What Happens When You Lose the Thing That Made You “You” | Matt Vincent

Matt Vincent Episode Transcript

Introduction 0:00

Matt Vincent: I got to build it in if it’s not already a habit I have. With my gratitude practice, I’m saying thank you to everything. But very few of us realize that you’re at the moment right now that the butterfly flaps its wings to affect 10 years in the future. So what are those small things? And for me, I don’t want to lose sight of all the good things that already exist.

Charles Eide: From being at the top of his game as a two-time world champion to redefining his future and what success looks like, my next guest, Matt Vincent, defies all the odds as he shares his story of perseverance, growth, and what success means to 

Matt Vincent: him. Nothing’s permanent. Human race, my life, my problems. That’s why each chapter was special.

It was supposed to be temporary. We don’t pay attention to the things that stick around. 

So how do you let go of that old identity and, and change the story? 

Charles Eide: Clinging to it as though you need it, that’s creating more suffering than simply trusting the curiosity that got you there in the first place and going to explore again.

Matt Vincent: I think there’s a lot of value in exposure to discomfort, but I [00:01:00] don’t think danger is super useful. We mistake the two. Get back in your body instead of in here and slow down. 

Charles Eide: It’s funny because it’s not in my nature to slow down. I don’t want to slow down. So 

Matt Vincent: how about just sitting still and breathing for five minutes and not doing anything?

Charles Eide: That’s uncomfortable. 

Why is that harder for you than driving somewhere to close a big deal?

Matt Vincent: Matt Vincent, welcome to Cleared for Takeoff. 

Excited to be here. 

You made the trek up from St. Louis in your beautiful van. 

Charles Eide: Yep. 

Hung out at my place. That was so cool. We did the sauna last night. It 

Matt Vincent: was a real honor, man. Um- Yeah, one of the reasons I started traveling years ago was I would… I think Jim Wendler being one of the first guys, guy in power lifting that kind of mentored me, and I went and booked sales calls for two weeks around the place he lived so that I thought I could run into him at the gym.

Charles Eide: [00:02:00] Really? 

Matt Vincent: And I did. And I made friends with him. And then we hung out. Yeah. And that’s introduced me to a number of other people, and one of the things for me, and the reason I prioritize having the van and kind of structuring my life the way I do is I wanna go. 

Yeah. 

Charles Eide: Like, I, I need it. Like, I need the time on the road.

Matt Vincent: I need to get to go spend time with people like you. 

Charles Eide: Yeah. Yeah, you travel the country. I mean, you’ve been all over the place in that thing. 

Yep. 

So was it, has it always been a dream to have a van like that? 

Once I kinda figured out that was a thing. Yeah. But I, I would say the wanting to wander kind of vagabond thing, for sure.

Yeah. Why do you think that is? 

I don’t know. 

Yeah. 

I don’t know what it is. I don’t know if it’s I like novelty that much, I like exploring, I like feeling untethered. 

Yeah. 

Um- 

You’re pretty self-sufficient in that thing. I mean, I- For sure … you showed me the back last night with the water tanks and 

stuff. Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah.

And it’s like, and 

you can, you c- you do live in this 

[00:03:00] thing. I’m good for, I’m good for a week- 

Yeah … 

Matt Vincent: basically off-grid without having to really try to ration 

Charles Eide: stuff. Yeah. And then you got the Starlink, so you’re 

set. 

Matt Vincent: Yeah. 

Charles Eide: I can work, I can… You know, look, what, what was the point of building a remote job if I don’t work remote?

Matt Vincent: Yeah. 

Charles Eide: Remote for me isn’t just in another room in my house. Yeah. That’s crazy. 

Matt Vincent: Yeah. 

Charles Eide: I’ll just completely isolate from everyone that way. 

Matt Vincent: How, like, tell me about your, like, how did, who, who is Matt Vincent, and how did you end up here in life? 

Charles Eide: Yeah. How’d I get here? 

Matt Vincent: Um, so- Like, tell me about your upbringing

Matt’s Upbringing & Background 3:33

Charles Eide: born in small town Louisiana, kind of southwest Louisiana toward Texas. So Interstate 10, small town called Sulphur, Louisiana. Yep. About 25,000 people. 

Yep. 

Um, grew up there. My parents are a, my dad was a boilermaker by trade, and then got into a supervisor role at the refinery, those type of things. Um, Sulphur’s a small southern town, really all blue collar.

Matt Vincent: [00:04:00] Basically everyone works at the refinery. 

Charles Eide: Hm. 

Matt Vincent: I remember, like, we had, we had rich kids in town, and I think his dad was a lawyer. 

Charles Eide: Okay. 

That has recalibrated for me as I’ve gotten older. 

Matt Vincent: Yeah. 

Um, like they had a pool. 

Charles Eide: Yeah. 

Like, fuck. You’re like, “Man, they’re rich.” Like Beverly Hillbillies, bro. And so yeah, grew up down there hunting, fishing, spent a lot of time in the marsh- 

Matt Vincent: Yeah

doing stuff like that, sports. 

And mom and dad, were they involved in life? 

Charles Eide: Yeah, yeah, tons. Yeah. Yeah, really supportive and everything. Great parents. Had good boundaries, discipline. 

Yeah. Do you have siblings? 

Matt Vincent: One older brother. 

One older brother. Yeah. So you’re the youngest. 

Yeah. Yeah. I’m the runt of the litter.

Okay. 

So- 

Charles Eide: That’s cool … 

um But yeah, grew up doing sports. Mom’s a teacher, has been a teacher the whole way through, lifetime. 

Yeah. 

Matt Vincent: My mom still lives in the house I grew up in. Um- 

So fast-forward, you are a, I wanna say it right, you’re a two-time world champion in the Highland Games. 

Yes. 

So fast-forward- [00:05:00] 

Charles Eide: How did we get to there?

Matt Vincent: Yeah, how did we get to that? Like, how, uh, first of all, I honestly had never heard of it- 

Most people 

haven’t … until you and I were having lunch at Keaton’s Limitless- Yeah, yeah, yeah … Arena event, and I was like, “Oh my gosh, this guy’s, like, a world famous athlete.” And we had so much fun at that lunch, and I, we just got to know each other.

And then I started looking into these games, and it’s pretty incredible. But how the heck did you end up there? 

So 

Discovering the Highland Games 5:24

Matt Vincent: I ended up on a track and field scholarship at LSU, and so did shot put, discus, and hammer at a very average level at the Division I standard. Um, and then after that, post-college, kinda got not into working out, tried a hand at entrepreneurship, doing bicycle shop was my first gig.

Like the Wright brothers. 

Yeah, basically. That’s an interesting thing that you immediately think of. Yeah, airplanes. It’s a great book, by the way. Right on, yeah. 

Yeah. 

But yeah, so got into bicycles, failed at that, and, um, ended up getting into the oil and gas industry. Okay. And so [00:06:00] once I kinda got there, got into training a little bit and had some spare time, and so it was back into lifting.

My brother got into strongman, so I followed suit, got into that. This is, 

like, in your 20s? 

Yeah, so probably, like, 25 to 27. 

Okay. So, like, prime, like, muscle mass building. 

I was just big. 

Yeah. 

I was just heavy- Yeah … at that point. I had lost the interest in working out and then had really gotten into snacks.

Um, I knew about the Highland Games as a thrower in college. It’s kind of- Okay … where the sport all came from, Scotland, and kind of- 

Yeah … 

clans battling and doing things like that after the English disarmed them, and so they figured out a way to still train for war- Sure … meanwhile with farm equipment. 

Charles Eide: Okay.

Matt Vincent: Find out about it, and then of course at that point, you know, 2008- 

Charles Eide: Okay … 

Matt Vincent: ish. And so a message board where they’re talking about it, and found a game that was gonna be within a couple hour drive of where I lived. And so I went as an amateur to go compete. 

Had you trained for it then? 

Charles Eide: A couple times. 

Okay, so you weren’t [00:07:00] like 

Matt Vincent: dialing in and- No, no clue what I was doing.

Charles Eide: Yeah. We were, we’re making up implements as close as we could based on looking at it. 

Sure. 

Matt Vincent: Um, but having the collegiate throwing background’s e- you, you’re cheating. 

Yeah. Okay. 

Charles Eide: I already know how to do all the things. It’s a little 

translation into- 

Totally. It’s definitely- You’ve been 

coached. 

Matt Vincent: Yeah, yeah.

Charles Eide: You’re, you’re, you’re not a very beginner. It’s 

Matt Vincent: not 

Charles Eide: the same. Now shot 

put’s like a big metal ball. Mm-hmm. But the, at the, at the Highland Games it’s like a- It’s a 

Matt Vincent: stone. 

Charles Eide: It’s a stone. 

Yep. 

And how heavy is it? 

Matt Vincent: 16 to 18 pounds. 

Charles Eide: Okay. 

Matt Vincent: Yeah. 

Okay. 

Which is about the same as a shot put, 16 pounds. 

Yeah. So you go in and you start, you 

s- Yep.

Charles Eide: So go in, compete, do the first one, and won the amateur thing, and then looked at what numbers I threw compared to the guys who were in the good amateur class at that one. I was like, “Oh, I’m gonna give this thing a run.” 

Matt Vincent: So you’re like, “I, I maybe I could-” I 

Charles Eide: think I could be good at this. 

Matt Vincent: Okay. 

And 

so- You walked in and you were like, “I, I actually could beat these guys maybe.”

Yeah. And so 

Winning World Championships 7:59

Matt Vincent: 2009 [00:08:00] did my first full season. Um, I think- think 

Now what is a whole season? Is it multiple 

competitions? Yeah, yeah. So I would find, man, I would, had the outside sales job, and so I can travel and go see clients. So I would book meetings with clients around places that had a competition over the weekend.

Oh, yeah. Great. 

So that travel was covered. 

Yeah, great idea. 

Charles Eide: And so compete nine or 10 times, and then win my first amateur world championship in 2010. Wow. And then ’11, won it again. World championship. Yeah, amateur one. 

Matt Vincent: Wow. So w- which, which sport did you win? 

Uh, Highland Games, so it’s the whole nine events.

So it’s the whole thing. Yeah, yeah, yeah. So- You beat everybody in everything. Yeah, so you have to, it’s like average score over nine events type deal. Whoa. 

So what are the events? You s- you’re throwing the stone. 

Charles Eide: Yeah, so you have two stones like shot put, a heavy and a light. 

Matt Vincent: Okay. And 

so the heavy’s 28 pounds.

Oh, gee. 

