S3E37 · Checking-In with Tyler and Laf

He walks to the police station and they asked him to describe the car and he described his car and then they're like "Oh yeah, we've had one of them come through." No way, I'd never heard that. So I don't know how his dogs didn't go off when the intruder broke into his house, but he slept through the whole thing and woke up to go to work and there was no car there and they took his phone too, so people were trying to get him to divert us and no one's here and Mitch can't call anyone to say "Hey, I'm not going to be coming in this morning."

That's crazy. So everyone's just thought he slept in. That's stressful as. Oh, that's hilarious, I never heard that. It's brilliant. That is good. And welcome to the Virtus podcast. I'm joined with our first recurring guest of season, I nearly said season five, season four. Matt Laff. How you doing? Good mate. First recurring guest. In my time anyway, there may have been a recurring guest in the past, but today we won't be diving too deep into Laff's upbringing and his past and everything like that. If you want to listen to that, the link to that episode

will be in the show notes where we chat about his move to WA and his move back to Victoria and footy and growing up as Laff and all that sort of stuff. But today we'll just do a bit of catching up what's been going on over the past few months. You got a new job, few questions from the audience, but it's going to be pretty, pretty lighthearted today. But I actually haven't seen you in a good couple of months, so this is a genuine like catch up for us too. It is. Cause I feel like now when I'm coming into the gym, it's not when you're coaching either.

You're avoiding me. It doesn't work. I think so. You're not an arvo man anymore. That's what it is. Yeah, I know. I'm trying to get stuff done in the morning. I'm a morning cat as well. And I find if I don't train first thing in the morning, then it's likely it's just not going to get done. Yep. And I just feel like a bit of human being. If I can like get my training session done, shower, eat and like my whole day is just set up and like you feel good. Like you feel good after getting a sweat on, you still get a little bit of a pump from your session.

So you're walking around with a bit of a swagger at work or wherever. No, you feel so much better. I think the hardest part is just getting out of bed, but once you do it, you feel so much better for the whole day. So, but yeah, no, it's been good. Still doing five a week sessions. Trying my best. I'm sort of sitting around three or four. There's normally one day a week. I'll just sort of go, no, I can't do it today. And I mean, which is plenty when you're playing footy as well and training twice a week and playing on a weekend.

How's that all been going? Good. No, really good. So we had footy around one last week, so came up against Langie, which was a good challenge. They just come up from Div too, so we didn't know what to expect, but no, footy's been really good. I had a pretty good pre-season. I'm feeling pretty good at the moment, but yeah, just really keen to get back into it. It's still back now. So hopefully the weather stays good for a little while. It wasn't too bad last week. Wouldn't count on it. No, I don't think so either. Especially today.

Who have you got on the weekend? We got Sorrento this coming weekend, so it's going to be good. First home game for the year. And then I think we've got three or four premiership reunions that day too, so it's going to be big. How many were you involved in? Of these ones? All three or four of them? None. I'll have three in the future, which will be nice, but these ones, no, none of these ones. I don't know if I'll have any soon, but yeah, I actually might. That's exciting. Hopefully I'll still be playing by then.

Are you going to put on a show for the old coaches this weekend then? Hopefully, yeah. How's your squad looking? Good. You've lost a few. Yeah, lost a couple. Does that hurt the ones at all? Of course it hurts a little bit. There's a few players there that we'd like to still have, but like every team, things change. You've just got to sort of work with what you've got. It gives opportunities for younger guys to get games or new players to come in and try and earn their spot, but yeah, no, we're still looking pretty strong.

Depth probably isn't there like we had last year. We had probably, I think we might've had 52 players last year. Yeah, it was huge. It was massive. So just dealing with that at the moment, but no, we're looking really good football and netball club. Yeah. And I believe you're the only Virtus member that plays for YC to not be currently on the injury list. Is that true? I'm actually a little bit, nah, I'm not injured at the moment. Lock Wallace, calf, Harry Lane, shoulder, Kyle Whitford, shoulder. Yeah. Wow. Well, there you go. Unless I'm missing anybody.

You've basically become a rehab center. Yeah, mate. Seriously. It's funny. Oh, actually it's quite funny. Cause I had a flat up tendon in my hip, so you can almost put me in that category, but I'm feeling good. Touch wood. We'll be okay. We'll be okay. Yeah. What else has been happening in your life outside of a football and Virtus? Obviously just, I moved back what, five weeks ago, six weeks ago. So just settling back into life here. Back at the plant nursery that I used to work at, which has been on and off for a while, but took on a two IC role there, which has been great.

Being under our head grower, which has been awesome. That's sick. So what are your roles and responsibilities to look like as a two IC? Pretty much take the load off him. So he's in charge of three different sections of the nursery. And he pretty much just needs me to help him take care of essentially just the, like part of the outside area, which we just call the growing team. So we take care of all the plants, whether it's the watering, the feeding, moving plants around. So pretty much he'll get jobs for me and I can pretty much delegate jobs and make sure everything runs smoothly and stuff gets done the way it should.

The shit runs. Yes, exactly. Hand them all out. So, um, but now that's been really good and, um, doing a bit of work with speak and share coming up, which is really, really exciting. Um, and then you have footy and stuff too. So it's sort of like, um, before going to WA, I'm similar doing similar things, but taking a massive step forward with them all. So it's been good. That's awesome with your speak and share stuff. I remember the last time we caught up, we got lunch, like maybe a month or so ago, um, you told me you were doing the speak and share stuff.

