're not seeing a result, I think that's when you kind of turn to the experts and you ask yourself, okay, what am I missing here? And, you know, I can share a story because I remember when I was starting to hit my late forties and, the... I... I've always been active even though I don't feel motivated to do so.

Think in my 20s and 30s I was driven by wanting to be thin and by vanity and it wasn't until my 40s that I started to really become more educated about just my mood and my physical health and wanting to live a long and healthy life. So my motivation started to change. But after years of running, hiking, pilates, yoga, all of a sudden like I'm like where is this flesh fanny pack coming from? Why is it that I haven't changed anything and I've got meat wings hanging down from my arms? What the hell is going on with my body?

Yes. I'd get so mad because my husband and I would do these cleanses or we'd take on these physical challenges or whatever, and he would come out of them looking like a ripped Adonis with a six pack and I'd be still standing there feeling like very puffy and fluffy. And it wasn't until I started to understand, wait a minute, there's something going on inside me and that something is what happens to every woman which is as my hormones have basically changed, I mean you basically go through a hormonal castration when you go through menopause and perimenopause and you have no more estrogen left in a body that has been thriving on estrogen your entire life, of course everything's gonna go into disarray. And it's when you start to understand it's not you, there's something going on inside of you that is trying to tell you something, that's when... Like, one of the reasons why it's so important to understand what's going on with your health changes or whatever may be going on internally is because when you have the information you can make smarter decisions.

Like, I I was not a weight lifter until I understood that it's critical for women in menopause to be lifting weights. It's critical for longevity. And it wasn't until I got onto HRT and I started prioritizing protein because all the experts are just, you know, telling us you've gotta have more complete protein. You gotta have more complete protein. And I also stopped with the cardio and started really focusing on resistance training that absolutely everything changed because I knew what I was dealing with.

And so part of what's exciting about living in the world today is you do not have to suffer in isolation. You do not have to suffer without knowledge. There is so much information available to you in today's world that if you do want to feel better, if you do want to be stronger, if you do want more energy, if you have symptoms that you don't like living with, I guarantee you with a little bit of research, you can absolutely figure out what the cause might be and you can do something about it, and you deserve that.

Dr. Mark Hyman
I agree. I mean, think people need to understand that I'm a doctor, and I have training medicine, and I treat patients. But at the end of the day, everybody's health is something they're accountable for, and they have to take charge of. They have to be the CEO of their own health, and they have to realize they have agency over their health and don't have to rely on the health care system because it's not a health care system, it's a disease care system. And it's fine if you have some serious thing or an acute illness or you need surgery like I did.

But for creating health, we don't know how to do that. Doctors don't take a course in medical school called creating health one zero one. We have no clue. If you go to your doctor, I wanna really improve and optimize my health. They'll go, okay.

Eat better, exercise more. Like, that's not really helpful advice. And so that's really why things like function health are so powerful because they empower people with their data, with understanding with information, and it's it's really where the ear win is is really exciting. I want to talk about a different part of health. We've talking about physical health and what what what causes resistance to it and and how we motivate ourselves, how we construct our environments, and how actually we can change at any age, and we can get better.

But there's another piece, which is our mental health. And a lot of suffering, let's call them mental symptoms, come from how we relate to our experience, how we relate to people, how we relate to other people, how we relate to ourselves. And and you wrote a book called The Let Them Theory, which sold a stupid amount of number of books. It's incredible how I know it's like in a million languages already. And it it lays out like concepts that are are are somewhat familiar to me related to Buddhism and non attachment and stoicism and other other areas that that these are universal concepts.

But you've kind of refreshed it into the modern world that gives people access to it. And and this whole idea is that suffering comes from trying to change people and they don't want to change, and we cause suffering. I I had this experience with people in my family like we all do, and I'm like, why don't you just do this?

Mel Robbins
Well, that's why we have families. You know that, doctor Hyman? We have families because they teach you how to love people you hate sometimes.

Dr. Mark Hyman
There you go. I don't really hate my family, but I I get it. And I think that that... Tell us how you kind of can open this. Why it's so important for people to reset their perceptions and their experiences and their beliefs around other people and themselves.