And then you’ve got two weights you throw for distance, and so block of steel, a couple lengths of chain, and a ring, and you throw it with one hand and spin it around twice. 

Okay. So there’s- 

So you have a light weight you throw [00:09:00] for distance, which is 28 pounds. You have a heavy, which is 56. 

Whoa, 56 pounds?

Yeah. 

And you’re 

Charles Eide: throwing this? 

It’s me. Yeah, yeah, yeah. 

Matt Vincent: How far can you throw that, or at 

Charles Eide: the- My best was 48.10. 

Oh my gosh. 50- Yeah, it’s far … 

58 

pounds? 

Matt Vincent: It’s far. For, uh, 56. 

I think about like a 56 pound d- like a 50 pound dumbbell, and you 

throw- Or a kettlebell would be a bit more realistic … 

and you throw that fif- 48 feet?

Charles Eide: Did. Wow. It would be ugly now. 

Oh my gosh. I’d 

probably have to go to the hospital. 

Matt Vincent: Whoa. Okay. Yeah. So- 

Yeah, so that’s two more. Yeah. Then you have, uh, two hammers, which is the ball on the end of a stick. 

Charles Eide: Yep. 

And so one’s 16 pounds, one’s 22 pounds. 

Matt Vincent: And you’re throwing it. 

Yep. 

Charles Eide: There’s a lot of these are throwing.

Matt Vincent: They’re all throwing. 

Charles Eide: It’s all throwing. 

Oh, for distance. 

Okay. 

Matt Vincent: Um, we have the caber, which is the one people recognize with the big telephone pole. 

Yes, you’re throwing a 

telephone pole straight. And so you’re throwing it, yeah, straight is the idea. 

Yeah. 

So that’s the only one that’s for accuracy. 

Charles Eide: Sure. Does it have to go a certain distance?

Matt Vincent: Doesn’t matter. 

Doesn’t [00:10:00] matter. You just have to flip it 

once. As long as it flips and it lands directly away from you at 12 o’clock, that’s perfect. How heavy is it? So if it falls off to the side, well, they’re trees. They’re different everywhere you go. So you 

Charles Eide: don’t know? 

But no, every game has a different one.

Matt Vincent: Same with the stones, same with the implements. That’s part of the fun. It’s part of the fun. Part of the fun. Um, you’d know where the good ones are. And so the cabers would vary, I’d say, in the pro class from like- 18 feet, 150 pounds to 23, 24 feet and 130 pounds. 

So you’re throwing a giant telephone pole that weighs, uh, basically what a person weighs- Yeah, but you’re-

Charles Eide: and you gotta flip 

Matt Vincent: it … you’re flipping it end over end. 

Charles Eide: Okay. 

And so you’re carrying it, so you have to… You get it handed to you standing up. 

Mm-hmm. 

And you work your way to the bottom of it, and so you toss it in the air, catch it- 

Yep … 

and you balance it kinda like a broomstick- 

Yeah … 

like that. 

130-pound broomstick.

Matt Vincent: Yeah. Same, same idea though. Yeah. Yeah. Kinda feels the way it does when you have it, right? Yeah. Like, it’s not a big fight when it’s in the right spot. 

Yeah. [00:11:00] 

And so then you run with it and give it direction, and then stop and flip it. So the end keeps going, and then you yank the back end. 

Charles Eide: You ever get slivers from that thing?

Matt Vincent: Like splinters? 

Yeah. 

Uh, no. Like a telephone- Uh, usually they’re pretty- 

They 

bend now … polished handle. 

Charles Eide: Yeah. 

Matt Vincent: Yeah, and they’re not really a telephone pole. 

Charles Eide: They’re like, “Larry, get out the sander.” 

Matt Vincent: Yeah, they… We break them all the time, too. 

Charles Eide: Really? 

Matt Vincent: Yeah. 

Charles Eide: That’s crazy. So you, you go on to win one. 

Matt Vincent: Yeah, win an amateur in ’10, win another amateur in ’11, which got me an invite to the professional world championship- Yep

which was, like, two weeks later. 

Charles Eide: Yep. 

Matt Vincent: Took second. 

Charles Eide: Mm-hmm. 

Matt Vincent: And then won the following year, second, won, and then some seconds. 

Charles Eide: Yeah. And how many people are competing against you? 

Matt Vincent: In a world championship, there’s usually 12. 

Charles Eide: Okay. So it’s not huge, but it’s- No, 

Matt Vincent: and it’s- … but not 

Charles Eide: so, like- 

Matt Vincent: But, like, at the world level, like, when we’re competing all season, I’d probably compete, like, 22, 23 times.

Charles Eide: Yeah. 

Matt Vincent: And so it’s a lot of weekends or- It’s a 

Charles Eide: lot … 

Matt Vincent: um, but there’s really only 20 of [00:12:00] you that are really good. 

Charles Eide: Yeah. 

Matt Vincent: And so you see the same- 

Charles Eide: Like, in the world? 

Matt Vincent: Yeah. 

Charles Eide: Yeah. 

Matt Vincent: So you see the same guys every week. 

Charles Eide: Yeah. 

Matt Vincent: Which was awesome. 

Charles Eide: Yeah. So did you become friends with them over the years? Totally. 

Matt Vincent: Yeah. Yeah.

That’s brotherhood. Like, that was part of the thing I missed most, like, after getting hurt- 

Charles Eide: Yeah … 

Matt Vincent: was, like, ah. And it wasn’t just that, like, I’d lost those guys, but it was I’d lost a group of people that understood this unreasonable pursuit. 

Charles Eide: Mm. 

Matt Vincent: That we didn’t have to explain this reason we train in the field by ourselves together doing a thing no one knows what it is.

Charles Eide: Part of the fun of it, though. 

Matt Vincent: Yeah. 

Charles Eide: So you said you got hurt. Yeah. Is that kinda what ended all 

Matt Vincent: that? Yeah, so 

Career-Ending Injuries 12:43

Matt Vincent: I finished up 2016 second in the world, and my knee was pretty nagging. 

Charles Eide: Mm. 

Matt Vincent: Um, wasn’t bad, but it wasn’t gonna get any better. 

Charles Eide: Mm-hmm. 

Matt Vincent: And so it was starting to kinda not lock out all the way, and so I can’t really extend the quad.

I can’t push the hip. I can’t throw. And so I was like, do ACL [00:13:00] surgery. You know, take a year off. We’re gonna come back and win a world championship in 2018. This is the script. We’re gonna… And we’ve been vlogging for years, and so this was part of- 

Charles Eide: You have people watching … 

Matt Vincent: gonna show it. Yeah, yeah. Yeah, man, let’

Got surgery, I think the first one in January of 2017, and then had another in, like, April. 

Charles Eide: Yep. 

Matt Vincent: And then another in September. 

Charles Eide: Holy smokes, you’re getting a lot of 

Matt Vincent: surgeries. So I had nine finished in three years. 

Charles Eide: Nine surgeries? 

Matt Vincent: Yeah, and finished with a total knee replacement. So five ACLs, a high tibial osteotomy, an OATS procedure, a meniscectomy, and finally a total knee replacement.

Charles Eide: So the reason you kept having them is it just wasn’t right? Things 

Matt Vincent: kept- Yeah, the ACL just failed. It would– My body would, uh… It just didn’t hold. It wouldn’t- I wouldn’t break it in rehab. There wasn’t a moment. There wasn’t any of that. It just didn’t go as planned. 

Charles Eide: [00:14:00] So when all that happened and you were like, “Okay, well, clearly my future is not doing this.”

Matt Vincent: Yeah. I very, very much remember journaling one day and, uh, realizing like, “Oh, we’re never gonna do it 

Charles Eide: again.” Hmm. 

Matt Vincent: Like, we’re not getting back to that. Like, we’re trying to walk again, man. Like, I’m traveling with a cane. Like, we got other problems to fix long before we think about getting back to competing, and have to make peace with like, “Oh, shit, that’s done.”

And I didn’t know my last one was my last one. 

Charles Eide: Yeah. What did it feel like when you realized that? 

Matt Vincent: It’s a bummer. You know, it’s a thing I poured a lot of effort into getting really good at, and I’ll never be good at it again. Like, I can’t even kind of do 

Charles Eide: it. Yeah. 

Matt Vincent: You know, I felt like I’d spent 20 years learning to play guitar, and then I lost my hands.

Charles Eide: Yeah. 

Matt Vincent: But I also lost, like, I couldn’t train either. 

Charles Eide: Yeah. 

Matt Vincent: And [00:15:00] so my stress management tool’s gone, my sense of identity, my sense of self. 

Charles Eide: Yeah. And, and friends. 

Matt Vincent: Yeah, friends, community, passion. 

Charles Eide: Your circle. 

Matt Vincent: The business I had started to build around apparel was kind of rooted in this thing. Yeah. And so, like, all I can see is it’s all gone.

That- 

Charles Eide: How did you deal with that? 

Hitting Rock Bottom & Chronic Pain 15:24 

Matt Vincent: Poorly. Yeah, poorly. Um Just got really nasty with myself. You know, probably not recognizing I was depressed, not really knowing how that feels or what it is, but more crushed by the chronic pain than anything else. Like, that was the real problem to solve. Like, I couldn’t walk more than 200 yards a day before I was miserable.

Charles Eide: Yeah. 

Matt Vincent: And just shitty to everyone around 

Charles Eide: me. 

Matt Vincent: Yeah.

I knew at some [00:16:00] point that if I don’t solve that problem with chronic pain, like I’m not gonna do, finish the ride like this, man. At some point I’m gonna punch out. And so if that’s the case, then what’s the risk in trying everything we can to fix this? And so at that point I just tried everything 

Charles Eide: So obviously going through that has changed you.

Matt Vincent: Yeah. 

Charles Eide: What did, what did you take away from that? I mean, looking back now 

Matt Vincent: A lot of that I was creating. 

Charles Eide: Hmm. 

Matt Vincent: A lot of, you know, not the pain, but my inability to deal with it was my inability to manage my own stress, my central nervous system, figure out what’s going on, how to communicate, any of those things.

And so I sought distraction. I thought or sought any other dopamine-driven bullshit to escape from it, or do the one thing that’s working and pour [00:17:00] everything I have into my business and let everything else rot. And I did that, ’cause that’s the only place I felt valuable. 

Charles Eide: So obviously, you go through this dark spot where you’re realizing that this, this is over.

Yep. And it starts to really tear you apart

Where did you start to reflect on… ‘Cause you said, “If I, if it doesn’t get better, I can’t keep doing this.” Nope. Where did that, where did that change? 