You're a little nervous about it and having to like speak in front of an audience has that all going, like, have you started facilitating yet? No, I haven't yet. So I've been a one session with them, um, just to sort of get an idea on what to do. Um, I've just recently put us a speech together, um, which is really exciting. So in the next few weeks, I've got, what do I have in the next sort of two months, I've got maybe six to eight sessions, um, that I'll go to. So I'm not too sure

how many I'll do, but, um, really exciting just to, just to get involved in, I'll be doing more sport based ones just cause obviously I work full time. Um, but just really, really excited just to get into it. Like this is something I've had a, had a, um, I've had a passion for sort of mental health and doing all this stuff. So the fact that they're happy to have me on board and help them is just awesome. So I'm so excited. You'd be able to add so much value, like you, especially to young people in sports.

No, I hope so. That's that's the plan. But yeah, obviously promoting them as well. So shout outs, big shout outs if you're watching on YouTube. Yeah. So it's good. Um, what sort of topics do you and what sort of value do you hope that you can bring to a young people in sports with your facilitator role? Like what are some of the lessons and teachings you want to be able to provide them? Um, I guess using my story and what I've done, um, or what I've been through, which you can see in that first video that we've been through, um, just showing them that, um, you know, we're all human.

We all have our own stories and just trying to be able to use it for yourself to try and make your life better or, you know, make yourself become happier because everyone's stories are different. I think sometimes maybe people compare their lives to others and go, you know, my, my problems aren't as bad as theirs, but that's not the point. It's about if you have problems that you're struggling with, make sure you deal with them. So just by talking about my message and, um, you know, what I've been through and how I got through it, hopefully I can, um, I guess have an impact on someone's life to want to go, Hey, okay, I need to do something.

Yeah. I needed to make a difference. And, um, yeah, hopefully just like I said, just make a difference for people. So hopefully that that'll, that'll work. So yeah. Yeah. You're so right. Like we do compare ourselves to other people. Like I haven't had too many struggles in my life, but every time that I have, which we might get into a bit later, like I do compare myself to people that are genuinely really struggling and battling. I'm like, fuck, what do I have to be sad about? But it's almost like not fair to downplay your emotions and your struggles like that.

Yeah. That's a tough thing too. But that's just what people do. Unfortunately, I think we just live in a, in a day and age where there's just a lot of comparison around, but, um, as it's written up, I think, is it still written up here? Comparison is the thief of joy. It's not, but it's good. And it should be. Yeah. Yeah. That's it. That was a good one. That sticks with me. But, um, yeah, no, you can't be doing that. So yeah. Been practicing in front of the mirror. Your speeches. Oh, I haven't. I think about it all the time though.

And I think in my head, I'm like, yeah, that sounds so good. I can't wait to say that. But if you put me up in front of people, especially early on, I'll probably just like go blank. Yeah. And I'm the exact same. And like now that I've been training people on the gym floor for years and years and years now, like that all comes second nature to me. But like if I'm facilitating a session out at red Hill or at a school or somewhere where I still haven't quite had that much experience, I go blank and like, you know, throughout the week I might be thinking of something to say and you're like, shit, that sounds good.

You know, I'll word it like that or I'll say this, I'll say that. And then you get up in front of a school or you get up, you know, in front of the boys at training, whatever, and you just go blank and it's just a shit show, like fumbling over your words. It's the worst thing. It's the worst feeling. And it just only gets better with practice. Yep. Yep. Like, you're aware of imposter syndrome? No. Completely. It's, it's essentially like, you know, you're in a role like for, this isn't true for me, but just for example, if I was working here at Virtus and didn't feel like I was good enough to work at Virtus, like that'd be imposter syndrome.

And like some, I saw a really good take on it the other day. It's like, maybe you don't have imposter syndrome. Maybe you actually just need to practice more at what you're doing. Okay. Interesting. Yeah. Makes sense. It does make sense. Self doubt. What'd you say? Self doubt is the thief of all joy. Well, you could put that in there too. Comparisons thief of joy, self doubt, it's always there. We got a question from one of our, one of our Virtus members here. Noah Oliver. Yep. I put the story out the other day. Yep. Got a few responses.

Got an interesting response, which we won't chat about. Yeah. That's a bit of a laugh. Before we get to Noah's question, do you want to just chat about the importance of checking in now that we are sort of talking about speak and share and the mental health side of things at the moment? Yeah, that's massive. Um, and I guess that comes with the stuff that speak and share are doing. Um, you know, I feel like it's not something that we do enough of. Um, it doesn't take much just to ask someone how they are. I think there's a, it happens a lot where people ask how someone is, but there's no intention to actually know how they are.

So it's about doing it the right way. It's usually quite shallow in there. Like, Hey, go on. Yeah, good. We're all, we're all guilty of it. 100% but I think it's about, you can do it that way just to be nice, but I think it's about noticing if something is off and just really approaching it the right way and just be like, no, like how are you? Like what's going on? Because once you break it down that little bit, it opens up everything. I think being vulnerable is tough, but once you do it, it's so much easier.

And I think sometimes if people struggle to do that, if I asked you how you are and you're struggling sometimes if I'm able to open up to you and maybe tell you what I'm going through, if anything, that might help you. Um, but I think sometimes just checking in, it makes a difference. I think it can make someone's day or even week or, you know, it could come at a time where it could be life changing. So, um, it doesn't take much to do it. Sometimes you don't need a response, but just to, just to actually put the effort in and check in and see if someone's okay.

