Why the Health Sovereign Podcast?

00:18 Hello and welcome. I'm Logan Christopher and I want to welcome you to the very first episode of the Health South Marine podcast. In this first episode, I'm going to talk about why this podcast, what am I doing here? What am I going for with the title health sovereign? What does that mean? What I'm trying to get to here is what it really takes for people to be healthy in our modern day world. First off, let's define health. For most people, it is a very ill defined term and wrongly defined out, say for most including probably most of the medical society, health is about the absence of disease. Now, first thing to ask yourself is do you even fit this definition of health? It's becoming a tougher and tougher thing to fit as we have more diseased diagnoses and all kinds of stuff going on and just the toxicity overworld some subjects we'll definitely be talking about, but it's not even a good definition of health.

01:20 What I like to think of health as is this ability to handle stressors in life. So if we take an idea of getting some cold germs or the flu virus that's out there, right? We're exposed to this stuff all the time. It is only that we get a cold or the flu, not just from exposure. Exposure by itself does not do it, but if there is a way that our system cannot handle that exposure, our immune system cannot fight it off. The ecology of our system is such that that disease can take root in it. So our body's handling stressors all the time and stressors are not necessarily a bad thing. Think about going to workout in the gym. You are intentionally placing stress on your body in order for it to adapt as living systems do and come back stronger. So true health is about having a greater ability to adapt and handle stressors that you come across in your everyday life.

02:16 And I would argue increasing your health further is developing, not just this resiliency, but I really liked the word antifragility, which is the ability to like living systems do come back stronger from stressors. So this is what health is now sovereign. Many people may not be familiar with this word and I'm not talking about being royalty or anything like that. Even though we do have a crown on the artwork for the podcast here, sovereignty to me is, it's a very strong word and I like this definition that I heard from Jordan Greenhall. I've been reading a lot of his material lately and finding it very interesting as he talks about what's going on in our society and some things we need in order to transition chords, a new system. So Jordan says sovereignty is the capacity to take responsibility. It is the ability to be present to the world and to respond to the world rather than to be overwhelmed or merely reactive.

03:16 Sovereignty is to be a conscious agent. I really like that first part, the capacity to take responsibility. So I'm really big about self responsibility and the reason for this is after going through a dark period in high school, I kind of realized that, oh, I could take responsibility for different areas of my life and with that, starting from that seed of self-responsibility, I could then seek to improve things. This began and fitness for me translated into the business realm and really all different areas. The problem is self-responsibility is not the end all be all because we live in a web of ecology, not just what other humans, but all life and everything. Essentially sovereignty is good in that it's this independence but also this larger thing of interdependence to recognizing that we're part of this system or web self-responsibility. It is independence and it is also more than that.

04:17 When you recognize all these things that are going on, then you can better respond to that. You build this capacity and understand that this sovereign capacity is of course much more than just about health, but it is very much about health. Because if you don't have your health, you know, what do you have? Health is foundational first humans as we're here on this planet, health is something that goes along with inhabiting this body that we have. So this ability to be present to the world, to actually like understand what is going on and then respond to the world, to take proper action out of that sovereignty is to be a conscious agent. So being conscious about your choices, not just falling into unconscious brainwash state that advertising or mass media or echo chamber of Facebook would have you believe and taken and thing that you see to actually understand what may be behind.

05:14 And the the hidden things going on that is a little bit about health and a little bit about sovereignty. Putting them together. Once again, it is to get to this place where we can truly be sovereign with our health to truly have a health that fits the earlier definition. I said where you are better able to handle stressors to go about an act well within this world rather than being reactive to the things that happen and then as happens for many people, diseases seemingly popping up out of nowhere and not having a clue as to how did this arise in me. It is because the lack of sovereignty that this is unfortunately kind of a common thing within the world and our look at what can we do to fight that. So related to the word sovereignty is this word abdication, which originally in its use it had to do with kind of like a king laying down his rule.