Matt Vincent: Was kind of in that realization of having that very honest conversation with myself about that. And like I, I don’t think you’re obligated to exist And so riding it out as a martyr for [00:18:00] something I’m not into.

And so if we’re gonna choose to be here, then let’s fucking at least give a shot at 

Charles Eide: it. Yeah. 

Matt Vincent: If this all fails and goes tits up, fine, punch out. But we haven’t tried everything yet. 

Charles Eide: Yeah. 

Matt Vincent: So let’s start there. 

Charles Eide: So, so where did you start? 

Matt Vincent: You know, 

Finding Tools: Cold Plunge, Breathwork & Kelly Starrett 18:21

Matt Vincent: I’d been journaling at that point quite a bit. I’d been creating content, and so I think probably the first thing that kinda got anything for me was cold plunging.

Charles Eide: Hmm. 

Matt Vincent: I was, uh, working with a mentor and brother at the time, um, Kelly Starrett, great friend. Um, he wrote a great book, uh, “Becoming a Supple Leopard,” and it’s kind of why everyone foam rolls. 

Charles Eide: Oh, really? It was 

Matt Vincent: Kelly, yeah. 

Charles Eide: Wow. 

Matt Vincent: Where he uses a lacrosse ball for sure. 

Charles Eide: I was just doing that an hour ago. 

Matt Vincent: Yeah, that’s ’cause of Kelly.

And so, um, he’s the first guy that I would, I would travel out to San Francisco and go see him like once a quarter. Like I just knew [00:19:00] I needed to be around whatever that energy he had. And so the, you know, in that time too, I got fired from the outside sales job and so like all I have is this business and so like all I know is go.

Yeah. And I’m traveling with a cane and just going and doing this. 

Charles Eide: Yeah. 

Matt Vincent: It’s the only area that I had this drive to. 

Charles Eide: And, and it’s not like you were an old man doing this. 

Matt Vincent: Nope. 

Charles Eide: You were a young man. 

Matt Vincent: 36. 

Charles Eide: Yeah. 

Matt Vincent: Yeah. 

Charles Eide: So you were like, “I gotta figure this out.” 

Matt Vincent: Gotta figure it out, man. So- No one else is gonna. 

Charles Eide: Yeah.

So you find this guy Kelly. 

Matt Vincent: Yep, I start, you know, I get to know him through some YouTube content that we had done together and which got me access to spend more time with him. Right. And I got to see a way he operates and how he treats himself and I got to learn a bunch of this kind of biohacking stuff in 2015 to manage chronic pain.

So I’m sauna-ing, I’m cold plunging, I’m doing all these things and then [00:20:00] I get exposed to Wim Hof which turns me on to breathwork. I 

Charles Eide: love Wim Hof. 

Matt Vincent: And so start using that, realize I can change my state, that I can get out of pain even temporarily but if I can get my central nervous system to down-regulate, I can tolerate things better.

I’m not always at that edge of like death of a thousand paper cuts which the chronic pain thing gets. It’s never that it’s just so fucking bad that it’s excruciating, it’s just you can’t ever get away from it. Not sitting, not standing, not laying, not walking, not doing nothing, not complaining and not being happy Still was there.

And so figuring out some tools that got me some, some space between it. 

Charles Eide: Yeah. 

Managing the Central Nervous System 20:44

Charles Eide: We were talking about the… You were explaining to me the central nervous system dilemma that a lot of us have- Mm … and not having control over it, and I guess not being aware of it a lot of times, right? And you were saying [00:21:00] breathwork and sauna, cold plunge.

Tell me about the use of those tools and what you saw for you.

Matt Vincent: So I don’t know how I would go back to that perspective, but I’ll just what I, why I still do it. Man, I’ve tried a lot of stuff, and these are the ones that have stuck around. 

Charles Eide: Hmm. 

Matt Vincent: They have lowest barrier of entry. They- 

Charles Eide: Cold water. 

Matt Vincent: Yep. And like one of, one of my rules of like, I wanna be the best version of me I can be.

When I do those things, do I feel more or less like that version of me? 

Charles Eide: Hmm. 

Matt Vincent: And I feel more like it, so that now becomes non-negotiable. Yeah. Especially if like those things involve me doing nothing, just nothing in there or in there, easy. 

Charles Eide: Yeah. 

Matt Vincent: That’s so much easier than figuring out a marketing strategy.

Yeah. I will pick up the points of improvement by doing nothing, I promise. And I think part of the skill in those comes from [00:22:00] overcoming the not wanting to do it, overcoming the why is it important, or do I notice I only lean on these tools once I’m in fight or flight and in panic instead of actually practicing them when they’re good?

Charles Eide: Yeah. 

Matt Vincent: But I started recognizing my… You know, after doing those for a long time and getting down-regulated and feeling that shift, shift, you know, you get some linear periodization, you know, progression to doing these things on a consistent basis. But then over time, I start recognizing that the cold will tell me how out of sync my central nervous system is based on how hard, how long it takes me to get my breath back under control.

So that like- 

Charles Eide: And so that’s what my problem is. 

Matt Vincent: Yeah. 

Charles Eide: I get in that cold tub. We did it last night, and I was like, “Man, I’m out of practice here.” I couldn’t take it for more than a minute. 

Matt Vincent: Yeah, and so like, you know, just getting used to does the cold decide how I breathe? 

Charles Eide: Hmm. It’s 

Matt Vincent: just cold. Doesn’t get a choice.[00:23:00] 

And being able to do that, I think, is a good thing to practice. It’s a real safe way to create a panic in your system that doesn’t have any, and there’s no risk of danger. And so I think there’s a lot of value in exposure to discomfort, but I don’t think danger is super useful. We mistake the two. Because we don’t get exposed to any real danger in most of our lives, we pretend discomfort is a threat to us, and we do that simply because it’s the biggest problem in front of us, and so we can’t help identify it as that.

That’s our biology. We’ve been rewarded from survival to fitness for a really long time of threat detection, do something about it. But in a time of abundance when there aren’t any threats to detect, if we don’t slow that system down and be able to see the abundance, we’ll keep doing it until we kill the whole thing

So being able to manage that [00:24:00] central nervous system keeps me from being triggered, keeps me from getting that accumulation of bullshit that becomes that death of a thousand paper cuts. And if I can’t be triggered, I can’t be manipulated because I know who I am and I know what’s true. I can return back to being present, return back to gratitude, and be able to deal with the problem at hand according to what it is.

It’s a problem, just like there always has been. There’s never not been problems. This is a constant. How I perceive the problem is entirely up to me

Fight or Flight & The Abundance Mindset 24:41

Matt Vincent: Would you crawl through 100 yards of broken glass for your wife? 

Charles Eide: Yes. 

Matt Vincent: Would you crawl through the same 100 yards of broken glass for a nickel? 

Charles Eide: Of course not. 

Matt Vincent: Did the glass change? 

Charles Eide: No. 

Matt Vincent: Did the pain? 

Charles Eide: No. 

Matt Vincent: Your purpose to why it mattered did [00:25:00] You get to decide that. That’s not handed down by the divine. Us having a consciousness that gets to choose it is the gift.

But if you don’t choose it, someone will assign one and make you think that you don’t have enough for any of this other bullshit, and that’s what happens when you’re stuck in fight or flight. How would you get a society that has everything they could possibly need to want more? Well, we have to convince them they don’t have it That’s how you keep this whole capitalism thing running at high speed, man The metric’s not happy, healthy people 

Charles Eide: Well, and when we were in the sauna last night, you said something interesting how in general a lot of society lives kinda on that edge- Mm-hmm

of fear, flight or f- fight or flight all the time. All the time. How do I– I mean, if we’re, if we are, then we’re used to it, and if we’re used to it, how do, how do [00:26:00] I identify that, and how do I not participate in it? 

Matt Vincent: So I started recognizing some things that would allow me to slow down. So fight or flight. Am I breathing in my chest?

Is my heart rate elevated? Am I anxious? So let’s look at a feeling in your body, and let’s just use anxiety as an easy reference point for determining fight or flight. Anxiety is my attachment to some outcome in the future that I would like to go a certain way, but right now I’m creating a narrative that it’s not gonna go that way, and I’m scared about it.

Charles Eide: Mm. 

Matt Vincent: Right? If I’m in fight or flight, all I see are the problems and barriers and things. If I’m calm and I recognize everything in my life is great, and whether or not this happens or not, the sun’s gonna come up tomorrow and things are fine anyway, I can look at this with the same feeling in my body and realize it’s excitement [00:27:00] because I’m curious about the outcome.

This is a choice. Our biology in fight or flight is going to run the negative scenario. None of the good things in your life have ever tried to kill you, so we don’t pay attention to them. Not naturally, not s- not in our subconscious. So consciously choosing to kinda opens your perspective to get out of this fight or flight spotlight that people get stuck in looking at their life that can only see the problem, and they think they back out, but instead they’re just swinging this thing around highlighting problems.

Getting out of that, slowing down, doing the breathwork, getting present, going out in nature, cold plunge, having sex, any number of things, down-regulate and be able to get back view with the floodlight of how fucking cool everything is You [00:28:00] already have an infinite amount of water that runs out of that tap in your house.

You already have a warm bed to sleep in. You already have a vehicle to get from a place to a place. You already have eaten. Like, recognize the abundance that’s already there, and if you don’t appreciate what’s already there, why are you begging the universe for more? You don’t appreciate what you have.

Why would it keep serving? 

Gratitude Practice 28:27

Matt Vincent: I want to choose to see it. 

Charles Eide: So that is a good segue into the idea of gratitude, ’cause I know you’re big on gratitude. Obviously, being grateful for the good things is important. Tell me how you look at gratitude when things aren’t going your way, when you’re frustrated, when something’s not right, ’cause you’ve been through a lot of that, especially with the le- leaving your athletic career.

H- how do you use gratitude to help you? 

Matt Vincent: So I do believe [00:29:00] in, you know, from the athletic side of my life, if I wanna get better at a thing, it takes reps. And so self-awareness wise, same type of idea. It takes reps. I gotta build it in if it’s not already a habit I have. And so with my gratitude practice, I’m saying thank you to everything.

Charles Eide: Hmm. 

Matt Vincent: I say thank you to the hard days that got me here because this is where I am. This is where the most opportunity lies for me to create more of the life I want. So anything that got me here, and if I ever feel a moment of happiness, proud presence, whatever the Buddhist would refer to as the God realm, then I have to thank it all, ’cause if any part of it changes, we don’t end up here.