I think it's massive. So say you've broken the walls down and someone does let you in, let you into their world and they, um, explain what's going on, like where to from there. Well, it's hard cause I haven't done enough sort of research or learn enough about to, to be able to tell people the right and wrong things. But if I was put in that situation, I'd just probably want to listen, see what they have to say and maybe sort of just break it down a bit more and see what they think they need to do.

Um, I mean, I think to these people who are struggling, it's pretty screamingly obvious what it is that they're struggling with. I think the hardest part is making the move to make it better. Um, but yeah, it's hard. Someone's different I think, but I think just talking about it to starting point gets, gets it out there. That alone would be enough weight off their shoulders just to move forward a little bit. But sometimes all you need to be is a safe space for someone to, um, you know, let you know what's going on into, to just word dump.

Yeah. Um, yeah, I've probably got myself in trouble in the past of like feeling like I have to say something to make it all better and you can't do that. So just listening is sometimes just the best thing to do. Yeah. How are you doing? Well, well, really wrong and like, um, that the moment of the next six weeks is just like a real hustle to grind and work and get myself in a position to enjoy three months over in Europe. Yep. Um, mentally like going really well. It's just, it's, it's pretty monotonous, but I'm liking the monotony at the moment.

It's just wake up, train, work, go to bed. How long are you going away for again? Three months, three months, May 26th to August 31. That's a long time to track. I'm so excited to see my best friends again. Yep. It's going to be epic. That's good. You're going to miss the worst time weather wise here in Melbourne too. I literally miss our whole winter and get the whole European summer. How good. Yeah. Just rub that into everyone. I'm sure they'll love it. Yeah. It's going to be epic. Yeah. I love it. All that. Yeah. I won't miss any of the tigers final series, which would be awesome.

Yeah. Well, I mean, it's the way it's going. That's true. That's a good point. The way it's going, there won't be a final series for the tigers? Nope. Not early pre-season. It's good for them. How are you? Yeah, I'm all right. It's been really good being back. Sort of just recently broken up with my girlfriend, which was pretty tough. Interesting circumstances behind it all, but yeah, it's, yeah, it's just, that's sort of been a struggle, but I've had a lot of good things going on and it's just helped me a lot. So I think at the moment I'm sort of fallen out of a good routine, a good balance, probably not prioritizing things right.

Like I was a bit late today. That's not something I want to do. Is that as a result of the, I guess, drained mental energy that comes with potentially going through a breakup? I think it definitely drained me. And I think I started, like I said, prioritizing the wrong things, stuff that didn't help me, but stuff that I don't want to stick around. So I just need to get back into a good rhythm. But I've been pretty self-aware with how I'm feeling and what I'm doing. I still haven't sort of worked through it yet, but I know what I need to do to take that next step.

But yeah, I'm feeling, I'm feeling a lot better now. But like I said, with everything going on with how lucky I am with work, with footy, with speak and share, with all my friends, I've been hanging out with my friends heaps lately and it's helped me heaps, but doing all that has definitely helped. But when it comes to probably the, the personal more self-motivated stuff that helps me, I'm probably not doing enough of that at the moment, but that'll come. So what have you been sort of prioritizing or maybe perhaps what should you be prioritizing to sort of?

So I'm pretty good on my routines. So I like to get up early, go to the gym, or maybe sometimes sleeping, go to work and go to the gym after. I prioritize my eating, my eating's a big one for me at the moment, but yeah, just making sure I'm training at least four days a week. Working really well, footy training, maybe run on the off days. Doing all that stuff is probably a priority, but at the moment I'm, and it's not the worst thing, I'm probably prioritizing seeing my friends more and sleep as well. I normally prioritize sleep, but at the moment I've been really bad, heavily under sleeping, going to bed very late.

But yeah, at the moment just going to bed pretty late, hanging out with friends till later at night just to keep busy. And by the time I get home and go to sleep, I wake up and I feel tired. And it's just sort of a vicious cycle that I need to break out of. So I've just sort of been prioritizing just seeing friends and probably not spending enough time with family or other friends as well. But at the end of the day, like it's, it is helping me now, but it's not something that's going to be sustainable.

Long term. Yeah. And like, I think I was the exact same when I went through my breakup a couple of years ago. Like I was so, so fortunate at that time that I was like living with three of my absolute best mates and it was also in the middle of the second lockdown in 2020. Yeah. So that you can't like go out and do anything. Yeah. You're not going to run into the other person. Like, you know, she lived over in Rosebud, actually I was in Ballarat. Oh yeah. Right. That, that was it. Like, so I had no choice, but to just focus on myself.

I'm living with like my best mates, got other best mates that live a couple of houses down. So we're all just seeing each other. Yeah. I was so fortunate to be surrounded by good people throughout that time of my life. Like it was awesome. And yeah, like there were some negative things that come with that, like, you know, same as you, like the lack of sleep, you're probably drinking a little bit more than usual, not looking after your health, but it's, if anything, it's just like mentally draining. Yeah. Like a breakup. Like there was a lot of sadness in the first like week or so.

Yep. Then after that, it's just like so draining. Like it's always just on your mind and in the back of your mind and that's just like a constant little micro stressor. Yep. So like being able to be with people that were close to me and just lift me up and give me a bit of energy. Yep. Just distracting I think as well. Yeah, absolutely. Yeah. But then there's only so much distracting you can do before it just sort of jumps back in. But nah, I guess it's, it's interesting. This is what I mean about opening up to like, I'm hearing that you've been through the same thing and just been able to talk to you.

