I Was Addicted to Meth & Now I Run 100 Miles a Week | Andy Glaze

I did a ridiculous amount of meth at a very young age. When they found me, I was, you know, emaciated, strung out, like probably hadn't slept in days. I was like, I don't want to feel like this anymore. [music] I'm going in a different direction. >> The one and only Andy Glaze, >> arguably the most inspiring ultra endurance athlete in the world. >> He serves others while juggling his passion for running. >> I have like a intense fire inside that burns. That's what allows me to do all this crazy stuff from triathlons to ultra running and every flavor cuz it's all fun. Yeah, it hurts and yeah, [music] it's uncomfortable but dead people don't get to suffer and I'm alive, you know. >> How long is your 100 mile a week running streak been going on at this point? >> 320 weeks. >> Andy, man, so good to meet you. This is long overdue. So excited to talk to you, brother. >> I'm so excited to be here. This is uh a dream come true honestly. Yeah. >> You're the guy who's running all these races. You're putting in, you know, these 100 mile weeks and you're the guy who is known for smiling. It's the title of your book. So, you're the smiling ultrarunner guy. But honestly, to me, there's so much more to your story. It's about two things in my opinion. It's about the space between falling down and getting back up. And second, how physical movement is a catalyst for emotional healing. >> Yeah. I mean, so I mean, the beginning of sort of the downfall was probably my parents' divorce. Um, they got divorced when I was about 10. And they split up. And so then I had two kind of different households that I was having to navigate um at a young age. My dad was like a workaholic, so he was never home. And then my mom was like a loving mom, but she had been a stay-at-home mom and then had to go back to work because now she was divorced. So she was at work, my dad was at work. And so I kind of, you know, a Gen Xer kind of raised myself, right? I mean, we were we were of that age where we came back home when the street lights came on and like um not a lot of parental supervision, you know, before cell phones, before pagers, all that sort of stuff. And so I had a lot of time just without any parental supervision. And that sort of led me into maybe not hanging out with like the best group of friends, >> which then led to, you know, starting to smoke pot and then um just experimenting with all sorts of other drugs and alcohol. >> Um which then, you know, got into like some really heavy stuff like, you know, crystal meth. And then I just really spiraled out of control at a, you know, at a very rapid descent um at a young age. I I basically had a friend whose father sold crystal meth and weed to the biker gangs of Southern California. I lived down kind of by Palm Springs and they would they'd bring the meth and weed up from Mexico and like Redlands, which is where I live, was kind of like a stopoff point. Hell's Angels had like, you know, Clubhouse in San Bernardino and like so there was a lot of drugs coming through and I just had like unlimited access to this stuff and I did a ridiculous amount of meth at a very young age which you know I was smoking it out of light bulbs. I was I remember for like my 16th birthday, they gave me a line as long as my arm and I did the whole line, you know? I mean, just really crazy amounts of drugs that a young person should not take. Um, which eventually caused me to like run away from home. Um, luckily my dad was able to like hire some offduty cops to find me. Mhm. >> Um, and then of course when they found me, I was, you know, emaciated, strung out, like probably hadn't slept in days. >> How long had you been uh away from home when you ran away? >> It wasn't long. Probably like a week or so cuz like, you know, I'm 16, so I'm just sleeping on people's couches and, you know, kind of like I didn't, you know, I was so incapacitated with the drugs that I wasn't even thinking people were looking for me. I had run away and I just figured, okay, now I'm like on my own and I can just, you know, do this. But no, I mean, my dad was like, they were all actively looking for me. I just wasn't even thinking about that as like a possibility. >> I don't want to rush through this. So >> 13, you start smoking cigarettes. >> Yeah. And by 16, you're completely strung out on crystal math. Yeah, I mean that's a pretty compressed period of time to go from, hey, I'm a young kid and maybe I'm buming a cigarette here and there to like being a fullblown like crystal meth addict, >> right? It was just really easy to to to access, you know. >> What was the first time you smoked crystal meth like? >> Um, [sighs] >> was that like a a light bulb moment? Like, oh my god. >> I mean, it just feels really really good. I mean, I think, you know, I I always think about it and I I've described it in like as like it's like taking in happiness, right? Like you just feel so euphoric when you take it in >> that at a at a young age and and I was going through some stuff like around 15, my dad was diagnosed with cancer. They gave him like six months to live