That’s how the whole time travel thing works. Like if you go back and change a thing in the past, chaos theory affects everything, right? 

Charles Eide: Yeah. Yeah, everything. 

Matt Vincent: But very few of us realize that you’re at the moment right now that the butterfly flaps its wings to affect 10 [00:30:00] years in the future. So what are those small things?

And for me, I don’t wanna lose sight of all the good things that already exist. And so this started out as a practice where I’d write a few things in my journal, and again, I’m in that kind of dark place and I’m writing and I’m like, I… I think it was something I saw Tony Robbins talk about with gratitude.

And up until this point, as a very arrogant, cocky 30-year-old, um, I think the whole self-help thing is such trash. 

Charles Eide: Hmm. 

Matt Vincent: I can’t even imagine why people would be so weak to even look at any of this. Hmm. I look at it as total charlatanism. 

Charles Eide: Okay. 

Matt Vincent: And that’s because I’m looking at people that it’s targeting.

Charles Eide: Sure. 

Matt Vincent: And instead, like I remember a number of things, whether that was cannabis or psilocybin or any other experiences, traveling to different places of I, I don’t wanna have an opinion without an experience [00:31:00] I can just say I don’t know. And so when it came to Tony Robbins, I was like, “How about instead of having an opinion, you read one book?”

Charles Eide: Mm. 

Matt Vincent: Read one book he’s written and then make up your mind. 

Charles Eide: Mm. 

Matt Vincent: You’re allowed to after that, but until then, shut up. So I did, and sure enough, it’s great. 

Charles Eide: I l- I, I’m gonna be honest, I love Tony Robbins. 

Matt Vincent: You should. He’s a wizard. 

Charles Eide: I love him. Like, 

Matt Vincent: like, like, like he’s an actual wizard. 

Charles Eide: Yeah. 

Matt Vincent: Like, if we go back 1,000 years and give that guy a cloak and a staff and some giant beard and call him Gandalf the Tall, he’s a wizard.

He is. He’s not giving people anything. He’s simply transmitting- 

Charles Eide: Yeah … 

Matt Vincent: a wavelength- 

Charles Eide: Yeah … 

Matt Vincent: a frequency to people. 

Charles Eide: Yeah. 

Matt Vincent: And it resonates and it amplifies because you’re in a group of people that want to receive it But like go back a thousand years and it’s like, “Uh, I don’t know. My grandpa went and saw this guy, he [00:32:00] cast spells on him, and now we haven’t worried about money.”

Charles Eide: Yeah. But 

Matt Vincent: that’s what he’s doing. Of course that’s spell casting. 

Charles Eide: Yeah. 

Matt Vincent: That’s prayer, that’s gratitude. It’s prayer, it’s spell casting. It’s whatever you’re bringing into the light to pay attention to and give your energy. 

Charles Eide: Yeah. 

Matt Vincent: Where your attention goes, your energy flows. I believe that’s true. Where my attention goes, it tells the universe what’s actually my priority.

Is it my problems or is it how great things are? And I wanna spend at least 51% of my time on how great things are. 

Charles Eide: Yeah. Absolutely. 

Matt Vincent: And so subconsciously I don’t. We’re not designed to. We’re designed to solve problems and provide and figure things out, and then we have to realize, oh, we just like doing that.

The reward isn’t necessarily as important as the doing that. 

Charles Eide: Yeah. 

Matt Vincent: And so finding gratitude in it, um, you know, this has all elevated over the years to where… I mean, that’s what I use my mala for, my [00:33:00] necklace. It’s beads on a string. I don’t associate it with any specific religion, background, whatever it is.

Um- Hmm … to me, I use it, I take it off, and I go through it and do one for each of the beads, and I say… I’ll give you an example

Thank you universe for all the hard days that got me here. Thank you for being able to show up. Thank you for being consistent. Thank you for not listening to the voice in our head that holds us back. Thank you for knowing exactly who we wanna become. Thank you for loving you the way your wife loves you.

Thank you for showing up on the days you don’t want to. Thank you for continuing to move forward. Thank you for choosing the path you’re on. Thank you for continuing to love yourself. Thank you for the way the sun works. Thank you for the way that I can present li- perceive light waves in my head and see beautiful sunsets.

Thank you for all the beautiful sunsets I’ve ever seen. Thank you for the way grass grows. Thank you for the way I can perceive light waves in general. Thank you for [00:34:00] sound. Thank you for every time I’ve ever heard I love you. Thank you for all the running water I’ve had access to. Thank you for the warm beds I’ve slept in.

Thank you for the only times I’ve ever been hungry was because I needed to lose weight. Thank you for the parents that loved me. Thank you for the house that I grew up in. Thank you for a brother that was a great representation of who I could become. Thank you for all the leaders that have believed in me.

Thanks for the hard times. Thanks for challenging myself. Thank you for the self-doubt that let me see where I could be better. Thank you for the injuries that got me away from a sport that I wouldn’t have left on my own terms better. Thanks for my dad passing away and shining a light on how important it is to be alive.

Thank you for the hard days I had in my old relationship to figure out where to have better boundaries with myself and my partner in this one. Thank you for continuing to be present. Thank you for continuing to believe in ourself. Thank you for the heart that beats in my chest that’s never needed a thing from me.

Thanks for the way my skin heals. Thank you for [00:35:00] being able to touch and taste. Thank you for my taste buds. And so I go around and do that. That’s about half. 

Charles Eide: Wow. So you use, you basically have a, a thank you for each of the beads. Mm-hmm. And- 

Matt Vincent: And sometimes I just say thank you for everything. 

Charles Eide: Yeah. Do you do that every day?

Matt Vincent: Mm-hmm. A couple times. 

Charles Eide: Couple times a day. That’s amazing. 

Matt Vincent: It’s been a really interesting practice. 

Charles Eide: Yeah. 

Matt Vincent: Um- 

Charles Eide: What has it done for you? 

Matt Vincent: So in that idea of having, like, the floodlight on- 

Charles Eide: Mm-hmm … 

Matt Vincent: I want as much of my peripheral awareness flooded with abundance and gratitude as I possibly can because it’ll continually resize the problem I have to solve.

There’s no boundary between me and happy. I’m already there. This is just simply a thing to see can I? And so I want that return back to the peripheral. When I’m doing that practice, anxiety can’t exist because I’m using the same part of the brain. [00:36:00] 

Charles Eide: That’s interesting. So when you’re feeling anxiety come on, you- It 

Matt Vincent: works

Charles Eide: you exercise gratitude. And it 

Matt Vincent: shuts 

Charles Eide: down. Yeah. That’s interesting. So it’s the same part of the brain. 

Matt Vincent: And so this is me paying attention to all those things that I normally don’t. 

Charles Eide: Mm. 

Matt Vincent: You know what I mean? Hell, man, just how many inventions had to take place for this microphone stand, microphone, and technology to exist for us to be able to do this?

Like, basically we go back to the wheel because, like, shipping is involved in getting all these plastics and molded material and the machines that made those and someone figuring it out. Like, thanks, man. 

Charles Eide: Yeah. 

Matt Vincent: Let me take a minute. 

Charles Eide: Yeah. ‘

Matt Vincent: Cause if we’re gonna bother comparing ourselves to just make ourselves feel small, then let’s actually compare, and look at all of human history, and look at what we know of opportunity, and realize how amazing things are right now.

You’re alive, and you get to make choices, and you get to decide what you want to perceive about a thing instead of just [00:37:00] being fed it. But if you’re constantly in fight or flight, you’re easy to manipulate because it’s easy to believe the other is the root of your problems 

Charles Eide: Easy to manipulate’s an interesting idea 

Matt Vincent: Well, it’s how you get people to buy things- 

Charles Eide: Yeah

or 

Matt Vincent: vote or anything else. You don’t think the powers that be know that that’s what it is? 

Charles Eide: Yeah. 

Matt Vincent: We’ve shown with tremendous amount of data at this point that they’re collecting of where we pay attention most. It’s not on things that make us happy. 

Charles Eide: If it bleeds, it leads. 

Matt Vincent: We can’t help it- Yeah … because of the fight or flight thing, because of our biology being more attracted to the train wreck.

They know this. They don’t operate in a way to inform. They’re, uh … The only goal is attention, ’cause we’ve also shown that if we give our attention, we’ll give our money. 

Charles Eide: Oh, that’s an interesting… Yeah. 

Matt Vincent: So that’s how you get people. 

Charles Eide: Yeah, so it make, it makes the economic engine run. So how do you tune out that stuff?

You know, like- Don’t 

Matt Vincent: watch 

Charles Eide: You [00:38:00] don’t, you just don’t watch. I don’t 

Matt Vincent: care. 

Charles Eide: But n- now you have Instagram just like I do. 

Matt Vincent: Sure. 

Charles Eide: Do you just- 

Matt Vincent: Your algorithm is a mirror, my friend, to what you pay attention to most. 

Charles Eide: Yeah. 

Matt Vincent: Mine doesn’t bother me. 

Charles Eide: It’s all those airplane videos I’m watching. 

Matt Vincent: Perfect. But if your algorithm makes you bad, like, it can tell why do you choose to look at things that make you angry?

Do you feel like you need to know this, or have they convinced you you do? 

Charles Eide: Oh, it’s so true. My… We had, uh, Christy Peel was on here, and she’s in PR. 

Matt Vincent: Okay. 

Charles Eide: She’s been in PR forever, and she said exactly that, that if you don’t like your feed, then you gotta pay attention to what you’re paying attention to. And I was like, “Oh, my gosh, that’s so crazy.”

No wonder I have so many airplane videos on my feed. It’s crazy. Yeah. Because that’s what I stare at when they pop up. That’s really interesting. So you, do, do you scroll? 

Matt Vincent: Of course. 

Charles Eide: Yeah. 

Matt Vincent: Yeah. I, I don’t have strict habits around these things, but I also [00:39:00] know what I’m doing. 

Charles Eide: Yeah. 

Matt Vincent: I have plenty of time where I feel like scrolling and disconnecting.

Charles Eide: Yeah. But you’re like, “I’m being deliberate about this.” 

Matt Vincent: But I also don’t have any areas of my life where I feel like I’m not getting stuff done. 

Charles Eide: Yeah. 

Matt Vincent: I don’t have anywhere I’m hiding. Like, I’m not distracting myself from doing a thing. I’m actually just bored. 

Charles Eide: Yeah. 

Matt Vincent: And even then, I limit it- Yeah … because I know that’s not downregulation.