I can relate, I guess, and then we could talk about it and we can even help each other. Like after this we could just sit down and, you know, have a coffee one day and we can follow up and it's great. This is back on the checking in. This is why it's so important. So yeah, next time you see a person you can just circle back like, Hey, how's that going? Yep. Or exactly or if I need help, just anything. So, but, um, yeah, interesting time, but nah, doing, doing well. So yeah. What's, um, that sort of leads onto something that I find very interesting and it's sort of, I'm still trying to figure it out myself is valuing happiness.

So for me, happiness is something that I've, it's probably my biggest value or biggest aspiration, if you will. It's probably the most important thing to me in life is do you reckon when you went through it, your happiness or what made you happy shifted or do you reckon you just steered away from it to try and cope? No, not at all. I think I was always coming back to what made me happy and that was time with friends and family and investing in my health. Um, like that, they are like my, like my values are time, health, free time and health, like time with the people that you love and health to sort of maximize that quality of time.

Yep. Um, so everything really came back to that. Like again, like I was lucky to be living in a house with my best mates and spending a lot of time with them anyway. And then sort of once that initial, you know, one month, yeah, once that initial like month wore off, like, you know, I started really going hard on my health, like training, eating well, like probably better than I ever have in my life. Yep. So everything sort of came back to those two values. Yeah. Okay. Interesting. Yeah. No, I feel like that's probably something

that I'm going through at the moment trying to figure out cause I know what makes me happy is eating well, sleeping well, go to the gym, but there are three things I'm not really doing at the moment and so I'm like, you know, what's going on? Is it, am I just not thinking clearly? Is it the mental drain? Is it that you're just leaning into maybe other things that make you happy, like people at the moment? Yeah, exactly. So that's an interesting one, but I think, like I said, I think about happiness a lot and I think talking about it and acknowledging it.

Do you, do you think people, um, what's the word, neglect the thought of what makes them happy? Yeah, well it's, it's temporary, temporary pain for, no, temporary pain for long term gain and then you flip that and short term pain for long, short term gain for longterm pain. So they, um, we've butchered it, we've butchered it. I think people lean into, um, you know, quick fixes and dope dopamine hits and sort of pleasure, pleasure chasing, which ultimately leads to longterm pain rather than doing the hard thing that is going to bed early, eating good food, getting up and going to train at the gym, which yeah, it sucks.

No one really likes getting up early when you've had a shit night's sleep, but then ultimately if you can get up early and train, drink water, eat good food, then it's going to set you up. Yep. Interesting. What are three things you're grateful for right now then? My work, like always, always so grateful for my work that I get to come here and sit here on a podcast and talk to you and like, that's how I make my money, like just doing shit like this. Like it's, it's credit. I know I say it a lot, but it fucking blows my mind that this is actually a job that I get paid for.

The people in my life and that's just everyone like you, family, friends, like every single person in my life, like incredibly grateful for them. Yep. That's a great question, isn't it? Yeah. And like, and I could rattle off a million, but I don't want, I don't want to be like generic and say, oh, I've got a roof over my head, you know, like, and yes, I'm grateful for those things, but I like to, I like to think of things that maybe others might not be grateful for. For example, like big one for me is like,

I'm so grateful for COVID because I, you know, this terrible thing that a lot of people hated and I definitely had at some stages, but I'm so grateful for it because I wouldn't be where I am right now. Yep. So I always try and take something that perhaps you wouldn't think you'd be grateful for and find a way to be grateful for that. Nice. Glass half full. Yeah. What about yourself? I'm grateful definitely for my friends at the moment for sure. Further to that, I think the opportunities I've got in front of me are really exciting.

The chance at work to take on this role that I am doing at the moment. The opportunities that Speak and Share are giving me. The opportunities with footy, just all of that sort of stuff. It's pretty exciting. I've openly spoken about trying to get to the fiery, so that opens up again in a few weeks. So I probably will try for that potentially, depending on how I feel with the whole Speak and Share and my job sort of situation. Whether it's just too much or... Just whether it's too much and whether it's the right time to go for it.

I feel like what I have now is really exciting and I kind of want to roll with it for now. You want to just stop and smell the roses. Exactly. Yeah. So I'm definitely grateful for the opportunities that I have at the moment. Like I said, friends and family. And I think just home. I think coming back here, I love WA, it's incredible, I'll go back for sure. But for me, just Victoria's home, like Frankston's home, and this is great. So definitely grateful to be here and living here. It is a nice part of the world.

I don't see myself ever permanently moving outside of Victoria. It's just home. I love Melbourne. I'd fucking hate to live in the city, but I love going out for a weekend and spending a few days in Melbourne, going to the footy. You're right, it's home. It is home. It's so nice. Can you quickly tell us about the fire reason, what that's potentially going to look like whenever you're ready to lean into that? Yeah. So I think it opens up in the 18th or just over a week away now. So I've sort of tried this since I was 18 on and off.

I've sort of been through it, got to the end a few times. So fair to say, I've got a pretty good idea on what to expect, but it's sort of a six month process where you do a whole lot of cognitive testing, physical testing, psychological testing. It's a whole range of everything, but it's a very highly demanded job. So there's a lot of people in there trying to get in. So just trying to separate yourself from everyone else is the hard part, which is actually very interesting. I couldn't imagine how hard it would be to really try and stand out from everyone else, but yeah.