And it's not just the let them theory, it's also the let me theory, which people often don't highlight in your work. But I think it's important we we discuss that because there there are two sides of an important coin and one without the other, it doesn't actually work. Yeah. So, walk us through what it is and why it's important and how it can help us end our mental suffering. You know, what what does Bob Marley say and only our...

What is it? None but ourselves can fear our mind, you know, end our mental slavery, something like that. It's like that's what we need to do.

Mel Robbins
So, the let them theory

Dr. Mark Hyman
is

Mel Robbins
a very, very simple way to have more control, power, and peace in your life. And you are correct. One of the most... You are correct when you say there's lots in this book that feels familiar. It feels like Buddhism.

It feels like radical acceptance. It feels like stoicism. It feels like the serenity prayer. It feels like things that I have heard at the kitchen table. And what I have done in creating the Let Them Theory is I have boiled stoicism down to four words.

And the first part of the theory teaches you how to stop trying to control things you cannot control. Because any psychologist and medical doctor will tell you that the fastest way to stress yourself out and cause chronic inflammation and probably IBS and everything else is to attempt to control things you will never be able to control. And so here's how you use it. Okay? You in any moment at any point in the day when you feel yourself starting to get pissed off, frustrated, annoyed, upset, worried, bothered, anything, just say let them.

And let them as a boundary. Let them as a cue. Let them as you reminding yourself, I can't control traffic. Let them. I can't control whether or not Austin is doing construction on a Monday morning.

These freaking idiots. Why would they be doing construction? Them. Because if I can't control what's happening, why would I allow it to steal my energy and my peace and my attention right now? If somebody is being rude, let them.

If somebody is talking behind your back, let them. If somebody misunderstands you, let them. Now here's what's important. When you say let them, particularly when somebody is disrespecting you, you're not allowing anyone to do anything. When you say let them you're forcing yourself to recognize that this idiot and their like disrespect is not something I can control.

The best thing I can do is to put up a boundary and remind myself, I can't control this person that's yelling at me right now in a retail store, so I'm just gonna say let them because I refuse to allow their negativity into my mind or body. Then you say the second part, let me. Let me remind myself in every moment that what is in my control is how I respond to this. This is Viktor Frankl's Man's Search for Meaning central thesis of the book. It's what you do in response to life that determines your experience of life.

And there's a lot of things that are going on in the world that are unfair. There's a lot of people running around doing very disrespectful and awful things. And your job is not to control it, it's to recognize in day to day moments what's in my control and what is not in my control. And focus your energy on what's in your control and what's in your control at all times is you. How you respond, what you say, what you do or don't do, and what you do in response to the feelings that rise up inside you.

And what I love about it and the reason why it is spread around the world, 11,000,000 books sold in nineteen months, 67 languages. It is the single most successful non fiction book launch in history. You know, that doesn't happen because of a marketing campaign. That happens because people read it and they can apply it in their lives and then they recommend it. And what I love about this and this is another big mistake that people make with it is people love saying let them because it rhymes with f them.

And, you know, you kinda like let them, you know, let my sister not help with my mom. Let my doctor not call me back. Let my boss be a jerk. And... But what happens is the more you say let them, let them, let them, the more you're kinda left with yourself.

And it's the second part where you say, well, let me. Let me remind myself that my... The kind of relationship that I want with my siblings dependent on me, not them. And if I recognize that my boss keeps, like, not promoting me, it's not my boss's job to actually promote me. It's my job to recognize the situation I'm in and leave it because I have the power.

You're not stuck in any conversation. You're not stuck in any job. You're not stuck in any relationship. But we spend so much energy, Mark, focused on everybody else that we miss where the power is. The power is not in changing other people.

The power is in changing yourself. Because when you change how you show up, you change how much time you pour into something, you change how much access people have to you. You change the compassion that you bring to situations. Your change changes everything.

Dr. Mark Hyman
Yeah.