06:10 Handing that over to someone else with abdication. I've for a while, for whatever reason since learned this word, I've used that in relation to the standard Western medical treatment and doctors specifically is we have abdicated our self responsibility for our health to other people to adopt her saying like this is what you need to do. Even to the government saying that these are the important things for health. I mean we have the USDA Food Pyramid, which was the laughing stuff for a long time. Something that no one in any field of health really agrees with what is on that. And doctors back in like the 80s would tell you that nutrition has nothing to do with disease. There's probably still a few doctors that believe that, but everyone recognizes how absurd that is. Now understand this was how western medicine looked at the world and there are issues with that.

07:02 So what I want to get to in this podcast is kind of understanding one, how we got here in the world and looking at the history, looking at the systems in place and how they interact. And ultimately what this is about is I want to see how do we develop a better system in the world, a new system that actually reinforces our health sovereignty rather than continually stripping in a way. And it is being continually stripped away, understand that we should have the right to have clean land and air and water. But do we actually have those things anymore? Maybe in some very secluded places. But overall, just about anywhere. I mean they've found DDT high up in the Himalayan mountains. So understand you can have this self responsibility for your health. You can be taking all these actions, but because of the web of ecology, the interdependence we have, there are things that are happening that are affecting your health, whether you want them to or not.

08:04 And there's a lot of this stuff going on. The great thing is the human body is amazing. It can do so many things and it's not just resiliency, but antifragility is something to be admired and to be respected and expanded upon. So doing such things that allow your body to handle the toxic load that we're under from poisonous chemicals, endocrine disrupting chemicals, all kinds of things in our environment, doing the right things for that so that we can effectively be healthy, that we can effectively live. You have to understand what's going on in order to make effective choice. A little bit about how this podcast got started and I could go back to childhood and everything with this and different aspects of my story. So I mentioned I really got into strength training and fitness. Everything I do at legendary strength and this was born out of not being a sovereign individual and kind of recognizing that at some point, for whatever reason I kind of saw that and that I could have power over such a thing.

09:09 And so I began, it was really with body weight exercises in the beginning that led to kettlebells that led to old times strong man. And around that time as I was getting into that, I was like, you know, this would make a good career. So business got born out of vet, started as a personal trainer, went online, started writing books, coaching, all kinds of different things and the strength and fitness led me into health in the first place. I was average American standard American diet hoc, it's cereal, all kinds of not best food ever. And as I got into fitness I recognized that the healthier I could become, the better my strength ultimately would be for a number of different reasons. And this led me deeper and deeper into health and nutrition and you get into alternative medicine and along with that, because it is there is there does seem to be some suppression of these alternative modalities by what is conventional out there.

10:07 Once again, this is very important to understand. There is some level of conspiracy going on. I mean it's provable. It's out there. There's no doubt. Yeah, we can go way deep down the rabbit hole and talk about aliens and all kinds of insane stuff. There's certainly is that out there, but we can also just keep it real grounded and look at things like the American Medical Association, beaten, sued and losing for conspiracy. Like that is a court case that is showing that proof that that happened and there's tons and tons of information out that so conspiracy does not take 12 men sitting in a room smoking cigars, plotting how to rule the world. It can be as simple as a lobbyist with a government official talking about how the revolving door works. So vote this way or get this law passed and when you leave two years from now we have a high paid position for you with tons of stock options with our pharmaceutical company, this kind of stuff.

11:02 Once again easily verifiable. It's actually kind of crazy how much of it's going on and sure there are some reasons where it makes sense where a regulator and say a lobbyist or a an official at one such company where there's that specialized knowledge that's required where you might see this happen, but yeah, you just see this as a pattern and you got to wonder what is really going on. Is that taking consumers your in my best interest to heart when you have such things like this and that's just one example. There's so many more and I feel once again this is very important, you have to understand this stuff is going on. If you want to be sovereign with your health because a certain worldview is enforced and with this worldview you are going to accept certain things and not accept others even though there may be cracks in it just by how dominant it is.

