by Sean Croxton

The look on his face still makes me giggle a bit.

A few weeks ago, I met a fellow blogger at the Fitness Business Summit in Costa Mesa, CA. He and I made plans for a Skype interview but ended up meeting up at my home to do the interview in-person.

Working hard everyday to build an online following of his own, he wondered exactly how I was able to do it.

My answer…

“Dude, I have no idea!”

I felt kinda bad that he drove 2 hours for that…

Keeping it real, I know just about next to nothing about analytics, keyword research, search engine optimization, paid traffic, pay-per-click, or any of that marketing mumbo-jumbo other bloggers talk about behind the scenes.

I just DO what feels right, and I DO it pretty much unconsciously.

As Dr. Pillay writes in Life Unlocked: 7 Revolutionary Lessons to Overcome Fear, “the successful paths of visionaries are unconscious. And once these leaders learn to trust the unconscious process, they learn to lead without asking where the information is coming from.”

Word.

Not that I consider myself a visionary or anything, but you get what I’m saying.

by Sean Croxton

Gum disease is some serious sh*t.

If you’re reading this right now and you’re over 30 years of age, there is a 90% chance that you have bugs hanging out in your mouth that cause gum disease.

I’ll never kiss another girl in my life…

In his office, my holistic dentist has a microscope hooked up to a TV screen on which he shows his patients the oral bugs they’re carrying around. Fortunately, mine was pretty clean. But when he showed me a video of what a typical patient’s oral environment looks like, it was like a scene from that movie Snakes on a Plane! The screen was overrun with little snakelike creatures called spirochetes.

Straight. Up. Craziness.

Why do I feel the need to gross you out like this? Well, because I just got done listening to the replay of last night’s UW Radio show with my main man Will Revak of OraWellness.

The show was an Instant Classic.

As Will says, gum disease is the elephant in the living room when it comes to health – no one likes to talk about it. But that definitely needs to change. If not, one-third of us will end up with no natural teeth in our mouths by the age of 65 (that’s the current statistic).

But it’s even more serious than the mere vanity of having a full set of real choppers. Being a student of the work of Weston A. Price, I learned long ago how infections in the mouth can lead to other common diseases such as heart disease, cancer, arthritis, and more.

by Sean Croxton

Mediocrity is an interesting place to live.

It’s safe yet frustrating. Cozy yet disempowering.

It’s like a default setting for human beings who wish to do more with their lives but just can’t get — or keep — going.

There have been days when I longed for mediocrity and normalcy. You may even remember the time when I shut down my YouTube channel and social media accounts. My goodness, you have no idea how awesome that felt. No longer would I have to deal with 8 billion emails every morning. Never again would I have to wake up to find another smear video by the fruitarian dude posted on my Facebook wall. And I wouldn’t have to worry about getting caught in line at Whole Foods with a slice of chocolate cake in my basket.

I just wanted to make edu-taining health videos. I didn’t sign up for all of this other stuff!

Leading up to my meltdown, I had convinced myself that I couldn’t deal with you guys — the readers, listeners, and viewers who followed me online. But the truth of the matter is that the fear of success had taken over both my subconscious and conscious minds and had its way with me.

But as I like to say, every breakdown is followed by a breakthrough. And here we are, almost two years later, still cranking away at it. And having a ton of fun doing it.

It’s interesting that we are so very familiar with the fear of failure, but seldom do we ever consider how we fear success at the same time.

This one got off to a wee bit of a rough start.

I was wondering why the heck I was hearing myself echo. Ended up having another tab open with the live show playing on delay in my headphones. Whoops! My bad.

Good thing I figured that one out pretty quick…

Anyway, we got the show started with an incredibly informative 5-minute briefing from Sherri Fogarty on the current genetically modified (GM) food labeling initiative going on here in California, as well as a few other states. Sherri has been on a mission for the past several months, working her tail off to get GM labeling on the ballot. She also fills us in on how the evil Monsanto is threatening to sue the State of Vermont if the State pursues a labeling law. That’s crazy stuff!

Learn more about the GM ballot initiative HERE.

Next up, my main man Reed Davis, founder of Functional Diagnostic Nutrition, drops some truth bombs, including:

by Sean Croxton

“The brain always chooses to shine the spotlight on fear above all other emotions.”

Ain’t that the truth.

As you learned yesterday, fears that we aren’t even consciously aware of can trump even our most stalwart attempts at reaching our goals. The oversensitive, fear-mongering amygdala brings to mind an anxiety-ridden driver’s ed instructor who taps his brake whenever his student approaches the speed limit.

You’re going too fast!

Watch out for the pedestrians!

You’re too close to the car in front of you!