Mel Robbins
And what I love the most about this is that, you know, for me personally, I wrote the book with our oldest child, daughter named Sawyer, who's 27 years old. Wow. And, you know, every one of us has a relationship in our life where you have somebody that you love and you just wish you could be closer. Yeah. And for whatever reason, you just Miss each other.

Yeah. To miss each other and you frustrate each other and you can't understand. Why can't it be easier? And we wrote this book together and we pissed each other off all the time because we were we were we're very very different.

Dr. Mark Hyman
Yeah.

Mel Robbins
And we would literally say let her, let her, let her, let me, all day long as we're working together and what what happened was very interesting. When you say let them, you're not only creating a boundary and reminding yourself I can't control this other person. I can't control their happiness. I can't control their mood. I can't control like what they're gonna say next.

I just need to let them be who they are and be who they're not. Not control them, not change them. You're actually operating with acceptance and you're stopping yourself from crossing a line and trying to change a person in your life and the other person starts to feel it. You create this space where somebody can be as they are and they can be as they're not without you reacting and trying to change them. And what I noticed and what my daughter noticed is the more that we said let her and then let me take responsibility for just kind of how I'm gonna show up right now, the closer we became.

We stopped judging each other. We stopped criticizing each other. We stopped trying to change each other. We stopped wishing each other were different and we both learned how to see each other exactly as we are and exactly as we aren't. Now we still piss each other off, but there's this deep deep sense of acceptance and connection versus what I think a lot of us are doing in relationships or at least I'll speak for myself is trying to change everybody to be the way I want them to be versus learning how to accept and love people as they are and just change the way I'm showing up so that it works better.

Dr. Mark Hyman
You know, the let me part is important because unless you decide what you're gonna do, what you're gonna allow, you're gonna communicate, what you're gonna change, your boundaries, like you you basically get to take care of yourself and not stop worrying about take care of them, which never works, you know?

Mel Robbins
Yeah. Well, and this is part of it is that, you know, if you've... If you're if you're holding on to the handle of a locked door and you're like, why is this not opening? And you're like, putting all this effort into like getting the door to open. You can't reach for the open door until you let go of the thing that's not working.

And so this is also important because the let them part is when you cue yourself to stop doing what you always do. Stop trying to change them. Stop trying to force them to lose weight. Stop trying to make them take their medication. Stop trying to get them to the doctor.

Yes, you're doing it because you love them. But when you push somebody, you're not motivating them. You're actually activating somebody's need to feel in control of themselves. This is why your spouse is resisting your pressure to lose weight, your pressure to go to the doctor, your pressure to take testosterone in my case because I'm like, Chris, you have low tea. You better take some testosterone.

That was the one most effective way in the world to make him not wanna take it is telling him to do it. Letting him have the dignity of his own experience. Letting him know that I was worried about him and I want him to feel better and that I was hoping that he would speak to some medical professionals about it gives him the space to be in control of changing on his timeline. And that's the most influential way to actually influence somebody else to change. It's to stop bitching about it, to stop pushing them to do things, to stop making the...

You know, if you ate a little salad, you know, maybe if you parked the car a little further away at the grocery store and got your steps in, that's not support. That's actually criticism. And what you're doing is you're you're forcing the other person to wall themselves off from you and to avoid the changes they probably know they need to make because they don't wanna hear those words. See, I told you.

Dr. Mark Hyman
And you get to decide what you wanna be in relationship with them, how you wanna be in relationship with them, whether you wanna be in relationship with them, like you get to choose for yourself. Because sometimes your relationships need to end or sometimes, you know, you need to shift your expectations. And I'm so curious though, like, as you thought about this a lot, then the question that comes up for me is, why are humans wired the other way? Like it seems like it's not an like a it's not an unusual problem. Like obviously 11,000,000 people bought the book and that's historic and so you've hit on something.

Mel Robbins
I have an answer for you.

Dr. Mark Hyman
You do?

Mel Robbins
I wondered about the same thing. Yeah. I I I write about this in the book. I I wondered about the same thing. Why is it that we're all actually working in the exact opposite way of the fundamental laws of human relationships?