Charles Eide: Yeah. 

Matt Vincent: That’s not being present. 

Charles Eide: Mm. 

Matt Vincent: Especially not with two screens. 

Charles Eide: Yeah. 

Matt Vincent: Right? Like, I’m still… Even though I’m laying still, how much is still incoming that my brain is having to process? 

Charles Eide: Yeah. 

Matt Vincent: Why do that? You don’t think that keeps the fight or flight thing going while you’re laying on the couch? Of course it does 

Charles Eide: Just tuning it out 

Matt Vincent: It’s– Look, social media or anything is a tool, like a hammer.

User error [00:40:00] is part of the problem, and that kind of goes from social media to AI to drugs to just about everything. They’re not inherently good or bad, it’s user error. 

Charles Eide: Yeah. 

Matt Vincent: What’s the intention? 

Charles Eide: So 

Intentional Living & Designing Your Life 40:18

Charles Eide: something that I really like about your teachings is the, the intentionality of designing the life that you want.

Matt Vincent: Mm-hmm. 

Charles Eide: So how can I get better at designing a life that serves me better? 

Matt Vincent: So until we can kind of set the compass in a direction, we’re basically just gonna be throwing attention, like throwing energy out, trying lots of stuff. 

Charles Eide: Mm-hmm. 

Matt Vincent: And there should be some exploration if you don’t know what actually connects you most to source.

Does that kind of idea- And you say source meaning 

Charles Eide: like God or the 

Matt Vincent: universe? Yeah, whatever it is. Like I know– All right. I know that there’s times, [00:41:00] there is times when you’re flying where you just know that’s where you’re supposed to be. 

Charles Eide: Oh, yeah. 

Matt Vincent: That source. 

Charles Eide: Mm-hmm. Did it yesterday. 

Matt Vincent: Yeah. So that feeling, things that make you feel that way.

Charles Eide: I remember yesterday I got the chance, or yeah, chance yesterday to go flying with a guy in this Super Cub, and you don’t fly high in these airplanes. They’re like low-flying airplanes because you do it for the fun of flying. 

Matt Vincent: Right. 

Charles Eide: And I haven’t done that in forever ’cause when I’m flying in the jet, it’s up to 35,000, get to where you’re going, and it reminded me why I love it so much yesterday.

‘Cause it was 

Matt Vincent: play. ‘

Charles Eide: Cause it was play. We were, we were 500 feet off the ground looking at stuff. You’re looking at… I was like, “I didn’t know there was a lake right there.” 

Matt Vincent: There wasn’t another mission other than fly the plane. 

Charles Eide: Yeah. It was just like go up and enjoy the beauty of being up there. 

Matt Vincent: Yeah. So that’s flow state.

That is- Yeah … [00:42:00] being fully present. So what are those things? So that’s 

Charles Eide: why I was so happy then. Yeah, 

Matt Vincent: yeah, 

Charles Eide: yeah. Yeah. 

Matt Vincent: Of course. Well, 

Charles Eide: I mean, I’m always happy when I’m in the air, but 

Matt Vincent: yeah. Well, sure, but again, the intent, it’s not the act of, right? Right. It’s that feeling of what connects you to that. 

Charles Eide: Mm. 

Matt Vincent: And so I can find that sometimes journaling or breathwork.

I do find it sometimes in work- 

Charles Eide: Yeah … 

Matt Vincent: in solving problems. 

Charles Eide: Yeah. 

Matt Vincent: And so I would build my day around those, and then I would identify what’s for sure the things I don’t wanna deal with. 

Charles Eide: Mm. And 

Matt Vincent: then I would do my best to try to eliminate those things from my life. 

Charles Eide: Yeah. 

Matt Vincent: And sometimes they’re unavoidable, so what?

The point is less of those and more time spent focused on things I care about with people I love. 

Charles Eide: Yeah, but just being more intentional about it, and intentional about your attention. 

Matt Vincent: Well, if not, you’re just giving it away. Yeah. I mean- 

Charles Eide: Yeah, I mean, if you’re not thinking about it, you are just giving it away.

Matt Vincent: That’s right. [00:43:00] Being, like, being intentional matters a ton. Like, why are you doing this? Not just what are you doing. What does it serve? Like, having that secondary thought of what’s the intention of this, right? So, like, I know what a podcast is, but what’s the intention of this? Yeah. Is this the intention to sell ads and make money?

Is this an intention to grow your business? Is this an intention to get a deeper chance to connect with people and network? 

Charles Eide: Yeah. 

Matt Vincent: Is this because I wanna meet friends, I wanna be exposed? 

Charles Eide: Yeah. Yeah, I mean- 

Matt Vincent: The act of doing doesn’t change- 

Charles Eide: Right … 

Matt Vincent: but the intention does. 

Charles Eide: Yeah. 

Matt Vincent: And that’s up to you. 

Charles Eide: Yeah. Yeah.

Matt Vincent: And I think everything you should do should be as intentional as possible to align with that life you ultimately want. 

Charles Eide: Yeah. 

Matt Vincent: But there isn’t a right or wrong. You just have to love 

Charles Eide: it. I mean, the reason I started the podcast is really simple. I wanted to build great [00:44:00] relationships with amazing people, and I wanted to help enhance the lives of other people with the people I sit at this table.

Yeah. Because I just, I wanna, I want other people to have that opportunity too. 

Matt Vincent: Right, and so then what’s the intention behind working out? What’s the intention behind how I feed myself? What’s the intention behind how I spend time with my wife? What’s the intention behind how I talk to my kids? What’s the intention behind how I talk to myself?

Charles Eide: How do I get more of that, though? How do I get more intentional? I mean, we’re… I think a lot of times we get in these subconscious habits- Yeah, autopilot … right? Autopilot. 

Matt Vincent: Yep. 

Charles Eide: How, how, how do you break that cycle when you realize something is off the rails? Are you, is it journaling? Is it somebody smacks you upside the head, a mentor?

I mean, what- 

Matt Vincent: One, I just try to get the message whenever I get it, ’cause I first at least have to notice something’s off the rails. 

Charles Eide: Mm. 

Matt Vincent: And then I can look at it with what. Now, if I’m still triggered, and I’m gonna point at why they are the reason [00:45:00] this is off the rails, probably weren’t Sort it. Do I have to care?

Is this important? Why do I wanna change it? Why do I wanna address the problem? What’s the intention of this? Do I wanna be right? Does the ego wanna win this, or do I want the whole boat to go the direction I’d like the boat to go? 

Charles Eide: The ego thing is so interesting because I’ve noticed that it’s, it’s a constant battle to keep it in check.

I don’t know why it’s so natural to have an ego. 

Matt Vincent: So, my thoughts on the ego is, one, I, I really hate any of the, the work around killing the ego or any of that that gets said. Like, it’s, it’s part of us. It’s not a thing that’s going away. It exists for a reason. Its whole job is to keep you alive. That’s all it wants to do, and it knows up until today, you’re not dead, so we’re [00:46:00] gonna fortify all the decisions and things we’ve believed up until now to make sure we keep doing them because they’ve kept us alive.

We’ve 

Charles Eide: got 100% success rate. We’re still here. 

Matt Vincent: That’s it. 

Charles Eide: Yeah. 

Matt Vincent: That’s all it cares about, and so anything that’s a change becomes uncertain, and that’s a threat, and so the ego wants to defend it. 

Charles Eide: Yeah. 

Matt Vincent: They’re not real threats. This is old hardware running a new problem. 

Charles Eide: Old hardware. 

Matt Vincent: Yeah. It’s kind of- 

Charles Eide: The human brain isn’t- 

Matt Vincent: Not evolved for what we’re doing.

Things ramped up really quickly. 

Charles Eide: I know in 

Matt Vincent: the AI band, you’re like, “Whoa.” Like, 

Charles Eide: and 

Matt Vincent: the, not, not just that, but like, like, let’s… Identity, right? And like people get trapped in that, this old identity that’s wrapped up in ego of who I’ve been and why I’m there and this and connected back to my past and all this attachment to was.

Charles Eide: You… And you mean like the story we have about- Us … things. Yeah. 

Matt Vincent: And that’s all it is. 

Charles Eide: The story. [00:47:00] 

Matt Vincent: That’s it. And so your perception of that story is up to you. You can change it. You can write it. It’s not here with us in the present. I don’t have to continue it. It’s whatever I do from here forward actually enacts my will on my life.

Letting this drive for me today is a bad idea. But we do get so trapped into that identity because of that ego, because of this. We wanna be right, but we’re not under threat. Things are already good, and if I can’t learn anything that I don’t have awareness of needs to change. So ego’s not terribly interested in learning things.

I also, at this point in my life, 

Ego, Identity & Letting Go of Old Stories 47:47

Matt Vincent: I don’t care to be right. 

Charles Eide: Hmm. 

Matt Vincent: With anyone. 

Charles Eide: How did you get there? 

Matt Vincent: I feel arguing’s a waste of my time. 

Charles Eide: Tell me more. 

Matt Vincent: I don’t care if we disagree. You’re [00:48:00] allowed to think whatever you’d like to, just as I believe I’m allowed to think whatever I like to. 

Charles Eide: How did you get to that though?

Because a lot, I mean, I, I don’t know. All 

Matt Vincent: right. Have you ever changed someone’s mind that didn’t wanna change it? 

Charles Eide: No. 

Matt Vincent: Then what’s the point? I also don’t care if they think I’m wrong or stupid. I’m, I have no interest in whether or not a moron thinks they’re smarter than me. They’re allowed to take the W.

I’d like to continue as frictionlessly on my path of life as possible. 

Charles Eide: Yeah. Yeah. You’re seeking fulfillment. 

Matt Vincent: I have no interest in extra conflict. 

Charles Eide: We all, we all know those people that you know you get in a room with them- Of course … ugh, and you’re 

Matt Vincent: like- I won’t get baited into it … 

Charles Eide: this is, like, gonna be endless.

Matt Vincent: Nope. I won’t get baited into it. 

Charles Eide: So, so what do you do? You’re just like, “Yeah, okay.” 

Matt Vincent: I can just not talk. I’ll just fucking not share my opinion. That’s fine by me. I don’t, I don’t care. 

Charles Eide: How did you get to that point? [00:49:00] 

Matt Vincent: Recognizing my own self-awareness of how I felt when people that did it in front of me. 

Charles Eide: Mm. 

Matt Vincent: I wasn’t ever impressed by it.

I always kinda liked the guy that sat in the corner of the room and didn’t feel he needed to prove anything.

Charles Eide: Yeah. 