Sheesh…

In its efforts to protect us from harm, the amygdala pumps the brakes on the action centers of the brain, known as the motor cortex. This battle between our unconscious motivations and our conscious intentions keeps us from sticking to our fat loss programs, from leaving our miserable jobs, and from earning incomes that will allow us to do the things we want in life.

No matter how badly you want to lose those 30 pounds, your brain attends to fear above all else and would rather save you from the consequences — real or imagined — of ruffling a few feathers (by changing the way you eat when with friends and family) or diverting from the path of familiarity. Sometimes, there’s nothing scarier than the unknown.

by Sean Croxton

Haters gonna hate.

Another of one of life’s certainties is that there will always be people — sometimes even those who are supposed to support you the most — who will do all they can to keep you down. They go out of their way to sabotage your diet and exercise program. They do all they can to tear you away from your significant other. For some reason, they can’t seem to be happy for you no matter what awesomeness may be occurring in your life.

That’s a hater.

Yet, little do we know that our biggest hater may be, in fact, that three-pound noodle between our ears.

Last night, I decided to pluck one of my favorite books, Life Unlocked: 7 Revolutionary Lessons to Overcome Fear, off the shelf. In it, author Dr. Srini Pillay breaks down the science of fear and why even though we know what we want, we just can’t seem to act on it. We get stuck.

This reminds me of a Facebook status update I posted a couple of months ago, in which I asked my peeps what they would do if they were guaranteed to succeed. The responses were some of the most amazing aspirations I had ever read. Yet, when I later inquired about why they were not pursuing these inspiring endeavors, the almost-unanimous response was fear.

But where does this fear come from?

The human brain is quite the survivalist. Although we have developed higher order functions like speaking, thinking, and, of course, blogging, our brains still possess primitive forces remaining ever-vigilant for signs of danger or threat. It is these latter forces that may lie at the root of what I call the game of start-stop-start-stop-only-to-start-again-and-stop-again when it comes to moving toward our goals.

by Sean Croxton

If there is one thing guaranteed about life, it is that we all evolve.

I can recall my early days as a personal trainer, when I considered exercise to be the solution for everything under the sun. I immersed myself in books, videos, and courses on fitness, strength, periodization, and anything else that could help me build the ultimate physical human machine.

Then I stumbled upon the work of Weston A. Price, Francis Marion Pottenger, and many other nutrition legends who convinced me that diet was a critical element of building not only a well-tuned physical body but one that enjoyed internal health as well.

As I learned more about nutrition, I became less enthusiastic about my personal training career. Since it was so different from anything else they had ever heard before, most clients seemed to be disinterested in my nutritional advice. They just wanted to work out. And since you can’t exercise your way out of a bad diet, I eventually hung up my stopwatch to become a nutrition consultant.

Working as a Metabolic Typing Advisor, I quickly learned that many of my clients had health challenges that went far beyond diet and exercise. Despite their much improved eating habits, things like insomnia, low libido, and digestive problems continued to persist. That is when I stumbled upon Reed Davis and the Functional Diagnostic Nutrition (FDN) course.

FDN blew my mind. I learned all about steroidal hormone imbalances, detoxification pathways, intestinal pathogens and dysbiosis (bacterial overgrowth), and a bunch of other cool stuff. The best part is that I could run lab tests on my clients to see where the hidden internal dysfunctions resided. Once we found those dysfunctions, I had the pleasure of helping my clients correct them through natural protocols.

Once again, I immersed myself in information, reading everything I could within the realm of functional medicine and the endless connections amongst the body’s many systems. You have no idea how much fun this was (and still is)!

As my FDN practice grew, another missing piece of the puzzle became apparent — mindset. Some clients just seemed to think differently than others. After a while, I could almost sense who would follow the program and eventually resolve their health complaints, and who would not. It all revolved around mindset.

by Sean Croxton

Green light.

About 10 years ago, when I worked for Todd Durkin I learned the art of color-coding the calendar. If I remember correctly, green meant Green Machine, yellow meant Mellow Yellow, and red meant STOP.

Green Machine is when you’re working your tail off, helping as many people as you can, making a contribution to the lives of others, and earning a good living doing it.

Mellow Yellow is when you tap the breaks a bit and slow things down. The fitness crowd may call this “active recovery”, when you back off on your workouts, reduce the intensity, and allow the body to recuperate before heading into another training cycle.

The color red is the universal signal to STOP. Break time! However, red can also indicate an emergency. And unfortunately, for some folks, it can take a real crisis — typically some kind of stress-induced health challenge — before they are forced to call a time-out from their overscheduled and undernourished lives.

Now I won’t lie to you and tell you that my Google calendar resembles a stop light. There are no green, yellow, or red weeks. But I will tell you that since I learned about Todd’s system way back in 2001 I have always been mindful of not only how I expend my energy but how I recover it as well.