and so >> I didn't know how to process that as a 15year-old. You know, I wasn't given any tools or like, hey, you should, you know, do this. I just did more drugs. Drugs made me feel good. I didn't critically think about it like, oh, I'm doing these drugs to mask my, you know, [laughter] intense. No. Yeah. Intense depression that I'm about to lose my dad. And my dad was very strict and very hard on me, but he's still my dad. You know, the crystal meth just made me feel so good. And just like, you know, being up for days and days with just endless energy and just it made everything in life fun. Like I I you know, I could clean my room and it was fun. And I was used to feeling like that, you know? I mean, we would smoke it and it would make me feel slow and it would kind of like just kind of make me chill out. But like crystal meth made me just want to do everything and everything I did was fun. It didn't matter what it was. Um it it was just just just amazing high. And as a 15year-old, 16-year-old, you don't really >> sure >> understand the the lifelong consequences of of doing this stuff. >> Super addictive. Very difficult to get off of. Uh and somehow you managed to keep your teeth like it rush. I went to treatment with some guys that like lost all their teeth from crystal meth. >> I don't have any back mers. So >> you don't. You did lose. >> Yeah. I I lost I lost a couple of them. Yeah. Yeah. your dad finds you after you run away, >> you know, from there ensues even more chaos. You think like, okay, now you're going to get into the solution and it just seems like >> you get put in one bad situation after the next. >> Yeah. I mean, so they they didn't really know what to do. Um, options were pretty limited back in the early 90s, you know. I mean, we didn't I mean, that was kind of even before the internet, you know, stuff like that. So they hired an educational consultant who basically is like well we have these wilderness programs we can send them to. Um and they're like okay. So they shipped me off to Utah and essentially there was like I think nine or 10 of us kids and we were all in various forms of drug abuse or you know behavioral issues and they like basically dumped us into the middle of Utah and then just started hiking us. >> Yeah. Like a physical scared straight situation. Yeah. >> But we're all coming down off I mean I remember there was a girl coming down off cocaine. She was like a rich girl from LA. I'm coming down off meth, you know, other people are coming down off other drugs. So, we're all just a mess emotionally crying and uh I remember the girl just sat down and like refused to hike for like 3 hours and we just had to sit there and like, you know, and we're all like, "Come on, let's go." Like, you know, and then everyone starts yelling at everybody. It was a lot of drama, but um yeah, it was pretty it was pretty rough there in the beginning. I I I talk about it in the book, but essentially the first day they hiked us all night with no food, >> right? This starvation. [snorts] >> Yeah. Just like and then at the end of the night they gave us a banana and [clears throat] we all just like I ate the whole thing. Yeah. Like everything and then I ate other kids. I was starving and that was kind of like how they introduced us to this program. But little did you know uh that this was your first kind of touch point with endurance like that that it's sort of an inciting incident that you know becomes salient m many years later you know but this is like your introduction to >> the world of voluntary suffering >> right yeah I mean for sure there's a lot of like parallels and looking back I mean now I've done the Moab 240 multiple times and you know I'm out there suffering in Utah like hiking around doing all the running and stuff and I'm like, "Oh, look at look at me 30 years later like doing this because I want to do it, not because I'm being forced to do it." >> And this idea that that pain can have a positive purpose. >> Yeah. I think the most important thing is they had a therapist that would come out like once a week and talk to us. And that was the first point in my life where somebody made the connection in my brain where they're like, "You're doing drugs because you're upset." I'm like, "What are you talking about? I'm doing drugs cuz they're fun." Like, no. like you're upset about your dad, you know, you're a teenager, you're going through your teenage stuff and you're doing these things to cope with whatever's going on in your life. And I had never thought about that. I never made that connection. There was no point where I'm like, "Oh, I'm upset. I'm going to smoke weed." I was just upset and then smoked weed, but never had the emotional maturity or emotional intelligence to like make that connection myself. So that was like my first sort of introduction to, wow, I'm using this stuff to mask, you know, what's really going on. I need to deal with what's really going on so that I don't have these issues later on and and try to run from them again. >> So you come out of that experience and then you get put in this crazy boarding school. >> Yeah. So I thought everything