11:56 It is really hard to get to the other side and especially without even being labeled a crackpot for doing so. It's a wild, wacky world we live in and add to this, right? Like it's not all conspiracy. Conspiracy does not necessarily describe every reason why things are the way they are. You have to look at systemic effects, right? So even if you have good people trying to do good things, you just have fiduciary responsibilities. You have the drive for profit in our business models and just cutting corners essentially like small things can add up over time and over larger organizations to what ends up being some negative and bad effects. You've thrown a sprinkling of sociopaths and psychopaths, right, which congregate into these high powered CEO positions in government positions because of the drive and desire of power. Then you can see how these things can really melt together in a way that once again does not get to the best health possible for individual people.

13:00 So recently, and I have to say this is probably because I recently had a daughter, I guess not too recently, about a year and a half ago now. And with this it's interesting, right? You can be very selfish before you have kids and the kids automatically are pretty much, I can't quite say 100% of the time, but most of the time if you are a good parent at all, it's you have to subjugate your selfishness to some degree because you have to completely provide for human baby that cannot do anything for itself. Self-Responsibility then becomes other responsibility. And with that, I think for me it became kind of a looking out more in the world, you know, I was very content to kind of stay in my own bubble of what I got going on with the business. Just kind of paving my own path. But my daughter being born and with that I began to look outside of the world because I'm thinking about longer term and not just for myself, but for her.

14:02 What is the world that she's growing up in? What is the world that is what is going to be going on in 20 years from now. We live in very interesting times and it could certainly go many different directions but the world is likely going to get more interesting, not less. So with this I kind of health being one the main fields that I'm involved in, I was really looking at why is the system like it is and what is going on and really there was a few kind of like key triggers seeing the increased censorship happening around some alternative medicine type of stuff happening in the big tech companies. And Yeah just reading some crazy stories of what's going on. We can certainly go deep down the rabbit hole here of possibilities of what's going on there. But there is stuff going on and I felt I had to speak up it, I had to grasp better what was actually going on.

14:55 Cause there's a problem like it's so easy to get wrapped up in any sort of belief system. You can take the completely conventional viewpoint of things that no conspiracy exists ever. Even though that's easily falsifiable. I mean look at the NSA spying on American citizens, look at Iran Contra affair, like the government is engaged in conspiracy like that has happened before. And to think that only these things that come to light are the only ones that ever happened and nothing else is a bit naive in my opinion. So from these things I've wanted to get, like how can the system be changed and looking at it, drawing out the map of the system in all the reinforcing loops and delays and different things going on, the system cannot really be changed how it is it's going to collapse and ideally something better is going to emerge that really just kind of displaces it.

15:51 That is kind of the best thing we can hope for. The alternative as it collapsed and nothing really takes its place. So yeah, we'll be talking about those subjects more in future episodes. Oh by the way, I'll be doing some solo episodes like this. I'm going to be covering at the end here, the healthy sovereign creed and all the different points on that. And then I want to go deeper on those specific points because when the big things I want to talk about here is getting down to principles we live even without conspiracy and complex systems and what not. We live in a world of information overload. Forget the misinformation and disinformation that's out there. Just even the information is enormous and impossible to comprehend. To get to the bottom of any issue is very, very, very, very, very hard and time consuming and who has the time for that.

16:42 That is why it's really hard to make sense of the world we live in and if you think you understand the world we live in, then once again, sorry to say, but you are naive because it's impossible to really wrap our minds around that we are not meant for this level of complexity and that is leading to some of the problems that are going on in health and in other areas. I'll be doing some solo episodes. In addition, I'm also going to have a number of guests on this and I'm really going to try to make it a little bit different because you know who needs another podcast. There's plenty of unhealth out there, but I want to target it a little bit differently when I've guessed, you know, not just talking about the same old stuff but trying to boil things down to principles and they may get repetitive, but you know, if you hear a thousand people that are in a health field talk about the same kind of principles, then that's probably good health principle to live in, guide yourself by.