And it comes down ironically because that... The Let Them Theory is really about control. What can you control and what can you not control? And and it teaches you how to focus on what's in your control which is where your power and your peace and your influence is. The reason why we get this wrong, and I got it wrong for the first fifty four years of my life, is that every one of us has a fundamental survival instinct that is tied to being in control of everything.

Because when you feel out of control, it immediately makes you feel like something's wrong whether the traffic is backing up. Now you're gonna be late for your interview. That causes a flood of anxiety because you can't control the fact that there's something where you need to be. Right? When your spouse is drinking too much, their behavior is making you feel out of control because their behavior makes you worry about them and their health and what's gonna happen and your future and what people may think.

And so the reason why we try to control everyone and everything around us is because in life everything going on has some impact on you. And when somebody else's behavior whether it's one of your kids who worries you because they're not doing well in school, so then what do you do? You step across the line, you try to push them to get grades, you take away their phone, you're now trying to control another person because their behavior worries you and it triggered this need for you to feel okay. The thing that I want everyone to understand and this is the kind of big epiphany for me is worrying about other people is a beautiful thing. Of course, you want people to be healthy.

Of course, you want people to do well and to thrive. It's how you're going about influencing other people and doing it that's backfiring. Controlling other people just pushes them away from you.

Dr. Mark Hyman
So how do you like then help them without helping them? How do you... It's because it's a paradox.

Mel Robbins
I turned to... There's 57 world renowned scientists and researchers that are cited in this book and that I interviewed, for this book and that have appeared on the podcast. And when it comes to how you influence people in a way that works with the neuroscience of human beings and it actually gives people the autonomy to believe that it's their idea, you win. Because while you can never change another person, because people only change when they're ready to change for themselves, they're not changing for you. People are only going to change when they're ready to do the very hard work that we've talked about to change for themselves.

No amount of worrying, pushing, bribing, pressuring is gonna work. If anything, it backfires. So while you can't force someone else to change, I never said you couldn't influence change. And for that formula we turn to doctor Tali Sharat who is a professor at King's College and also at MIT. She studies the science of influence and basically there's this model called ABC that I made up using her research to help you remember this.

The first thing you're gonna do is you gotta do the a part. A is apologize, b is back off, and c is complement any behavior you see that's moving in the right direction.

Dr. Mark Hyman
Like positive reinforcement, yeah.

Mel Robbins
Yeah, so the so the reason why you want to apologize is you have no idea how annoying you've been. You have no idea how rude your comments have been. You have no idea like particularly let's say you've got somebody in your life who needs to lose weight. They know about GLP ones, they're not an idiot. They know that sitting on the couch versus going for a walk is probably not the right thing.

The only person that's harder on this person that you love about their weight than you is them. They beat themselves up all day long. And so you want to start by apologizing whether it's to your kid who you've been pressuring to study more. They know that they're not doing well in school. They know that playing video games versus studying is not like gonna help them get better grades.

Do wanna know why they're playing video games? They're good at it. And when they sit down and stare at the books they think they're bad at it. That's why they're avoiding it. And then you come up like, you know, a stormtrooper and yell at them, do you think that's helping?

No. So you apologize. Hey, I just wanted to say I'm really sorry. I've been thinking a lot about the way I've been hounding you and it can't feel good and I'm really sorry about that. I care about you deeply and, you know, you have my word.

I'm not gonna bring it up again. I'm here. I love you. If you ever need my support, you just let me know but, you know, what do you... Like, I'm here to help.

Whatever you need. You can ask open ended questions. How do you feel about this? You know, I haven't even asked you. I've been dragging you to the...

I've never asked you. How are you feeling about your weight? And it doesn't even matter what they say, doctor Hyman, because what the research shows is simply asking an open ended question stirs up the internal conflict they silently deal with all day long.

Dr. Mark Hyman
Being curious.

Mel Robbins
Yes. It's it's it's not even that they don't want it. It's that they've convinced themselves it's not possible. Then you back off. Like literally, this is the let them part.