was good. Like I had done really well, did a lot of work. All my, you know, counselors and everything were like Andy is great. But then that educational consultant came back and they're like, "He probably shouldn't go home. It's only been three months. Like, he'll probably get mixed up with those same people again." Everybody else in my whole group got to go home. And and my parents came, they're like, "We're taking you to Massachusetts." And I'm like, you know, I I'd maybe been to the East Coast one time. Like my what do you mean Massachusetts? You know, and they flew me to Massachusetts and and took me to this boarding school. um in a in a giant castle, like a real castle um in the Birkers, which is like western Massachusetts. Yeah. It was considered a therapeutic boarding school. They they went with this philosophy. It's called Daytop, which you'll have to like, you know, listeners or viewers will have to Google it, but that was sort of the the philosophy of the school. And um it was kind of based on positive peer pressure, no medication. And on the on the surface, it looked really like a great place because the the philosophy was they were taking very uh intelligent kids, gifted kids that um were really messed up and then getting them into really really good universities. like, you know, one of the guys I went to school with, you know, 1600s on all his SATs, went to Colombia, like, and so they would take us and and that kid was like really strung out on drugs when he first got there, 14 years old, 15 years old, whatever, but like was able to turn it around and get 1600s on his SATs and then get into Colombia. So, it was like it was a school that on the surface looked great. Like, hey, my kid's messed up. He's he's he's intelligent. I'm going to send him there. And then at the end result is he'll get into a good college and graduate high school. And because a lot of us when we got there were like you know dropped out of high school or like you know >> and it did do that for a lot of a lot of kids. [laughter] I mean a lot of kids did. I mean >> let's just call it what it is. I mean this place all right the John Dewey Academy. >> Yes. Uh to me, you know what it sounds like is they they had a very aggressive form of therapy and would create these group therapy sessions that were very confrontational where they were weaponizing fear and shame to like you know if you >> interpret it charitably to like root out like whatever is bothering you. But, you know, that's a pretty violent way to go about it that, you know, yes, it can go one way and this kid gets into Colombia, but it can cut in another direction. >> A lot of kids did not make it. You know, a lot of kids got kicked out or ran away or whatever, went on to somewhere else, and then >> it was also like there was aspects of it that were really off. Like I remember we had a we had a kid there who was gay and they decided they were going to be able to make him not gay, >> you know, and did some all these weird things where >> conversion therapy. >> Yeah, conversion therapy. They made him like wear a pink crown and all these different things and it was just it was like it was total emotional torture. And we're all in the thick of our own drama, but then like having to experience other kids also getting tortured, you know, and it's kind of I mean, you're already ashamed, you know? It's like, you don't need more of that. >> Yeah. So, it's like I'm getting, you know, and then you're like in group sessions and you're just hearing the most horrific things that these people have done or, you know, seen or whatever and or experienced, which I think a lot of that should just be like one-on-one type stuff. Like, I don't need to hear about your deepest, darkest, most horrible things. >> But in the right environment, like shame doesn't survive the light. And if you can, you can have a cathartic experience if you feel safe enough to share something like that in a group setting. If it is wellreceived, but if you're being shamed or made to feel Yeah. attacked, that is only going to strengthen that that shame response. >> Yeah. Well, I mean it was I mean I could I have stories like we had a kid whose mom killed his dad and he was like a real famous guy and they made a Lifetime movie about him and like I the the headmaster made him watch the Lifetime movie with all of us, you know, and then I mean just just >> that feels abusive. >> It was quite quite abusive. And then, you know, I talk about it in the book, but like he was then accused of some, you know, stuff with females that were going there and somehow got out of it, but you know, I don't know if he was really innocent, the headmaster. There was like this whole >> Yeah, there's some stuff online. I mean, this school still exists, right? >> It does, but I I don't it it's not at the castle anymore, and it's kind of I'm I mean, I'm sure it's like morphed and become something completely different, but >> And then there was this Spanish teacher. Yeah. So, I mean, we we all hold like things that are um you very difficult to talk about and deal with. And, you know, I you know, one of the things