Matt Vincent: So be that guy. Yeah. 

Charles Eide: Deep down we want, we want others to agree with us. 

Matt Vincent: We do. We do. And, like, there’s a really ‘portant, important part of that that I, I think is necessary part of the journey of life. And so I think there is this big point where you should chase perhaps a purpose that was provided for you.

Charles Eide: Mm-hmm. 

Matt Vincent: Maybe that’s society or family or who knows. You do this, and it’s all gonna work out. You’ll have fulfillment. And so we do, and then we get to that point and we go, “Uh-oh. I don’t like this.” [00:50:00] And then what? And so the beauty of this thing is realizing that the destination was never the point anyway, but hopefully that handed-down purpose that was given you gave enough skill acquisition to then pick a purpose to put all the skills into, right?

The beauty of it was the journey of the skill acquisition, not the there. 

Charles Eide: Mm. 

Matt Vincent: But if you try to give someone too early, like, “I need you to pick the journey and the skill acquisition,” it’s too much. Yeah. So provide them a purpose. They’re gonna go get to work. And men do this, and then at some point, midlife crisis, whatever it is you’d wanna call, they lose the understanding of why to keep dying for it, ’cause they feel like all they are is there to provide and show up and be the breadwinner and do that.

It’s Chris Rock’s joke about, you know, the last one to love is Dad. 

Charles Eide: [00:51:00] Mm. 

Matt Vincent: Keeping all the lights on, doing all the things, thankless work that because failure was never an option, that makes success the only metric that’s acceptable, and yet we compare every bit of where we are to where we’re not, and so we’ll never get there And that’s what creates burnout in any of the other things in our lives is you get disconnected to the purpose 

Charles Eide: Which ties into what you were saying about letting go of old identities and the story you tell about yourself.

So how do you let go of that old identity and, and change the story? 

Matt Vincent: You 

Charles Eide: know, I think a lot of 

Matt Vincent: people feel like they’re deceiving themselves. I, I, I think it’s realizing, look, I think it’s realizing nothing’s permanent. It never has been. Earth, human race, my life, my problems, my 40s, when I was injured, previously married.

I mean, even if you do meet one person and spend the rest of your [00:52:00] life with them, it’s still a less amount of time than you’re alive. Everything’s a temporary thing within the constraints of my life. All the relationships are temporary. That’s why they’re special. That’s why each chapter was special. It was supposed to be temporary.

We don’t pay attention to the things that stick around Loss is a reflection of how much love you had for a chapter of your life, but still clinging to it as though you need it, that’s creating more suffering than simply trusting the curiosity that got you there in the first place and going to explore again.

Charles Eide: Why do you think when we get older we become less prone to do that? 

Matt Vincent: Fear. 

Charles Eide: Like, why do we get more fearful as we get older, though? Don’t you think we should have more confidence as we get older? 

Matt Vincent: We 

Charles Eide: have more to lose. Why is that? More to lose. 

Matt Vincent: Yep. We’ve a- we’ve acquired all this stuff. We have the house and the wife and the family and all these things, and we’ve built this great life and [00:53:00] business, and we have hundreds of employees and all this stuff 

Charles Eide: I’m just thinking about the tubs of stuff in my garage right now.

Matt Vincent: Of course. Or the tubs of stuff in your emotions, the tubs of stuff in your past. Like, what are you still dragging around? 

Charles Eide: Hmm. You’re 

Matt Vincent: welcome to let it go. 

Charles Eide: Why do you think we don’t let that go, especially if it’s holding us back though? ‘Cause I know that we all have it, but 

Matt Vincent: why do we- ‘Cause you are away without it And that’s what the identity gets built on.

If your identity is external facing based on other people are creating my identity for me because of the things I have and the whatever, yeah, it’s really scary to let go of. I remember, man, I had, I had a Jeep in college. Real piece of shit, but I did love it. And, uh, at some point I had to sell it ’cause, like, I need to get to class and work, and this thing doesn’t [00:54:00] really start if it’s wet or raining or both.

And, uh, I go to sell it. I think I got, like, 1,500 bucks for it, real mint. And I had an honest question with my girlfriend at the time of was she as attracted to me not driving it. And she’s like, “Of course.” And I was like, “Huh.” 

Charles Eide: Oh, 

Matt Vincent: you- ‘Cause I sure thought this upped my- 

Charles Eide: Your 

Matt Vincent: sexy factor … my stock. Yeah. Yeah, you know?

That like- 

Charles Eide: She thought the Jeep was really something. 

Matt Vincent: I thought it added to it at least a little bit. She was with you for the junky Jeep. A little bit. Um, because surely it couldn’t be me

this stuff. I think it’s the illusion. It’s not, it’s, it’s, “But if you really knew me, you wouldn’t like me. It has to be this other stuff.” 

Charles Eide: How did you change the way you saw that? Not just with her, but with everything else. Like, where did that shift where you were like, “It’s not about [00:55:00] that stuff, it’s about who I 

Matt Vincent: am”?

Four Hour Workweek by Tim Ferriss 

Charles Eide: Such a good 

Matt Vincent: book Yeah. So there’s a part in it where he’s talking about being a millionaire, which I’m sure inflation at this point has made that a different number, but you don’t need money anymore. 

Charles Eide: Which it doesn’t seem that 

Matt Vincent: much, that 

Charles Eide: long ago. Right. 

Matt Vincent: You don’t need money anymore is the idea.

So how would you spend your time? Do you wanna be a millionaire so that you’re perceived as a millionaire, or do you want the freedom to spend your day doing whatever you’d like? I may spend the day doing whatever I like, Cam. And so It’s a lot cheaper than people think it is. 

Charles Eide: What is a, uh, spending the day however you’d like, what is that for you?

Matt’s Perfect Day 55:48

Matt Vincent: I probably wake up without an alarm clock, which is most days. Uh, so between 4:00 and 6:00, usually around 5:00, 5:30. Um, I get up, I make [00:56:00] coffee. I do a couple minutes of breathing while my coffee’s brewing, and then I sit down and I go through my beads and do a round of gratitude, and then I drink my coffee, and then I make my way to the gym or my office, and I move around for maybe an hour.

At this point, I kinda sit on the bike and move my legs enough to tell myself I’m, I’m exercising. It’s, uh, it’s about as pathetic as can be. But I’m doing it. I’m moving. I’m basically getting things online. I’m warming up for my day. I put on a documentary, a podcast, or something like that that’s intriguing, ’cause that’s gonna fire off some thoughts, some new concepts.

And so then I go to the sauna, sit there for a bit, do a little bit of breathwork, think about whatever I had on the podcast, cold plunge, get to my desk, and then I usually write. So I would write for a while and- 

Charles Eide: What do you write? 

Matt Vincent: Um, usually whatever I was thinking about [00:57:00] in there, and then trying to work out some kind of connection from that idea to, like, a core operating principle- 

Charles Eide: Hmm

Matt Vincent: I guess is what it kinda ends up being. Mostly just in my own journal. 

Charles Eide: Do you do anything with that? Or- 

Matt Vincent: Yeah. Yeah. I mean, that ends up being coaching points and things like that down the road or any of that once they kinda get melted down enough to something that seems to be a bit more universal that I kinda can’t argue with.

Charles Eide: Yeah. 

Matt Vincent: It just seems to be like, “Well, that’s that.” There’s some bedrock level 

Charles Eide: there. And I don’t care what you think anyways. 

Matt Vincent: Doesn’t matter. I don’t need it to work for you. 

Charles Eide: Yeah. 

Matt Vincent: The point of it is my base principles keep me on my journey. 

Charles Eide: Yeah. 

Matt Vincent: And so- You know, recognizing those type of things, I would then work for a bit and then probably for the next five or six hours work on some type of a project.

Charles Eide: Hmm. 

Matt Vincent: Whether that is creating a webinar, a journal, if I had a public speaking thing coming up, if it was a new [00:58:00] course I wanted to put out, or it could be working on the van, building things outside, making furniture. I don’t care. A project. I want to do a thing. 

Charles Eide: Yeah. 

Matt Vincent: I want to focus on a thing. So your perfect day is basically 

Charles Eide: doing whatever suits you that day.

Matt Vincent: Yeah. Yeah. But also exercising. 

Charles Eide: Yeah. 

Matt Vincent: I mean, if I really wanted to break it down, probably the most simple way possible would be I would work out, play some type of a sport, make a thing, have some sex, eat good food, sleep. 

Charles Eide: Yeah. You forgot the coffee in the morning. I’ll 

Matt Vincent: take, I’ll take the five out of six. 

Charles Eide: So okay, so designing a life that works for you- Mm-hmm

is far better to you than pursuing some nebulous number, chasing some- 

Matt Vincent: There’s always more. I’m gonna- you and I are both gonna make less money than Elon. 

Charles Eide: Yep. 

Matt Vincent: So what’s the point? Like, do you get to do the things you wanna do with your time? Are you happy? Do you spend time around people you like [00:59:00] being around?

Do you enjoy being you? 

Charles Eide: It’s funny ’cause I do have those days where I go home and I’ve spent so much brain power working, and I want to be dad- Yeah … and I wanna be present, I wanna be all that, but I’m so cooked- 

Matt Vincent: Mm-hmm … 

Charles Eide: that I can’t. You know? And then I get a little, like deep down I get a little resent where I’m like, “You guys don’t understand, like, what I go through every day so you can come home to the ranch and- Of course

screw around and…” And I’m like, “Why am I feeling this way right now?” You know? 

Matt Vincent: Meanwhile, they never asked for any of this. You’ve been more than happy to just provide and die for it. No one ever said, “We won’t love you if this isn’t what it is.” And so it is an interesting thing to- So I do it to 

Charles Eide: myself. 

Matt Vincent: Yeah, of 

Charles Eide: course.

Matt Vincent: And so to change it, like if I actually wanted to institute some type of strategy, um, before you leave here, hit the cold plunge, and take three minutes in your office to do some gratitude. 

Charles Eide: Okay.[01:00:00] 

Matt Vincent: What I love about guys like us, we’re lunatics. And so like- I’ve 

Charles Eide: been, I’ve been told. 

Matt Vincent: Oh, yeah. Yeah, yeah, yeah. And so like I’m not that passionate about trying to convince people to care about their lives. I d- I don’t care. You’re more than welcome to not. Whatever. I do. And so my boundaries are I only wanna deal with people who are also as equal, as give, who care.

Charles Eide: Yeah. 