You have to say let them let them let them to stop you from saying anything. And while they're just living their life and you're not saying anything, you also want to just be doing whatever it is you think they should be doing. And don't ask them to participate, just model the change you want to see. And then the third thing is eventually, eventually you're gonna see somebody get up and make a walk, or take a walk. And instead of being like, see how easy that was?

No, just be like, Oh my God, you look so cute when your cheeks are red. I love you, honey. Positive reinforcement.

Dr. Mark Hyman
Good compliment.

Mel Robbins
That's it. That that's that's all you got. Yeah. That's all you've got. When you give somebody the space to sit with themself, they're now having to deal with their internal resistance.

Speaker 4
When

Mel Robbins
you're pressuring somebody to change, you're the resistance that they push against.

Dr. Mark Hyman
So true. And so this is like important kind of combo package around into your health and your mental health. Because, you know, if people don't don't figure this out in life and they constantly are fighting reality, it's gonna cause a lot of suffering, a lot of stress, and a lot of mental anguish. And it that also affects your health. So this is a kind of a I'd say a combo package for living well, feeling good, and actually having a fulfilled life.

And it's it's beautiful how you crystallize it all and I I I I'm so appreciate how you have taken, you know, the world scientists distill their work and kind of made something that's accessible for people to kind of distill down into the nuggets that really are fall... Are able to follow interactionable. And you know, it's kind of like for your own life, and I'm curious about email. How you're thinking about the next part of your life? You know, you you've kinda had this this trajectory where, you know, you struggled, you're bankrupt, you're, you know, you're you're kinda were drinking a lot, you were kind of mess, and then you've kind of transformed out of that into this into this life where you're having such a positive impact on people.

And so... And you're you've figured out your health journey, you've done function health, you've got other stuff, you've figured out how you balance your menopausal issues that, you know, often derail women. And and I'm wondering how you imagine this next twenty years and living into your you know sixties, seventies, eighties, nineties, and and and how you how you dream for yourself.

Mel Robbins
First of all, go back to the very first thing I said, which is you gotta ask yourself what do you want? And when it comes to my health and the next thirty, forty, fifty years, you know, I'm gonna be 58 in a week.

Dr. Mark Hyman
That's just a baby.

Mel Robbins
Just a baby. I really want to live a long and vibrant life. I was just at my niece's wedding and I was watching my husband's mom who's 89 boogieing down on the dance floor with all of her grand kids and I thought that's gonna be me at 89. And so I have a very clear vision of a very active lifestyle, a very strong lifestyle. And you know it's no accident that my mother-in-law is like that because for the thirty plus years I've known her she walks five miles a day and twenty years ago started adding in two days of resistance training.

I mean the woman has biceps at eighty nine. So this stuff works. Like that's the thing that a normal person like me doesn't wanna doesn't want to really grasp. You actually can feel better if you prioritize sleep, if you make time for friends, if you do some resistance training and move your body, if you recognize that there's no amount of exercise that can outdo a crappy diet that you have to like think about the fuel and for me that meant a ton more protein which is why I got involved as a co founder of Pure Genius Protein. And that's kind of it.

Like, that like it's... The the stuff is simple. The pillars are very very simple. And so for me, I am really focused on taking care of myself and the source of motivation that's personal is I want not just a long life, I want a lot of life in those years. And that's on me.

And I wanna be strong. And I wanna be mobile. And that means what I'm doing now in my late fifties matters tremendously for how I want to feel in my eighties and nineties if I'm lucky enough to live that long. I think the other big thing about me that I don't think a lot of people probably from the outside understand is that, you know, when you have this kind of level of extraordinary success, I mean, third largest podcast in the world, this extraordinary success with the Let Them Theory, you got 40,000,000 people that follow you online, and your work truly is encouraging and empowering people to make changes that improve the quality of their lives. And I know this because I read the avalanche of inbound messages that come in from all over the world every single day.

It's the thing that really motivates me. And it motivates me because when I was 41 and couldn't get out of bed I thought I was the only loser that had screwed up her life. I thought there was no way that I could fix these problems. There's no way I could get out of debt. And there were no podcasts.