that happened to me was I was essentially groomed by an older, you know, teacher. Um we were not we were not allowed to date while we were there. You know, female contact was limited. um you know, we could be friends, but you know, it was it was very segregated and whatnot when it came to that sort of stuff. We weren't allowed to like watch TV or have, you know, anything anything like that. And so I had this this older teacher that was there kind of start inviting me over to her apartment, letting me watch TV, letting me watch movies, kind of like becoming my friend. And I mean, I I don't think there's any other word but grooming. you know, I was, you know, quite young, 16, 17 years old, and it turned into like a sexual relationship, which then, you know, definitely made things very different while I was there. Um, and then, you know, I left the school and and she continued to do it with other students. >> Wow. >> And I think, you know, she did it with students before me, too. But it's, you know, we didn't, we were all so secretive and so like if I were to like have reported it, I would have then gotten attacked. And so I was like scared to talk about it. I didn't I mean I didn't tell my parents about it till way later when I was older. I didn't I mean I didn't tell anybody about it. Um and I always felt this like really intense sense of guilt because you know after I left I was like you should say something Andy. You should report this. This is like not okay. And then she ended up getting like pregnant by one of the other kids. >> Wow. >> And then, you know, had the baby and, you know, then I then I felt super guilty because I'm like, >> man, I could have prevented this, but I didn't. And I still I mean, I really have never said anything about it till I wrote my book and I put it in my book. But beyond that, like I mean now it's been 30 years, but yeah, it's uh and I have no idea what ever happened to her after that point, but obviously she didn't continue to work for the school. >> Did you stay sober through that high school experience? >> I did. So I I didn't do any drugs or alcohol through high school or through that high school experience. And then um my dad told me he would pay for college if I stayed sober. And I felt like that was a good deal because college is quite expensive. And so I actually stayed sober through college as well. >> Mhm. >> And then as soon as college was over, I was like, "All right, I'm good. I'm going to start drinking again." >> Yeah. I mean, you're undergoing this intense experience in high school, presumably for purposes of like healing, you know, and actually just making it worse or giving you more kind of emotional baggage that's going to lead you back to drinking and using. Well, and I and I think too like when you're when you're confronted like that and you're being yelled at and all this stuff, like you learn to survive and sometimes learning to survive is just like making stuff up so that like you know you the the camera or not the camera but the like the attack will get off of you. And so you you end up like kind of like faking who you are and like creating like a different persona and >> just just to survive, you know, like >> if the sharks want blood, you give them blood and then they'll leave you alone, you know? And sometimes, >> you know, that's and that's not a good way to develop as a, you know, 16, 17 year old person, right? Like you don't want to like develop those skill sets where >> Yeah. you become a chameleon. you know how to put on the right mask for the right situation to feain submission when you need to or to just >> get by, you know, meanwhile you're just calcifying that like armor, you know, and that's putting distance between yourself and like who you are because you just all you know is survival and in order to survive, you have to be this kind of person in this situation and this kind of person in that situation >> and you don't learn how to stand up for yourself. If you don't learn how to, you know, have principles that you will stand on, you know, because your principles might be threatened or like attacked and then, you know, you don't want to you don't want to have that. So, it's yeah, it was just a very challenging and then, you know, you you become close with other people and then they get attacked and maybe they get kicked out and then you never find out what happens to them. So, you know, I lost a lot of friendships in there that I was like friends with them and then they left and I still to this day never know what ever happened to them. >> Then you go to Skidmore, like great liberal arts college in upstate New York. Lots of freedom. >> Yes. >> Your dad's paying for it, >> provided you stay sober, but no one's really watching you. >> Yeah, it's true. I mean, nobody was watching me, but I mean, I didn't I was still very scared of like doing drugs. Like, I sort of that like scared straightenness that that had been institutionalized in me in that place. >> And you went from the kid who ran away to now you're at Skidmore. I was well and I >> I was just so scared that if I drank then I would smoke weed and if I smoked