Matt Vincent: And so being around other people like that, you’re, 

Slowing Down: The Deload Principle 1:00:33

Matt Vincent: you’re all the time thinking about optimizing and building systems and getting better and improving and moving forward, and you’re building this giant productive engine- 

Charles Eide: Mm-hmm … 

Matt Vincent: that’s just go, go, go. You have to get brakes. You can’t build fast cars without brakes, otherwise you slam into the wall.

Like in business, that’s burnout. As athletics, that’s injury. And so to [01:01:00] avoid injury as an athlete, you don’t just train as hard as you can until you’re hurt. 

Charles Eide: Mm. 

Matt Vincent: You deload every four weeks no matter how you feel. 

Charles Eide: What does that mean? 

Matt Vincent: So for a deload, for, as my training, the way I built it, right, is so I would do four weeks on and then have a deload week and then four weeks on, have a deload week.

So that four weeks would ramp up in progression, kind of a linear style of going from fives to threes to doubles. 

Charles Eide: Mm-hmm. 

Matt Vincent: And then the percentage of weight would also increase. 

Charles Eide: Okay. 

Matt Vincent: The following week I would do three sets of 10 at 50%. I would recover. 

Charles Eide: So it’s a recovery week. Deload is- So 

Matt Vincent: even if I feel good, I take the deload week.

That way when I return the following week, I’m still really excited about doing the work. 

Charles Eide: Mm. 

Matt Vincent: The more I do that, I get long-term. I don’t burn out in three months. Yeah. I can do this for a decade. 

Charles Eide: Yeah, ’cause you get those breaks. I’ll win. 

Matt Vincent: I know I need them. But it [01:02:00] wasn’t till later that I realized how do I need to install those for this lifestyle or this system?

What does that look like emotionally? How do I hit the brakes? How do I slow things down? And so managing my central nervous system became, oh, that’s the brake pedal. 

Charles Eide: What does that look like for, uh, an entrepreneur running a company? 

Matt Vincent: I think that is super basic stuff. Sauna, cold plunge, journaling, gratitude, breathwork are all things you can just do by yourself.

Charles Eide: Yep. 

Matt Vincent: And none of those are mystical in any way, shape, or form. They’re all tools that simply just make you present. 

Charles Eide: Yep. 

Matt Vincent: Stress about the past is typically depression. Stress about the future is typically anxiety. Neither of those happen right here. Return back to center, realize where you are, get back in your body instead of in here, and slow down.

Charles Eide: Get back in your body. 

Matt Vincent: Yep. 

Charles Eide: Yeah. 

Matt Vincent: Slow down. Give yourself a second. 

Charles Eide: It’s funny ’cause it’s not in my nature to slow down. 

Matt Vincent: Of course. So- 

Charles Eide: [01:03:00] I don’t wanna slow down … 

Matt Vincent: does, does discomfort create adaptation? 

Charles Eide: I, I think so. 

Matt Vincent: If you wanna work out, why do your muscles grow? You stress them out so they grow back- 

Charles Eide: Yeah … 

Matt Vincent: to grow in a way that’s unnatural to what your normal life demands would 

Charles Eide: be.

Right. Sure. 

Matt Vincent: Right? So anywhere that I can identify discomfort that isn’t danger, I bet there’s something to get from it. 

Charles Eide: Oh, yeah. That’s interesting. 

Matt Vincent: Right? 

Charles Eide: Discomfort without danger- 

Matt Vincent: Yep … 

Charles Eide: there’s gain. Of 

Matt Vincent: course. 

Charles Eide: Yeah. 

Matt Vincent: There’d have to 

Charles Eide: be 

Matt Vincent: an adaptation. 

Charles Eide: Like when you say go do the cold plunge, I’m like, “Ugh, okay.”

Matt Vincent: So how about- 

Charles Eide: I mean, it is sitting there … 

Matt Vincent: how about just sitting still and breathing for five minutes and not doing anything? 

Charles Eide: Yeah, that’s, that, that’s uncomfortable. 

Matt Vincent: Why is that harder for you than driving somewhere to close a big deal? You have to do nothing. 

Charles Eide: Yeah, yeah, you’d think doing nothing would be easy, but it’s- 

Matt Vincent: It, it is.

Right. It’s the narrative that you have- You gotta practice it … running [01:04:00] this flywheel at such big momentum that it can’t slow down. Practice. 

Charles Eide: Yeah. 

Matt Vincent: So I don’t wanna live with the floodlight on all the time, right? Like, I’m not into the gratitude and all this hippie wellness practice, self-talk, love stuff so that I can disappear into the woods and put on Jedi pants and make macrame.

Like, I’m not into it. 

Charles Eide: What is macrame? 

Matt Vincent: Uh, whatever, like doilies that were on, like, your grandmother’s thing. You could hang fruit in it- Oh. Oh, yes … or on your shirt. They’re- 

Charles Eide: Yeah. … 

Matt Vincent: basic knitting. Um But I’m also not into the just burning it down forever to prove to the rest of the world I’m important. Like, I want the ability to go from focused light, using fight or flight for what it’s for, for creating focus, and then also knowing how to do both.

Like, I want the front and back to the paper. 

Charles Eide: Yeah. 

Matt Vincent: I want both sides. It’s yin and yang. There isn’t one or the other. [01:05:00] There always was. 

Charles Eide: It just f- it feels like as y- just as a, as an entrepreneur doing what I’m doing, it’s, it’s hard to believe that stopping and pausing or doing that stuff is going to do anything.

It’s hard to believe that, right? ‘Cause I’m like, “No, there’s… I’m putting myself last. There’s more to get done. I gotta go talk to this person.” Has the 

Matt Vincent: list ever been finished? 

Charles Eide: No. 

Matt Vincent: Is it ever gonna be? 

Charles Eide: No. 

Matt Vincent: So do you have five minutes to breathe, or do you not own your life? 

Charles Eide: No, you’re right. Yeah, I- 

Matt Vincent: It’s the practice of remembering you own your life.

Charles Eide: Hmm. 

Matt Vincent: I can sit and breathe. 

Charles Eide: How do you develop the discipline to actually follow through in doing this? 

Matt Vincent: Um, set five alarms on your phone And when they go off, it’s non-negotiable. I stop [01:06:00] and breathe. If anyone would like to join me, great, but I’m gonna recalibrate for a second. 

Charles Eide: Hmm. 

Matt Vincent: And remember how great everything is and how cool it is to get to solve the problems we’re solving

Charles Eide: Yeah, I would imagine that that causes a lot more happiness. 

Matt Vincent: Well, it also removes a lot of burnout. It removes a lot of friction. It removes a lot of me making an indecisive, a, a, a choice out of fear- 

Charles Eide: Yeah … 

Matt Vincent: and not trying to fail instead of taking the shot at winning. 

Charles Eide: Yeah. 

Matt Vincent: I wanna play from the side of curiosity and play from the side of love 

Charles Eide: Yeah.

I don’t know why it’s so ingrained in us that if we’re not grinding our faces off, that we’re not being valuable to the world or ourselves. 

Matt Vincent: Well, ’cause we’re cannon fodder. That’s what men have been throughout history. It’s been rewarded a lot, like, like biologically. 

Charles Eide: You know? 

Matt Vincent: Yeah, of course. Of [01:07:00] course. And then, like, Eastern Europeans that came over, like we’re all gnarly warriors.

Charles Eide: And like I feel worthless if I stop. 

Matt Vincent: Of course you do. I 

Charles Eide: feel like not 

Matt Vincent: so much- So how much of that is true and how much is programming? 

Charles Eide: It’s program- it’s all programming. 

Matt Vincent: So then it’s narrative. 

Charles Eide: It’s totally narrative. 

Matt Vincent: Which means it’s a lie 

Charles Eide: Yeah. It’s a lie that I buy every day 

Matt Vincent: That’s up to you. 

Charles Eide: Yeah. 

Matt Vincent: I mean, if sitting still and doing those things doesn’t bring you any of the other, I wouldn’t recommend doing them.

I don’t know what- 

Charles Eide: No, I think it would. It’s just- 

Matt Vincent: You know what I’m saying? Like- 

Charles Eide: Yeah, it’s just I don’t- I feel like a lazy POS if I take the time- 

Matt Vincent: Show me one metric that you have going on that would quantify as lazy. 

Charles Eide: It’s true. I know, but I feel lazy, you 

Matt Vincent: know? Yeah, yeah, yeah. To which voice in the head? 

Charles Eide: I don’t know.

It’s like if I… [01:08:00] I remember when I would set time aside, especially early on, to work out during the day as a clarity break, and I’d be like, “I shouldn’t be doing this right now. I shouldn’t be doing this right now. I feel…” And I had, like, this guilt, you know? 

Matt Vincent: Then you got over 

Charles Eide: it. Yeah, and then I got over it, and I was like, “No, if I can’t go work out, like, what am I doing with my…

Why, why do all this if I can’t just work out?” 

Matt Vincent: So we’ve learned this lesson before, but we’ve learned it in the physical realm. 

Charles Eide: Yeah. 

Matt Vincent: So why not copy and paste this right over to the spiritual- No, you’re 

Charles Eide: right. You’re 1,000% 

Matt Vincent: right … central nervous system. 

Charles Eide: I’m- 

Matt Vincent: Like, if it works- 

Charles Eide: Then use 

Matt Vincent: it … use it everywhere.

Charles Eide: Yeah. 

Matt Vincent: Like, consistency. 

Charles Eide: Yeah. 

Matt Vincent: Huh, wonder if that works everywhere. Like, so even me being down-regulated, which means I can be consistent with how I show up in conversations, relationships, like, I can be angry. I don’t have to be aggressive. 

Charles Eide: Hmm. 

Matt Vincent: It’s different things. One is a reaction to a feeling. [01:09:00] Angry just lets me know my boundaries were crossed.

How I decide to express that is up to me. 

Charles Eide: Yeah. 

Matt Vincent: So being able to manage this then allows me to come home and not bleed this on the rest of the people in my home, which also then improves intimacy and connection with the people in my home, which further increases the value I have in my life, and reminds me why I’m over here dying.

Charles Eide: Mm-hmm. 

Matt Vincent: Because I want to. Because I love it. 

Charles Eide: Yeah, I mean, because I d- I d- I love my work. 

Matt Vincent: Right. But the idea that the only reason you take action is to not be a piece of shit is an untrue story. Like a lie. Like, if you’re only gonna use the fear of failure to drive yourself forward, you’re only ever gonna reach good.

Because if you ever come off your neck, you’ll be a loser, just like you know you’ll be. 

Charles Eide: Yeah. 