Especially the people that are going for those sorts of jobs are probably beasts themselves too. A hundred percent. A hundred percent. They'll just be genuinely good people that just have, oh yeah, it's hard. And that comes with the comparison side that we were talking about earlier is I think about the potential of some people who I'm coming up against who, you know, might run a business or they might have managed a company, like they might've done all these different things. But then there's me, who's just worked in a plant nursery and I've just finally taken on a two IC role.

It's kind of like, how do I expect to get in when I'm comparing myself to that? But that's not the point. But that's just the story you're telling yourself. Exactly. Whereas for me looking at you, like you're, you know, yeah, you're two IC. You're you've just started a new job at a facilitator at a massive non-for-profit mental health organization that's blowing up, won a flag at YC last year, looking good for this year too. Like that's just the story you're telling yourself. Yeah, well that's it. It's just those negative thoughts, those intrusive thoughts, but. And there'd be someone that's, you know, hypothetically applying for the fire isn't there looking at you thinking shit, like he's, he's really well set up.

Yeah. Well, that's it perspective, I guess. But like I said, it's, you just got to not compare, but I think I know I probably don't have that resume that other people do, but I think if I got in there, I'd, I'd be a fantastic fiery. I think I'd do a great job. Yeah, absolutely. That's the thing. I think a lot of people think that too. So it's just about trying to get in there. But yeah, that opens up soon and it's pretty exciting. But like I said, I'll, I'll weigh out whether it's worth doing now with all the speak and share stuff and the nursery stuff and, and all of that sort of stuff.

But yeah, it's, it's pretty exciting that that comes with your opportunity side. There's just so much going on at the moment. I'm loving it. So stressful, but exciting. It's a really good place to be in. Yep. Um, sure. That's a little good segue into a question I got from Steph. I nearly said Stephanie and Steph masculine on the gym floor this morning. She wondered where does laugh Getty's motivation to improve and train from cause you're already a really incredible footballer. Um, you're already really well established with your training. You've been doing it for years and years and years.

Like where do you still find the motivation to get better? Um, I think it stems from the bad mental health patch I had back in 2020. Um, but also I think when I was in WA, when I went there, played a bit of footy, I was a little bit overweight. I was pretty underdone. I sort of took it all for granted and I had a bit of an awakening where I put myself further forward, say 20 years, 30 years when I'm done with footy, maybe got a family or even on my death bed and I was like, am I going to be content with what I've done with myself so far?

And I said, no, there's no way. So from there constantly thinking about that, um, got me into training more, got me into doing so much running, heaps of gym, focusing on footy, trying to play the highest level I can, which I did last season for a little bit, obviously cut short, but I just don't want to get to the end and have too many regrets. Like I'm at a point now where there's so much I can do. I mean, right now I feel like I'm in the best shape I'm in ever and I just want to keep going.

Like, I just really want to see what I can do because I don't want to, I don't want to die wondering. I don't want to miss out on what could have been. Yeah. There's a great quote. I can't remember who, but it's like, it's a shame for a man to go through life without realizing the beauty and potential for which his body is capable of. Exactly. And that's what it is at the moment. Um, it all happened pretty quick. You, you sort of saw that after the last footy season when I started getting into the running, decided to do the half marathon, decided to do the 50K lifting here, I'd never lifted 200 kilos before.

Then the first day I lifted 200, I lifted 220, like all these things are happening and it's so exciting. And I think it's just striving to get more like you get addicted to it. You do. Cause like I said, once upon a time, 200 kilos off the ground sounded like the most unrealistic thing ever. I've gone above that and now I'm like, okay, what, what can I do next? What more can I do? Yeah, absolutely. And so I have these crazy goals and aspirations with my running and my fitness with my gym, with footy, even footy is a bit more of an iffy one, but I'd like just so many things I want to be really good at.

Um, and I think further to that, further to the physical side of it, the mental side, um, like doing all this speak and share work is really exciting because that for me is really valuable and I want to see how far I can get with that. Um, you know, I'm focusing on, like I was just saying, bettering myself individually, but I'm really excited to help better other people's lives because that to me is a massive value in my life is trying to make people happy and make people be better people or, you know, just see people smile.

So I'm just trying to do all that together. It's really exciting, but that's sort of what motivates me is just become the best version of myself I can be. So I don't have to regret it later down the track. And then from there I can hopefully help other people do the same. That's awesome. Like once you start to break down, like self-limiting beliefs, it's almost like, you know, what one next, what next, what next and you do get addicted to it, like choose your addiction. Yeah. Yeah. A lot of that came from Ned Brockman as it's actually quite funny.

I'm wearing his jumper, but a lot of that motivation side for me came from Ned Brockman. I think for anyone that hasn't looked too far into him, I think listening to his podcast is awesome because he's not a very unrealistic person to, to aspire to be like he was just a guy that was a sparky trained for two years, decided to run across Australia. He didn't train anything that was crazy. But he sort of just shows that if you put your mind to anything, you can do anything. But if you can't do it, of course you're not going to do it.

So, but yeah, that's sort of where it stemmed from, but that's where it came from. That's a good question, Steph. Thank you. What did he actually do? It was, so he did, it was, it was a lot of people doing 50 marathons, 50 days. What was his, he did that. I think listening to him, he did that within six months of starting to run. He said he went for a run one day, did 10 Ks and did 20 Ks and did a marathon, or he said he did 50 before a marathon, like someone else I know.