weed it would lead to like something else that would lead to crystal meth and then I'd be like back where I was. >> And so that fear just kept me sober because I was just so scared of like going back to being the the kid that I was. you talk a lot about PTSD uh and and your your kind of relationship with it in different contexts, but and but I but I haven't heard you talk about like the PTSD of just surviving institutionalization, you know, like just knowing like, hey, you know, I I went so far off the path, off the radar that I ended up like having to go to this Utah situation and this crazy school and surviving all of that. like that has its own, you know, kind of that casts a long shadow. And I would imagine just throughout college, you're like, can't go back to that. Like, you know, if I touch any of this stuff, like it's going to take me right back to, >> you know, Utah wilderness camp. >> I mean, I definitely had some some emotional like responses, you know, for a long time. I think just over time that just kind of numbed out. I don't know if it was when I started working out and exercising if that like sort of helped move me past that. But I think also like I did start using again after college. Um I was like, you know, you go through that rationalization where you're like I was young. >> I'm so young. I can handle it. >> I can handle it. You know, I'm s you know, I had a job. I was success. I was adult. You know, [clears throat] my my dad's not telling me I can't do it anymore. and, you know, started drinking and smoking weed again. Um, and I definitely probably did it more than I should have, but I was able to sort of still maintain. >> Yeah, you were high functioning. >> Yeah, high functioning, but like I have like a intense fire inside that burns and that I mean, I think that's what allows me to do all this crazy stuff, but it just numbed that, you know? So I was high functioning but like it was limiting my ability to like do anything meaningful. >> And it was like that for a long time like at least probably 5 years I just smoked weed and drank and like you know continued on with my life and you know I I was in sort of corporate America working at like a like with computers. I'd always been really good at computers and that's what I leaned into after college and yeah, I mean I wasn't unhappy but I wasn't happy, you know, but my body was unhappy and so my body started to like revolt. I started getting like all this anxiety and depression and I'm like what's going on? What are these feelings that I'm experiencing? like because I hadn't felt like well I mean one cuz you're sober you know and so you're not masking things any when you're sober but then when you when you lose that sobriety and start using again it's very easy to mask >> feelings and some of those feelings are probably like I wasn't living up to my potential I knew I wasn't you know you start I was in a marriage but it wasn't like this great marriage where I was like super excited to be married and I started like feel like I was going to die. I was having panic attacks. I was having chest pain, shortness of breath, all these sort of physical reactions to my emotional state. And again, I didn't there's this is before the internet, before WebMD, before you could like, >> hey, what's going on with me? I'm 20some years old and I'm having these chest pains and shortness of breath. And um I eventually got to a point where I passed out because I was having such a bad panic attack. like I started hyperventilating and passed out. I was talking to my buddy. I have a friend who I've known since kindergarten. He's still one of my best friends. And so I called him and I was telling him all this stuff and and and he goes, "Man, you need to start working out." And I was like, "What? What? What do you mean I need to start working out?" He goes, "Yeah, it sounds like sounds like you need to start doing some exercise." And I had, you know, again, never thought about that. You know, here I'm 20some years old, don't work out at all, >> smoke weed, drink alcohol, and just work on a computer all day. I ended up getting a personal trainer. They showed me some exercises, got me on an elliptical trainer, started, you know, doing the elliptical trainer. It felt pretty good, you know. I started to alleviate those anxious feelings. I mean, I was still probably a little depressed, but like the anxiety started to kind of alleviate. And so, I started leaning in a little bit more, like, well, if this is going to make me feel better, then I'm going to do more of it. How do I how do I learn more about this exercise stuff as an adult? And I ended up I was living in Portland, Oregon at the time, and we have a very robust like community college network up there. And so I took a community college class on exercise science >> and I had to run a mile and a half to like start the class and then end the class. That was like part of the grading. You they wanted to see improvement >> and that was my first time running since like you know I was a little kid. >> Yeah. I never quit after that. I just kept moving and kept lifting and everything. I mean, I've done everything endurance-wise from triathlons to tough mutters to, you know, marathons and half marathons and ultra running and everything, every flavor cuz it's all fun. 