For example, when I was a personal trainer I would take it easy during the summer months, working maybe 10 hours a week, just enough to pay the bills and have some fun. In an occupation known for burnout (my buddy Chris even wrote a book about it), I think these Mellow Yellow summers were what kept me going for as long as I did.

A few years ago, I even took an entire summer off, woke up without an alarm, spent many days with my feet in the sand and eyes on the ocean, and BASICally had the time of my life on the corner of 10th and J.

And as you probably already know, I take at least a month off from UW Radio every year.

I guess you can say I’m a master at recharging my batteries.

by Sean Croxton

You thought it was over, huh?

No. No. No.

Every great show deserves an encore!

By popular demand, our 3 most popular presenters are coming back to the stage one last time.

In Room 1, Dr. Tom O’Bryan eloquently demonstrates the link between gluten, muscle pain, bone loss, autoimmunity, and more.

If you thought gluten was all about the gut, you MUST watch this presentation.

Attend Dr. O’Bryan’s presentation HERE.

In Room 2, Chris Kresser updates us on the latest in cholesterol research. Your cholesterol scores may not be what you think they are!

Attend Chris’s presentation HERE.

In Room 3, our favorite neurosurgeon, Dr.Jack Kruse, uncovers how leptin resistance lies at the root of inflammation, obesity, and chronic disease.

Attend Dr. Kruse’s presentation HERE.

Today is your LAST CHANCE EVER to order your Summit Upgrade Package for the special price of ONLY $67!

Click HERE to learn how you can take the summit home, along with some bonus Paleo goodies.

So sad to see this summit end. You guys have been a great group.

The Underground Wellness train keeps chugging along this week with the following events…

Tuesday — UW Radio LIVE with Brian Johnson, author of A Philosopher’s Notes. All about mindset and living a life you love. Click HERE for details.

Wednesday — How to Become a Health Detective webinar hosted by Reed Davis and yours truly. Learn how you can get certified as a Functional Diagnostic Nutritionist (FDN). This course changed my life! Without FDN, there would be no Paleo Summit! Click HERE for details.

Thursday — UW Radio LIVE with Dr. Jack Kruse. Can’t get enough of the doc! Click HERE for details.

Keep up with me on Facebook and Twitter. I’m a social media addict!

That’s all, folks!

Thanks for attending the UW Paleo Summit.

Sean
Host, The UW Paleo Summit
Author, The Dark Side of Fat Loss

by Sean Croxton

All good things must come to end.

And this Paleo Summit is going out with a blast!

If you’ve read my ebook The Dark Side of Fat Loss, you know that the first nine chapters are all about the
nuts and bolts of diet and lifestyle, while the final chapter is all about DOing it.

Yep, the big D word — DOing!

So, of course, today’s summit presentations are all about getting your mind right, so you can actually DO some of the things you’ve learned about over the past week.

First up, I always tell people that if they want to DO something, they might want to learn from someone who has already DONE it. In Room 1 fellow podcaster Jimmy Moore — who used to weight over 400 pounds — shows us how to break free from the grips of morbid obesity and embrace healthy living for life.

Jimmy shares the struggles of keeping his weight down, the obstacles he has had to overcome, as well as whether or not he’s still a low-carber.

Attend Jimmy’s presentation HERE.

Rooms 2 and 3 feature a couple of rising stars in the Paleosphere.

Stephanie Greunke — a rare breed as a Paleo-centered registered dietitian — talks about that other D word, DIET!

Stephanie covers how Paleo is different from run-of-the-mill fad diets, how a “diet” mentality is sure to fail when following the Paleo approach, as well as which aspects of “dieting” we can use to our advantage.

Attend Stephanie’s presentation HERE.

A lot of attendees have asked if I would be posting a presentation of my own. Well, not this time. But if there is one presenter whose approach is most similar to mine, it is our Room 3 presenter Dean Dwyer.

Dean goes beyond diet and exercise, and shares his 6 “inner game” components that helped him go from fat to fit. This is great stuff!

Don’t miss the book recommendations toward the end. They’re golden!

Attend Dean’s presentation HERE.

Don’t forget! Today is the last day to order the Summit Upgrade Package for the special event-week-only price of ONLY $67!

Click HERE to learn all about this LOADED package of presentations and bonus Paleo goodies.

I’m kinda bummed that this summit is coming to an end. This has been incredibly fun. I have thoroughly enjoyed reading and responding to your emails. You guys have been awesome!

At the same time, I’m looking forward to getting a full night’s sleep for the first time in over a week. I’m exhausted!

Stay tuned for the next UW Summit. I still have not decided what the focus will be. If you have any ideas, shoot an email my way.

Thank you for attending the UW Paleo Summit!

Sean Croxton
Host, The UW Paleo Summit
Author, The Dark Side of Fat Loss