Yeah. Yeah. Stupid. Right. And then he did 50 and 50 days. And then, what do you do? He did, he did 80 Ks with eight Ks of elevation. I'm pretty sure one night, just cause he wanted to, but yeah, he did two years of training and the training was no more than 40 to 60 Ks a week. I'm pretty sure, which is no different to what a lot of people would do anyway. Um, but yeah, just trained for that for two years and then decided to go from Cottesloe beach in Perth to Bondi beach in Sydney, which is the, what is it, 3,900 Ks?

It's on my back I think. So it's about a hundred Ks a day he was trying to do in 43 days. And the story behind it is incredible. I'm not going to tell it all, but just the stuff that he went through was just insane. His body was pretty much broken. Like his injuries and stuff? Yeah. Yeah. He couldn't run for six weeks. The next week he ran a hundred Ks a day for seven days. Like it's madman mental. It's crazy. It's ridiculous. But, um, yeah, that's the sort of stuff that just, you know, inspires people to do more be better.

Yeah, that's right. You see someone doing that stuff and it's like, well, they're just a human being like I am. We're the same thing. Why can't I do that? Yep. So it gets people thinking, but yeah, all it takes is a little spark and you never know what'll happen. So how's your running going now? Cause you were right. You were right into that end of last year and you did your half marathon. Correct. Yeah. I did a half in Fremantle end of last year and then five days later I did 50 just cause just bit of fun.

Wait, 50K? Yeah, I did 50K. Yep. Five days after the half. Um, fuck. That was good fun. Dude. I must not have known that. Really? Maybe I didn't. I've just fucking forgotten. Well, I haven't spoken about it much, but yeah, it was just, I wanted to do it and I decided to do it. I think Speak and Share were doing a fun run here and I couldn't get here for it. So I thought, I'm just going to do something on my own. I thought, I thought I'd do a marathon and I thought so close to 50.

You raised money for it, didn't you? I did it. Nah, not this one actually, surprisingly. Um, normally I do, but this time I was like, nah, I'm just going to do it. I'm just going to do it. Um, that's madness. Yeah. It was pretty, pretty good. I got ITB friction syndrome in my knee or like on the outside of my knee, which is still bothering me now. But other than that, it was, it was so much fun. 71 k's in five days. Yeah, I know. Not good. Not, not very smart, but I'll do it all again.

But now the running's going really good with footy. It's a bit harder. I'd like to get another session in a week, but I just have to see if it works. I don't think it will. I mean, it's priorities and I guess it's footy in your number one physical priority at the moment. That and gym. So just trying to make sure it all works. But I got some pretty exciting, um, aspirations and goals for the end of the year. So I'm not going to put them out there yet because nothing's confirmed, but few things we speak and share.

And, um, you know, look to do my first marathon and hopefully the two bays run that it goes on down. My first marathon. You've already done a 50. Yeah. First proper marathon. I'd like to get that done. Yeah. Hopefully get it done pretty quick and, um, do the two bays. So I've got a few things at the end of the year, which is exciting, but just got to focus on footy at the moment. But circling back to the 50, how hard comparatively was that to the 21 k? It's it's totally different. Um, the 21 k was more obviously higher intensity, but just trying to like manage your pace and um, how you're breathing, how you're feeling.

Um, whereas the 50 was more, I wasn't puffed at all at any point I was cruising, but it was just acknowledging how my body's feeling like physically. I think when I was doing it, I was expecting it to be a bit easier. Uh, and I thought the, it was going to get difficult later. So I think I thought maybe around 15, 20 k's, I'd start feeling a bit heavy, but I remember I hit seven k's and my groins had started to flare up and my body started feeling fatigued already. And at that point, and it was a bit of karma cause after a few k's, I'm like, Oh, this is boring.

I want to get, I want it to get tough. Like I'm really excited for this to get really hard. Careful what you wish for. Yeah. And it happened quick. And then yeah, I hit seven k's and was like, shit, I feel a bit sore here. But I wasn't running with anything. I didn't have any water. I had two gels, which I got through in the first 21. Um, so this is seven k's and you start to get a bit beaten up. Yeah. So you got 43 to go. What gets you through? Just the excitement of knowing what's to come.

Like I'd never run that far. I was just really keen to get to that point where, you know, I hit 25 k from 30 k. Um, I don't know. It was just, it was just so exciting. I think the challenge of it all, um, it just like drove me so much, but I think my first break wasn't until 23 k's. So I did 23 k's with no more than just a small bottle of water. Um, I think I had one gel or two gels by that point. Um, and then every time I stopped, I was having donuts, LCM bars, that's the leisure of running too.

Like you can have anything, just get anything inside me. So I was smashing that down and, but yeah, it was good. Felt pretty good. I hit 35, 40 k's and started to, started to get pretty heavy. Um, and then yeah, I think when was it? I hit 44 was my last break and I started by that point I was, what do you mean by break? So I was stopping. Yeah. So I was just doing like this track that was near home in Perth. Um, and so it was just, I kind of just ran as far as I felt like I wanted to then sort of ran back and I got to 44 k's was my last break.

So all right, I'm feeling it now, but I'm so close, six k's in my head. I'm like, this is going to be so easy, but that six k's was the hardest six k's of the whole run. It was just, my body was just seizing up. I had to keep stopping from jogging, going down to a walk just cause I just couldn't, my body was just absolutely fried. That was the stuff that I was really keen to sort of say and like say how it feels. Um, but yeah, that last three, the last three k's was so difficult.