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Well, and I mean, when I first started going to the gym, I would use still using >> I would use it as a carrot. I would go, "All right, we're not going to smoke weed right when we wake up. We're going we're going to go to the gym. We're going to lift. delay it until go for a run then we'll smoke go eat lunch you know and and and you know have a nice have rest of your day but so it was like in the beginning it was like a delayed gratification of the of the drugs and then that became >> you know wider and wider and wider but yeah I was >> so you have these two incompatible things this like growing interest in like fitness and running etc uh and then you know that quietly on the other side like you're continuing to like use Right. And I did that for, you know, a couple years and then I ended up getting a divorce. >> Well, it's more than that. I mean, there were like three crazy things that happened in a 24-hour period, >> which you're talking about like getting hit by a car. That whole Yeah. I mean, I got hit by a car >> and um almost died. I mean, I you know, >> you were riding you were riding your bike. >> Yeah, I was riding my bike and you know, now I'm a paramedic and so like I know a lot about trauma and just how dangerous that situation was. And of course, like I didn't go to a doctor. I didn't, you know, I woke up. I had missing teeth. I was on the side of the road. My bike's mangled. I'd been hit from behind and they just left me. So >> like a hit and run. Landed on your head. >> Yeah. I don't I mean I I think I I face planted because I I I knocked out a couple of my front teeth. Although, you know, I could have hit the actual handlebars. I'm not really sure >> what exactly went went down, but cuz I have no memory of it, which is like concussion and, you know, all the, you know, traumatic brain injury type stuff. >> And so then I had to have all this emergency dental work. I luckily didn't have any broken bones, but like was bruised and, you know, maybe I'd broken some ribs, but nothing that needed like a cast or anything like that. And um yeah, and then my wife decided that was a good time to let me know that that she was going to leave me. >> Mhm. >> And um so yeah, so then I had to like transition into okay. Like I mean at this we had grown apart, so it wasn't like this huge like I wasn't not expecting it, but I guess the timing just was like kind of bad. You know, >> in the aftermath of that bike accident, you're basically self-medicating with weed, right? And your wife's like, "I'm done with this." >> No. Yeah. Yeah. I mean, I was I leaned into it hard. >> Yeah. And then your grandfather passes away. >> Yes. Yes. Um and so I went back to California and um went to his funeral and at that point I was like, I need to do something with my life that is not what I'm doing. I need to do like a a hard pivot, a hard shift. I started taking some fire classes and and um EMT classes and and I and I liked them and so I I kind of leaned into becoming a firefighter EMT and that led to me being a firefighter paramedic. But it was that funeral with my grandpa that really changed my perspective on where I wanted to go with my life. >> I mean, do you call this like a rock bottom moment? I mean it it is like a you know kind of a flash point that changes everything trajectory. >> The rock the rock bottom moment kind of was I was lying in bed. My wife came in and told me she was leaving me. You know I had like my my teeth were all messed up. I'm sore. from, you know, and she left and I smoked a big joint >> and got super high and then immediately had like a panic attack just like I did years before I started working out >> and I was like, "Oh my god, I never want to feel like this again." And that was the last time I've smoked weed or done any illicit drugs, you know. What is your definition of of rock bottom? >> For me, at that moment, that was like a rock bottom moment as an adult. You know, I had rock botto bottom moments when I was a kid, obviously, like running away, getting found all meth out, like that was a rock bottom moment. But as an adult, when you're, you know, you're extremely injured, your wife's leaving you, then you smoke weed, and you feel the same way you did years earlier, even after all this growth and like trying to like make things better. And you're right back to that point. I mean, that was a rock bottom moment. And and that's where I was like, I don't want to feel like this anymore. Not doing this ever again. I'm going in a different direction. Um, and then the thing with my grandfather happened, which just pushed me even further in that, you know, different direction. So, I think, you know, whether you want to call it rock bottom or the springboard that I jumped off of and continued to move upward, that that was that was definitely it. >> Yeah. I think rock bottoms are when the pain of your circumstances exceeds your fear of doing something