17:39 So I want to get down to that rather than just the like strategies and tactics. Those are important too and we can geek out on that sort of stuff. But to get down to principles that really simple rules that are true and guide your health. If you have principles and you only need a few of them, then it becomes much easier to do. You don't get swayed by the latest study or meme on Facebook as far as your health. And unfortunately that is a lot of what is going on right now. Another thing in addition to guests is I want to bring on multiple guests at a time. I want to make this more discussions with most interviews, right? It's almost like a lecture. You have one person that asks a few questions and the other person just kind of goes off in the interview sound to get more of a discussion going and even group sessions where it can, might even take the form of a debate.

18:29 So do these just some ideas I'm playing with. So there will be a mix of the solo sessions and interviews and guest podcast as well. And I do want to go deep, right? So I think that's the main thing here. What I'm going for is to distill health down to just a few basic, simple principles and help you to understand a worldview that delivers health sovereignty to you and how far this is outside of the dominant cultural Western worldview that is alive and well in not just the western world, but where it's like our dominant export is how we look at the world. Despite the flaws. And then here's the thing, every single culture has idiosyncrasies, has flaws in it, including our own. There can be a problem if you just look at all the different cultures, realize they're all wrong in certain regards and get into like a nihilistic funk over it thinking that there's no meaning as well.

19:27 So how do you really understand all that, bring it together in a way that is effective and fulfilling for you as well. So this is why I started this podcast is I wanted a new outlet, new way to explore ideas and in conversations with other people to really have some very good conversations. You know, I listened to quite a few podcasts myself. While I'm driving my car. Number one thing I do, I, I listen to plenty of music as I work. So when I'm driving, I use that as podcast time. I feel in listening to a good podcast, it's almost like a conversation, but it's not one I'm participating in. And so starting this podcast for just selfish reasons, I want to get into some really good conversations around the topic. I know many people in this field and there's a lot more out there that I do not know it's about.

20:12 I want to start having these conversations and I'll record them and you can join me as well, so I'll mention that. I've also started writing around these similar subjects. If you follow me on Facebook or Instagram or in emails as well, you'll see some stuff like the medical monopoly Monday musings that I've been doing, which I've been having a lot of fun on, and we'll be talking about many similar concepts in there. Last thing I want to do here for this episode is to read the Healthy Safir and creed. This was something I put together that really gets down to these principles and over time this will likely be adapted and changed up and hopefully refined down to fewer points. Right now I've got 16 points on it. I think it can be distilled down lower, but this is different ways of looking at health than most people do.

21:05 It is ways that I personally look at health, like you don't have to follow all of these if you don't want. I think everyone's going to be a bit different. There may be some you don't agree with, which is going to make for some good conversations, so this is posted on the website health sovereign.com or you can find it free there and no need to opt in or anything like that. Let's just can be readily available. Am going to read the whole thing here and in upcoming podcasts I'm going to be covering these different points in more detail. This is very important because I do use certain terms on here or certain ways that I kind of reflect my ideas may not be 100% clear from just the point right there. So there'll be a deeper dive in upcoming podcasts. It might just be a single point per episode or maybe two.

21:53 We'll see how that pans out. So let's read this. They're healthy sovereign creed. Humans across the world need a better system when it comes to health. One that takes the best of everything in the past and build something new, sustainable, ecologically sound and mutually enriching to move forward with. This must start from a place of sovereignty for each individual to develop their ability to respond, to think and to act, not just react in the world surrounding their own health. These are the tenants of doing so. Number one, I understand that health starts from a place of self-responsibility that no one, not a doctor, especially not insurance nor the government will care about my health or the health of my loved ones as much as I do. Therefore, I will educate myself taking radical responsibility for both my actions and inactions. Number two, I recognize that there are hundreds if not thousands of modalities for effecting health, whether physical, mental, emotional or spiritual.