Just looking at my watch going, I've only gone 200 meters, like I've got so far to go. Yeah, she said drag on. It did. How long did it all take in total? Uh, that took me four hours and five minutes maybe. Do you get bored? When I sit in the saltwater I can do like a little bit of aerobic conditioning and for 20 minutes I get bored as batshit. A little bit? Um, I think I was bored at the start when I said I was waiting for it to get really difficult but I had, I

had music in, which helps me heaps, but no, I think you get to a point where you just sort of just go off into your own world and yet you're just focusing on, you know, what's coming up or what's in front of me. What am I listening to? I suppose once you're starting to break down all you can think about is just surviving and yeah, cause you can't think about being bored at the end. It's not, you know what they say, it's not about the destination, it's about the journey and I think I really embraced the journey and it was so much fun.

So I'm keen to do that again. Probably do another ultra soon, maybe at the end of the year. I think I remember now, do I remember correctly, you went to the cricket that night after your 50k? Yeah, the ashes was on, no not the ashes, just the cricket was on at the Optus, no it was the Aussies in South Africa and I remember going there and oh, I did not, I sat down and just did not want to move. I was so sore. I was thinking he's not getting back up. No, no way. Did you have a beer, correct?

Yeah, of course. Good recovery? Yeah, I know. Had, I think I only had one or two. I was like I can't do this to myself but then yeah, the next day I've never, like everything in my body was sore. There was no part of me that wasn't so nah, it was good, good fun, good fun. What did the days look like after, like how long did it take you to fully get back to normal? I think I worked a few days later but I would say given what happened with the ITB friction syndrome, that still

bothers me now but everything felt pretty normal pretty quick, just soreness went down, it was just that knee, outer knee pain that was struggling but if that wasn't there I think I would have felt pretty good after maybe five days. Yep. Yeah. Good effort. Yeah, I ate pretty well after, sort of had to but yeah, that was good fun. So the most you'd run before that was 21k, that would be the most you ran in my stint so you've essentially doubled it. Yeah, yep. You've done well, you've done well to get away with that, away from that.

I know. Scott Furry. Nah, it was good fun, good fun. I'd do it again for sure. Love it. Great. Got another viewer question. Yep. From one of my friends, Jacob Barlow. Yep. Just wanted to know how you go about managing your time because I guess it's one of the age old barriers to doing good things is I don't have time. Yep. What's been your experience with time and how do you not let it be a barrier to wanting to do good things? That's a great question. Wanting to do your running and your footy and all the other things that you've got on your plate at the moment?

Yeah, I think I can get pretty selfish with my time. If I feel like I want to do something, I'll do it. Which is good, but sometimes bad. I probably don't put in enough time for the right things. I really, I'll get to this after you've finished answering your question, but I'll feel that I'm so incredibly selfish with my time to the point where I almost like step back and think, fuck, I do need to give this person time. Yeah. Give this person space. Yep, yep, a hundred percent, but I think at the moment, like we touched on earlier with everything that's going on, time management at the moment probably isn't great.

I've got the time to do stuff, but I'm just not doing it. I'm prioritizing things. Yeah. You need the energy to do it. But yeah, I think I'm normally pretty good when everything's running smoothly. I'm pretty good. I'll get up, go to the gym or the night before even the night before I'll get my lunches ready, get my smoothies ready. I'll get everything ready in the mornings. Wake up, get ready, go to the gym, then go to work, then I'll have footy or either rest or maybe run if it's not footy season. I had everything pretty down pat.

I probably didn't prioritize friends as much and I probably still feel like I don't, but that's an interesting one because I feel like it's not that I don't need to, but I feel I don't, I'm trying to think of a way to word this without my friends going, oh geez, he's a dick, but it's kind of like, I feel like I can go X amount of time or like even a week or two without seeing or talking to them. But then once I see them, it feels like all normal again. And I don't know if that's a good or a bad thing.

It's a great thing. But that's, that's just how I feel as long as I'm doing the right things for me sort of thing. I've got some of my best friends that I grew up with back home, like Christmas just been 2022. Like that was the first time I'd seen a lot of my absolute best friends from Hamilton since the last Christmas before then. And like, you know, sometimes we'd go months and months and months without even messing each other via phone. But you know, I think for some of your truly close friends, like you don't

need to be up in each other's shit all the time to know that you love each other and you care about each other like, and as soon as you see each other again, it's just, everything's back to normal. Yeah. Back to normal. So I'm pretty lucky with that, but again, I don't know how they feel, but that's just sort of me. Um, but yeah, I think my time management's okay. I've noticed more lately that I've got more things that I want to be doing and I probably don't have the time for it. So years previous, I feel like I had all the time in the world, but now it's definitely something different.

But it's good. I'd rather be busy being busy so much better than having too much time. I think. Yeah. It's a great place to be. Um, yeah, I, I probably sometimes get too selfish with my time in that like, you know, if I have a shift here on the floor and it's a six to 11, then you better believe I'm fucking starting on six. And as soon as that clock hits 11, I'm done. I sometimes I get a little stroppy if some people come in late to the 10 o'clock session and they're keeping me late afterwards, but sometimes I've got to give them the space and think, okay, well why they're late, what else is going on in their life?

How can I add value to their session? And Greg is incredible with his time when I had to get stuff going on with my head. Last week I was like laying down on the couch in the kitchen at Virtus and he saw me laying down. He's like, Oh, a bit of a nap. I'm about to go and do the same. Like told him about my head. And then he's like, all right, come with me. And he spent an hour of what was going to be his nap time or his like chill time in between clients given me a free session and we, you know, we know how much Greg charges for a one hour consult.