different. >> Yeah. And these events or circumstances uh in which you think like it couldn't get any worse like this is this is like my lowest moment >> in retrospect uh often turn into being like these springboards to use your word like these catalysts for >> reimagining and rebuilding your life. Like everything that happens >> is neutral until you apply your perspective. And if the perspective you apply to it is like, oh, this is an opportunity for change and transformation. Uh, and then you put on your smile hat and adopt the Andy Glaze positive a effect, then it could end up being like the best thing that that ever happened to you, >> right? Yeah. I mean, I >> I don't hate that it happened to me because I think now I'm able to live to my like full potential and um I'm a lot happier. >> How did the ultra thing kind of come? The thing is, I didn't I didn't even know about ultras or any of that stuff until I was like in my mid30s. I didn't know anything about any of it. And I went down that rabbit hole and that's how I got into ultras. I essentially signed up for 50k. >> The dopamine is going off. It's like >> what is the deal with people uh like sober people like recovering addicts and alcoholics and ultras? >> There's there's a lot of us. What is your do you have like a theory of mind about that like >> disproportionately high? >> Yeah, I mean there's definitely a lot of people with like you know significant trauma in their lives that then go on and like want to continue to do hard things. I mean, one, it's like if you're going to do anything to an extreme, our personalities tend to like push us in that direction. But voluntary suffering, you know, it's like you're you're putting yourself into a situation that you're you're suffering, but you always have the ability to tap out if you want to, is something that we can't do in real life, that we could never do when we were like in the addiction like phase of our lives. And so it's like it's a safe way to really push ourselves without like huge consequences >> because at the end of the day you can quit. You can't quit if you're like in life and and all these horrible things are happening to you. >> So what do you say to the person I'm sure people have come up to you and said, "Well, you've just traded one addiction for another like weed crystal meth. Now it's just running." I think that like, you know, a lot of my running is because I love to run. I don't know if I I love to do drugs. I love the feeling that drugs gave me, but I don't know if I like love to do drugs, but I love to run and I love to be in nature and I love to be surrounded by, you know, trails and and all these things. I don't, you know, drugs gave me a feeling that I liked and it gave me an escape that I enjoyed, but I don't think I I loved loved them. I I mean, I was addicted to them for sure and I'm obviously still addicted to them if I if I ever went down that rabbit hole again, but the it's I think it's it's it's different because I truly just love to run. And so, yeah, I'm sure my addictive personality, I mean, anything I do in life though, it's like running, you know, spending time with my family. Uh, I'm like I I'm a beekeeper. Like, all these little things like I I have a huge garden. I have a grove. Anything I do, I do like on an addictive level. >> You found healthier outlets for your addictive tendencies. But I think it's like, you know, I asked this question to lots of people who are in recovery who do ultras and stuff like that and it's almost like a litmus test because if they just deny their addictive relationship with it, like there's something dishonest going on. Like of clearly the fact that so many people in recovery gravitate towards this world, there's something going on there. And I think that if you're really being honest, it's like, yeah, it satisfies some kind of addictive craving that I have inside me. you know, it's a worthy investment because it's it's in the interest of my personal growth and it makes me a better person and it's a journey of self-discovery and there's all these good reasons, but that doesn't mean that it absolves you from having like an obsessive compulsive relationship with it. >> I have an obsessive compulsive relationship with like >> anything I do that I can be anything like it >> like like sugar, >> you know, like I I have to like refrain from eating sugar because I just love it. so much. I would eat candy, ice cream, everything. Vegan ice cream, but you know. >> Yeah. But there's no there's no like sort of relationship with sugar that's about becoming a better person. You know what I mean? So with running, >> you could insert anything else, bow hunting or whatever. >> Are you using it to run >> towards something or are you using it to run away from something? Like all these pursuits can be distractions from some other discomfort. Because running, especially at such long distances, is so painful, you have to sustain a degree of discomfort for such an incredibly long period of time, it can be an effective way to like mask whatever other discomfort you really don't want to deal with. Or it can be a way of confronting