Matt Vincent: How long do we wanna believe that? [01:10:00] Like, you’re allowed to enjoy the whole thing and be proud of yourself and be in it, and continue to have the desire to grow it bigger. It’s that lie that if I ever allow myself to believe that this is good, we’ll quit trying.

Charles Eide: Hmm.

Matt Vincent: Silo operate I don’t want fear to be the driving decider for me. This is already bigger than I thought it would 

Charles Eide: be. I don’t, I don’t know where I got that, like I, I feel like I’m a lazy person if I’m not constantly thinking, doing, acting, driving, talking. You know what I mean? 

Matt Vincent: I mean, 

Charles Eide: I don’t know where that came from.

Nobody told me that. 

Matt Vincent: No, but I mean, look at what we’ve seen in movies. What type of heroes did you see? Like, it’s all these things that you could look at that creates these little impressions. 

Charles Eide: Yeah. 

Matt Vincent: Of either you were slightly more turned on to it or slightly left turn- less turned on to it. That’s a story 

Charles Eide: I believed.

Matt Vincent: Yeah, and you also believe that’s what a valuable man does. [01:11:00] And also, you’ve been rewarded handsomely for solving problems Like the same way that the voice inside my head, the one that’s harsh to me, this judge, this critic, whatever it is, and calls me a fat bastard and piece of shit and like manage your stuff and why are you such a loser and blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah.

All it’s ever really saying is you can do better. But I realize I’ve characterized it into some voice that sounds like these men that I had as coaches or my dad or other employers I had that I did respect. And lucky enough for me, I responded well 

Charles Eide: and 

Matt Vincent: found success. So of course that’s the stick I use in my head to make myself move forward 

Charles Eide: Yeah

Wow

I need to take more time [01:12:00] to think and relax and do some breath work and jump in that. I, I bought a cold plunge for the office so that I would do it. And when I bought it, you know how this is. When I bought it, I was like, I was in there all the time. I was like, “I’m up to six minutes,” you know? And then, you know, it takes, you go off to Christmas break or whatever, you come back and you’re like, “Eh, not today.”

That’s 

Matt Vincent: where I end up getting people. That’s ’cause I do. I return to it every time. 

Charles Eide: Yeah. 

Matt Vincent: It’s usually my first stop once I land and come back home. 

Charles Eide: Is 

Matt Vincent: the cold plunge. And I go to the gym and I hit the cold plunge and I close off whatever that was that I’ve been doing. 

Charles Eide: Mm. 

Matt Vincent: And I go home

Charles Eide: That’s a heck of a commitment. 

Matt Vincent: Am I 100% on it? No But enough to know that it matters

And it matters to me [01:13:00] 

Charles Eide: This was really, really interesting stuff, really powerful. The way you look at taking care of you. 

Matt Vincent: Well, who has to solve all your problems? 

Charles Eide: I do. 

Matt Vincent: What’s the most valuable asset then? 

Charles Eide: Me. 

Matt Vincent: Yeah. Why wouldn’t you prioritize that thing and be nice to it? 

Charles Eide: Yeah. 

Matt Vincent: I mean- I- … carrot or stick, man.

Like, a, a stick can get you to good. It can’t get you to great. You need both. 

Charles Eide: Mm-hmm. 

Matt Vincent: And knowing when to use what.

Charles Eide: Yeah. That’s crazy stuff, man. I gotta work on this. 

Matt Vincent: But I also don’t wanna restrict love from me based on outcome 

Charles Eide: Yeah, that’s the other one. It’s like, what if the outcome isn’t good? 

Matt Vincent: The outcome’s what the outcome is. Like, that’s having an attachment to the outcome from the beginning. 

Charles Eide: Part of me goes, “No, the outcome’s what I’ll make the outcome.”

Matt Vincent: Right on. 

Charles Eide: It’s just the control freak in me, I guess. Sure. [01:14:00] 

Matt Vincent: But I mean, so if you are the control freak then, what are you actually in control of? How you spend your time, where your energy and attention goes, what you put in your mouth, what you consume in any form, shape- 

Charles Eide: Yeah … 

Matt Vincent: and where you prioritize your energy.

Charles Eide: Yeah. 

Matt Vincent: But very often we try to control external things and think that’s control. 

Charles Eide: Yeah. 

Matt Vincent: That’s distraction. 

Charles Eide: Sure. You just con- you can only control- 

Matt Vincent: That’s gonna go the way it’s gonna go. 

Charles Eide: Yeah. Yeah. 

Matt Vincent: Right? Like me having some attachment to like, “Oh man, we’re gonna do this podcast and it’s gonna get millions of views,” I’ve done enough podcasts that like it’s a waste of energy to come in with that feeling of expectation, and instead I just wanna have the best conversation I can for a couple hours.

Charles Eide: Yeah. 

Matt Vincent: It’ll do whatever it does, and at the end of the day, I got to have this conversation. 

Charles Eide: Yeah. 

Matt Vincent: It’s for me. 

Charles Eide: Yeah. If it works, then it works. 

Matt Vincent: Yeah. How quickly we move past the, “If I can [01:15:00] impact one person, it would be enough” to, “Why aren’t there enough people listening?” 

Charles Eide: It’s, it’s the analytics they give you.

Matt Vincent: Well, because that’s just the data-driven side of things, right? Yeah. And well, is that the only measure for success of the podcast? 

Charles Eide: No. 

Matt Vincent: Right, ’cause like at this point now that I don’t do apparel, like I don’t care much about the metrics. Right. And because of what I’m offering with coaching and retreats and things like that, I need 100 people to be into what I’m doing a year- 

Charles Eide: Yeah

Matt Vincent: for me to have the life I want. 

Charles Eide: Yeah, it’s 

Matt Vincent: not that hard. I don’t need 10,000. 

Charles Eide: Yeah. 

Matt Vincent: So I’m not gonna bother trying to convince other people who don’t get it to come on board if I’m not fully serving those who already care. 

Charles Eide: Yeah. Yeah, I mean, it’s true. Sarah said to me one day, she was like, you know, at the time of this recording we’re at about 650 YouTube subs, and I was, you know, I’m like irritated about it ’cause, you know, I look at Steven [01:16:00] Bartlett and all these guys- Yeah, of course

they have 15 million and- 

Matt Vincent: Go back to 

Charles Eide: your first show. She 

Matt Vincent: was, 

Charles Eide: she was like, “Put 650 people in a room. Okay? That’s a lot of people. You know, these other numbers are just nebulous really. What matters, I mean, even if this helped one person have a better life, we’d be, I’d, we’d be good.” 

Matt Vincent: I mean, what about having, you know, a purpose to it, right?

That like what this can ultimately evolve into is you getting to host an event. 

Charles Eide: Yeah. 

Matt Vincent: Where you get to bring these people on stage and let them actually get interaction with everyone that loves the show. 

Charles Eide: Yeah. Yeah, I mean, I’ve thought about it. I’ve thought about someday having our own event that helps people connect better.

Matt Vincent: Host something at one of the hangars with a plane in it, it’d be so sick. 

Charles Eide: It would be pretty sweet. It’d 

Matt Vincent: be so sick. Or at 

Charles Eide: the ranch. 

Matt Vincent: Yeah, of course. 

Charles Eide: Yeah. Yeah. 

Matt Vincent: Like that’s the point of having the dreams. 

Charles Eide: Yeah. No, it’s true. I do wanna bring people together. I mean, I’m a [01:17:00] big proponent- I know … of it clearly being in the events industry.

I know. 

Matt Vincent: Same. You know, we talk a lot about purpose and, uh- I think you have a lot of them. Right now, like the reason I train is to be in less pain for when I have surgery in a couple weeks. Also, I think if I let myself get fat, it lessens the message that I share to people. 

Charles Eide: Mm. ‘

Matt Vincent: Cause it’ll be a thing that someone can point out and say, “No reason to listen to that.

Look, he can’t even do himself.” 

Charles Eide: Mm. 

Matt Vincent: I’m aware of that, so I choose to make sure I stay on point to give it as much value as I can. Um, but overall, like universal purpose is I wanna create for a living. 

Charles Eide: Yeah. 

Matt Vincent: I’m not terribly greedy about what that becomes. I will happily take whatever the universe puts in front of me.

If it is connection between two people, if it is creating events that have an impact, if it’s creating experiences with the travel that my wife and do, or getting to write, or if it’s getting to [01:18:00] make apparel, if it’s getting… I, I don’t care. I wanna take thoughts and watch them become something. 

Charles Eide: Yeah.

You’re doing that, man. Okay, I wanna, I wanna, I gotta wrap up here. I’m running out of time. 

Matt Vincent: Sure, sure, sure. I’ll come back up. 

Charles Eide: You have to. 

Matt Vincent: Yeah. 

Charles Eide: We gotta talk more about this. 

Purpose, Legacy & Closing Thoughts 1:18:18

Charles Eide: When you look at the summary of your life and how the world will remember you, how do you wanna be remembered? 

Matt Vincent: I don’t. 

Charles Eide: You don’t wanna be remembered?

Matt Vincent: I don’t think I’m that important.

I don’t care much of what happens after the lights go out, man. I just wanna know when that time comes, I don’t beg for more of 

Charles Eide: it.

Matt Vincent: I got no worries about what happens after I’m gone. That doesn’t mean I’m trying to leave a wake of destruction behind. It’s not a selfish pursuit, but pretend to think that it has[01:19:00] 

more weight on it than just how I chose to experience existence. I don’t think it does. I do this for me

Charles Eide: Yeah, but in doing that, you’re helping so many people. I 

Matt Vincent: believe that’s true. 

Charles Eide: Yeah. 

Matt Vincent: I believe that’s true. But because of that impact to having some type of legacy, I’m not, I don’t care. I don’t care where people got the message as long as they got 

Charles Eide: it.

Profound stuff, man. I appreciate you coming up here. I sincerely appreciate our friendship. Yeah, it’s 

Matt Vincent: an honor. I really appreciate it too. 

Charles Eide: Thanks, man. 

Matt Vincent: I imagine we’ll do more of 

Charles Eide: it. Absolutely. Thanks for coming on, Matt. It’s good, good seeing you, man. Thanks for watching this episode. I hope you loved it. If you did, make sure you subscribe, turn your notifications on, and share it with somebody.

If you wanna learn more about me or my company, EideCom, I set out years and years ago to start a [01:20:00] production company that did things differently. And today, 23 years later, we produce corporate events that are really impactful for our clients all over the country, and you can find out more at EideCom.com.