You wouldn't be caught dead walking into a self help aisle. Like, I couldn't afford a therapist. Hell, I couldn't pay my mortgage. Like, and nobody went to a therapist sixteen years ago. And so I suffered alone.

And for me, knowing that in some small or large way, either the episodes we're putting out or the books that I write or the short form content we put on social media is truly spreading around the world like little drops of light. And it is awakening the light inside each and every one of us, this power that we have to flip a switch in our health, in our mindset, in our attitude, in our goals to take control of what our life feels and looks like. That's what motivates me. And so people often ask me, okay, what are you gonna do next? I'm like, next?

Are you kidding me? Like, what more do you need? Like, I don't want more. I want I want time. Like, I would love to continue doing what I'm doing in service of people and of your ability to create a better life and to feel better.

But what I would like to do is to have more time back to spend it with my husband, to spend it with my kids, to be outside hiking, to enjoy all of this hard work because I think one of the things that's interesting about being older, and this goes to those of you that are saying it's too late. First of all, Doctor. Hyman's on Medicaid he's now the co founder of basically a Medicare, whatever it is. Medicaid. Medicare.

You're the doctor. I don't know. Whatever it is. And, you know, he's like literally the recent founder of a company that's now valued at a billion dollars. And I started the podcast at 54, wrote the book at 55, became the co founder of this incredible pure genius protein shot company at the age of 56.

We... You... We will not hear it. And what happens when you attack life later in life is you're doing it with experience. And with the experience that you have right now, you don't forget what actually matters.

And so for me when I look ahead there's nothing that I could do in the future Doctor. Hyman that would change what I know is important in life. And what's important in life is your health, it's your family, it's your friends, And, it's waking up every day and having somewhere to go, having something to do that you care about, and having somebody that you can show a little love to. You have those three things, you are winning at this game of life.

Dr. Mark Hyman
And it's true. I think, you know, you know, what you're saying is so important. We we really have to kinda come back to the essentials, and it it... In both of us, as I was reflecting listening to what you're saying, both of us had pretty bad breakdowns in life. When you at 41, you know, had incredible debt and everything was falling apart and you were, you know, just kind of in a deep depressed hole.

I was, you know, in my late thirties. I got chronic fatigue syndrome, and I had to discover a new way of healing than the work that I do around functional medicine. And and it and coming out of that and figuring out a way out of that for both of us has has compelled us to want to give back to the world and to bring the love that we gave to ourselves to everybody else and to you know share with everybody else, steps that they can take to actually feel better, live better, you know, and actually have a more meaningful complete life. And it's it's it's actually hard because a lot of people just don't think that it's possible. They don't think that getting out of the crappy situation they're in, whatever it is is possible.

But I think, you know, you and I are examples of people who've who've been at the bottom and who've who've come back. And and it's it's really I think hopefully inspiring for people to listen to this and to have this conversation and to sort of think about, okay, it doesn't matter what age I am. I could be 75. I could be 55. It's never too late.

And it's it's never too late to take control of your health. It's never too late to reset your relationships, to reset your mind and fix your your your patterns of thinking that cause suffering for you and your beliefs that cause suffering. Your your book really is about changing our beliefs about how relationships work, about how love works, about how Yeah. Supporting others works, about how taking care of yourself works. These are really important things we don't learn in school.

We don't write this stuff in school. And so I think we're we're at this amazing moment where you know, work that you're doing, some of the work that I'm doing is really helping people to become empowered with with the information, the knowledge, and the tools to actually live a better longer life. And you know, were saying you wanna have more life in years. That's the tagline of function which is live a 100 healthy years. That's that's our goal.

And I I've written a new book that's coming out next spring called a 100, how to live a 100. And it's really about this exact thing. How how do we do this? And it goes through everything from physical health to mental emotional health to, you know, dealing with our traumas. All this stuff is necessary in building community.

And I was kind of reminded a little bit about the work I did for Rick Warren where he where he... We we create something called the Daniel Plan in this church. It was a very unhealthy overweight church and it was based on five principles, is faith essentially is what he's talking about is meaning and purpose that you're talking about, food, fitness, focus, which is getting your mindset right and friends. It's really it's really all the things we've been talking about and that's what really creates a life that allows you to be empowered to do the things you want and to live life you want.