He gave me a free hour of his time that was going to be spent resting and looking after and nurturing himself. And he gave it to you. Yeah. Yeah. I think I've got a lot to learn from Greg. Shout out to Greg. He's a great man. He's the man. He is the man. If I could be more like Greg, that'd be great. What is your favorite thing about Greg? Just quickly. Everything. I think his knowledge every time when I go see him for whenever I'm injured, I think I look forward to what I'm going to learn from him.

It's not just about what isn't him telling me what's wrong. It's about learning more than that. Just his knowledge is just incredible. And just his kindness, like just everything. It's so good. I love seeing him, but it sucks because I only see him when I'm injured. So it's like, yeah, we got to get him back on here. Yes. I've listened to his episode a handful of times. He's just what I like. I like a lot of things about Greg, but one thing I love about him is he's really soothing voice. He's got a nice voice and he can tuck me into bed and read me a bedtime story anytime he likes.

There you go. Keep that one in mind, Greg. Clip that shit up. Yeah. No, it's so true. I get it. He's a great man. So shout out to you, Greg. Appreciate you. Thank you. We're approaching the 45 minute mark. Before we get to the finisher, is there anything that you've brought to the table that you'd like to ask or have a chat about? No, I think it was nice to check in with you. It was just nice to, like I said, we haven't really seen each other much. I think it was nice just to see what's going on.

I feel like it was pretty genuine for the audience too, because we genuinely haven't seen each other for a couple of months. I forgot the camera was there for a bit. This is a genuine just insight into us catching up, really. No, it's been good, but nothing too much, but yeah, I just want to say thank you. Always a pleasure to have you on. We've got the finisher. I was going to ask this during the mental health check in, but I thought I'd save it to the very end. This is from Noah Oliver. When was the last time you cried?

Great question. This week would have only been a week or a week and a half ago. This was a question I got asked a lot and I normally am not much of a crier, but through the breakup sort of happened a bit, but I'd say maybe a week or so ago. Yeah. So how about you? So if you had to ask me this, because this isn't one I don't really get asked, but I think about it a lot because you see like the video or the people doing podcasts and asking this question and every time I hear it, I sort of think to myself, when was the last time I cried?

And I'm the same. I'm not much of a crier, but pretty around maybe November-ish last year and I was just really, really, really stressed. Nothing really overly bad happened. It was just a time I was just super stressed, a bit anxious and probably not really one thing in particular. I was feeling a little bit down on myself, a bit of self comparison was going on and just one morning was just a little bit too much, so I had a little bit of a mini cry. So that was probably the last time I can remember. Yeah. How'd you feel after?

So acutely after I can't remember, I think I was just feeling pretty shit all day, but then a couple of days later, I'm not one that likes to dwell on things too much. I was like, fuck, what was all that about? I've got to get moving. I'm going to like start training again. As I said before, everything just comes back to my values of, you know, time slash people and health. So I just got to lean back into people, spending time with people I love and investing in my health and funnily enough, everything was sort of fine again once I lent into those two things.

Yep. But like before that, I couldn't tell you maybe, maybe my breakup a couple of years ago. Yeah. Who knows? Interesting. Do you find it easy to open up and be vulnerable to people? I don't. You don't? No, I don't at all. Did see a psychologist for a few weeks late last year, late 2022, I guess this is actually after the cry and I think that's what prompted it. Yep. And like it took us a fair few sessions for me to actually feel comfortable enough to open up and talk. And I think a lot of

it comes down to fear of judgment and I have a really big fear and apprehension of what people think about me and I know I shouldn't, like even people that I don't really care much for. Like I, yeah, I'm very, I don't think vain's the right word, but I do somewhat care what people think about me. That's interesting. So that, that's my big barrier to sharing. Like I don't want to have someone else's opinion of me changed by something that I've told them. Yep. Interesting. It's sort of, I feel like we were finishing up, but it's a, it's a good thing to talk about.

I think when it comes to the whole vulnerable side and the fear of the judgment, do you ever think about maybe that if you can talk about what you're going through, someone else can maybe open up to you or they can sort of relate to you. Yeah, absolutely. Because I've had that, I probably couldn't give you an example, but I've definitely felt that when the roles have been flipped, like someone else has said something and that's made me feel comfortable enough and given me the space to then share a similar experience. Yep. Again, probably couldn't think of an example off the top of my head, but that's something that I felt.

Yep. No, that's good. Yeah. Vulnerability is not easy. And like, you know, even just then like talking about the last time I cried, like one, I can't remember the details cause it was a while ago, but yeah, two, like probably didn't go as in depth as I could have. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. That's what I mean that I'm working on. There you go. You're not perfect. I thought you were. Nah, hell no. We're all not perfect are we? But no, that's good. Good for you. You're pretty close to it though. Who me? Perfect. I try. I didn't do my head today.

You know who is? Who? Greg Day. Oh, he is though, isn't he? He's the man. He is the man. He's going to love this. Won't be listening. He won't be listening. Won't be listening. We won't tell him about this either cause if he does, he'll come up to us and say something hopefully. Well then maybe we can get him on the podcast. We'll tag team him. Sounds good. Yeah. We'll end on that. All right. Well thank you very much. Absolute pleasure to have you on man. That was good. I might make it a semi-regular thing. Do one a month.

Check in. Frosty and Laffs. See what's going on. Monday fun day. For Monday fun day. Frosty and Laffs. Fucking fuck around. Maybe we'll get our own thing and we'll bring people in. Yeah. I like it. The daily check in. Sorry, the monthly check in. Checking in with Tyler and Laff. Could be it. Could be the one. that all right thank you have a good day