22:58 I will find those that worked for me. I will not give up after one, two or 10 have not gotten me to where I want to go. Number three, I understand that mind, body, spirit is a system and in multi-way street psychology affects physiology and vice versa. All levels affect all levels. Number four, I will understand and harness the placebo effect for my own betterment. Number five, I recognize that I am not just human, but as Simeon with my microbiome that includes bacteria, fungi, viruses, and even the animal kingdom. I will act as a shepherd to my body's ecology to the best of my abilities. Number six, I recognize that I am like a bacteria or insect in size to the greater ecology of Gaia planet earth, that I cannot exist without plant life nor many other species and kingdoms in the web of life.

23:56 I will do my best to align what is good for me to what is good for the greater ecology. Number seven, I understand that my views on health are shaped by my culture and community regardless of their truthfulness, so I keep an open mind about different possibilities and a recognize that I intern come to shape my community and culture at large. Therefore having a moral responsibility to lead and inspire others in being healthy. Number Eight, I recognize the antifragility of the human body that its livingness can serve to help come back from stresses stronger than before. I will aim to support expanding my antifragility to further increase my health, not him. I recognize that over intervening when it comes to health, especially at certain times can be worse than doing nothing. There are risks and rewards to everything, so aim for the lowest scale intervention possible with any issue escalating as needed rather than jumping straight to large impact interventions.

25:00 Number 10 I understand that you can't mess with nature without downside while doing so may be positive in the short term. There are worse effects in the long term. Humans play on a much shorter timescale than nature herself, which is why to strive for lower scale in the wrench [inaudible] for self and ecology. 11 I will strive to understand the difference between what is scientific for health versus what is simply technological. The highest tech interventions are not necessarily the healthiest as shown by science 12 I will come to terms with the inevitability of death for myself and my loved ones. I understand that this will help avoid the fear induced pushing of unnecessary interventions, allowing for greater connection instead of denial. Number 13 I recognize that all of Western medicine was built on a flawed and incomplete model of reductionistic materialism while useful in certain contexts.

25:56 The flaws that this one way of seeing the world to the exclusion of all others. It misses the world views of psychology, spirituality, holistic or systems thinking, even cultural effects. I recognize that all of these are important when it comes to health. 14 I recognize that big Pharma has a track record of criminal and harmful activity. While drugs have their place. That place has been inflated through advertising, incentivizing doctors, lobbying and successfully pass in certain legislation, public relations campaigns, and more. I will strive to understand that proper place. 15 I recognize that other large industries have track records of criminal and harmful activity and releasing manmade dangerous chemicals into the environment. I'll aim to educate myself on such actions and reduce the support of such companies for the health of all 16 I recognize that we all must be able to make up our own medical choices for ourselves and our families.

26:55 I will stand up against all medical totalitarianism. That is the health sovereign creed. Once again, you can find that download it, that one page document over at healthsovereign.com that's going to wrap it up for this episode. I do want to mention that if you have not already, please check out lost empire. Herbs.Com herbs are not the end all be all of health, but they are a mostly forgotten part of our health that in the last century or so we have moved away from with this drug model of doing things and once again, drugs do have their place, but so do herbs. So think about what herbs are actually in your life. Is it just cannabis? Yeah, that's a lot of people think of verb or is it culinary herbs or what about the wide world? Every single area, every single people's used certain herbal ingredients to help support their health.

27:48 So are you doing the same? A lot of information over there and this podcast is made possible because of the cost of doing so by lost empire. Herbs are theirs. They are the primary underwriter of this podcast. I hope you have enjoyed this episode. Please do send me your comments and feedback reviews on iTunes or wherever else are much appreciated. And if you want to reach out directly to me, you can at Logan at lost empire, herbs.com we'd love to hear from you. How do you like this podcast? What are you excited about that's coming in the future? And are you on board with this mission? Thank you very much.