Mel Robbins
I agree.

Dr. Mark Hyman
Yeah. So thanks you Mel for being on the podcast.

Dr. Mark Hyman
Everybody, you can

Dr. Mark Hyman
find Mel's work everywhere. Her podcast is the Mel Robbins show. She's got her social media, which

Mel Robbins
is Like

Dr. Mark Hyman
literally,

Mel Robbins
you just look for Mel Robbins and if you're trying to get more protein, want you to check out Pure Genius Protein. I have one every single morning, doctor Hyman, and it has changed my life. I really struggled to get protein in because I listened to you doctors and it's really hard. It's hard with the number of calories. It's hard on the go.

There's only so much chicken and eggs. When I found out eggs were only six grams of protein Yeah. Six eggs?

Dr. Mark Hyman
For a year. Five.

Mel Robbins
Yeah. I like I can't eat six eggs. And so given how much I struggled, I joined a company and became a founder and spent a year working with medical and scientific and nutritional experts to build the first of its kind three ounce TSA approved shelf stable 100 calories 23 grams of complete protein.

Dr. Mark Hyman
Yeah.

Mel Robbins
It's incredible.

Dr. Mark Hyman
I've had it. It's delicious and it's great and it's it's it's chewy.

Mel Robbins
Well, thank you for saying that. It really is. And so, I'm really proud of that because it's made it simple. And one of the things that you and I talked a lot about today is Function Health helps answer questions about what's going on inside so you can make changes that improve your health. And for me as a normal person, if the changes are hard, I ain't doing it.

And so the fact that it can be simple to either figure out what's going on through medical tests or simple like I do. I drink a protein shot every morning instead of a smoothie. Boom. It's done. That's what helps you get these things done.

Dr. Mark Hyman
It's true. It's it's true. It just it's just allowing people to have the tools and access and things that are gonna make their default choices better choices. And I think, hopefully this

Mel Robbins
has

Dr. Mark Hyman
inspired a lot of people. I'm sure this podcast is gonna be out there. Thank you for everything you do Mel. It's great to see you again. I love you and keep keep it up.

Mel Robbins
It's great to see you. I love you too. I'm seeing

Dr. Mark Hyman
the dance floor and when I'm a 100 and you're like, you're like 50

Mel Robbins
At someone's

Dr. Mark Hyman
80, 90 or something.

Mel Robbins
Yeah. I'm like ten years behind you.

Dr. Mark Hyman
So you'll be 90. I'll be a 100 when we dance. How about that? I'll meet you on the dance floor at a 100.

Mel Robbins
Sounds good.

Dr. Mark Hyman
All right, Mel. Thank you. Hey, everybody. It's doctor Mark here. I'm so excited to share that my new book is officially available for preorder today.

After more than thirty years of practicing medicine and caring for tens of thousands of patients, I've written the book that brings everything together that I've learned about helping people get healthy and stay healthy as they age. It's called a 100. What to do today to live a 100 healthy years. It's a whole body guide to living a 100 healthy years. It's grounded in a new understanding of how our bodies work.

It's the new map of the body. And inside, I walk you through the seven core systems that drive your health from your gut and hormones to how your cells make energy and help you understand the signals your body's been sending you all on. Now a lot of what's in the book, I learned the hard way through my own body. When I got sick, the medicine that I trained in did not have any of the answers I needed, so I had to go looking for them myself. And that search became my life's work.

This book brings together decades of my learning from my patients, from the scientific research in scouring that, from the things I got wrong, and the things I had to rethink along the way. I don't want you to have to struggle the way I did to find those answers. So much of our health is shaped by what happens outside your doctor's office. And I want you to feel confident knowing how to care for yourself every day. I put so much of myself into this book, and I'm really excited to finally share it with you.

It's really my life's work. It's my capstone of my career that I put everything I know. It's finally available for order today. Preorder. Everywhere Books Your Soul.

Go get a copy. Please support me, and this is my life's work. So I think you're gonna love it.