that so that you can heal it and become more whole. you brought up earlier like I I do suffer from PTSD mostly from my job, you know, just from years and years of seeing the most horrific things you can possibly imagine um from being a paramedic. >> Yeah. you know, in the last five years, I've really had like pretty bad symptoms and stuff, and I've been able to utilize the ultra running, especially the long-distance ultra running, as a way to quiet the symptoms of the PTSD. I think probably because it overrides the nervous system. You know, like when you're like 80 miles into an ultra, like your nervous system kind of gives up and you just kind of go into that survival mode where you're like a lizard brain. You're like, I need to eat. I need to drink. I need to keep moving forward and you don't really think about anything else. And that has been very like beneficial for my PTSD, like being able to like manage it. Mhm. >> Um >> the problem is that that in the last few months it has stopped like working >> and so I'm kind of in like a weird spot where I've always used running as a way to like deal with this sort of uh you know emotional trauma that I have that I don't have control over and now it's not working the same way that it's worked for years. And so, you know, I've started you going to a therapist and um I'm trying to get to the point where you do like it's called EMDR. >> Um we're doing like CPT right now. um which uh just these ways to help like reprogram the brain for these um traumatic moments that I it's like it's almost like the brain can't recognize that certain memories are in the past >> and and so you have to like >> you have to figure out how to like get those memories into the past and you know I'm not a therapist but you know there's there's there's very proven techniques and I've talked a lot about it online and I've had a lot of positive feedback from people that have said like EMDR is like a really good thing. And so I'm sort of in this like thing. It kind of reminds me and I don't want to like, you know, trivialize your your your your injury or your your back surgery, but like I've used running as a way to deal with my trauma and now I can't use it as a way to deal with it. And it's like definitely a weird weird place to be in, you know, because it's like >> I want to escape the the PTSD symptoms, but I don't have the way to do it like I used to. >> Yeah. >> Does that make sense? >> Yeah. >> It seems to me like you found your way into running and running was so effective at helping you manage your mental health. Yeah. And it was almost like this epiphany like, "Oh my god, like this is what I've been looking for all along that's been missing in my life." And doubling down, doubling down, doubling down, and then realizing >> that it's really just helping you manage it, manage the symptoms, you know, like there's there's the underlying root of all of this that's still sitting there. And at some point you develop a tolerance, you know, and it's like, okay, now I have to go from 50k to 50 miles to 100 miles to 250 mi to 300 miles. I'm doing 100 mile weeks for 300 weeks in a row. Yes. >> And your trauma or the root of that is now so acclimated to that like that's your that's your resting state now. >> Yeah. And until you go deeper and um begin to untie the knot, like the actual source of all of this, uh it's not it's not surprising. And look, I'm not a mental health professional either. I'm not I don't mean to like armchair psychologize any of this, but >> you know, it makes it makes sense. And again, I think this is like, >> you know, you got very emotional a moment ago, like this is a beautiful opportunity, you know, like what a gift. Now you can go deeper and get to the source of this and and really heal it rather than go to such great lengths to just mask it or manage it. >> Well, and I'm, you know, I mean, the trauma stacks, right? So, I'm I'm, you know, that that's the hard part is like it was probably manageable, but like the more that stacks on top, it just eventually becomes a pile that just tips over, right? and firefighters, police officers, military, whatever, like they just are exposed to stuff on a daily basis over and over and over again. >> And and if they don't deal with it, like right now we have like a huge like suicide problem [clears throat] >> with with with firefighters. And we don't talk about it because, you know, we don't I don't I don't know why we don't talk about it, but we don't. And um I I'm hoping that by me being honest and talking about it on my platforms and whatnot that I'm helping like sort of break that stigma like hey, you know, we we got to go get help. We can't just you can't just mask it. And unfortunately a lot of firefighters and police mask it with drugs and alcohol, you know, and so it's it's just not a good combo. It's a weird thing because I feel I feel like weak talking about it. Even though it's like I'm telling people like, "Hey, we got to break the stigma." I still feel weak having to like get emotional about the fact that I have something like I literally have something wrong with my brain. That's that's the way I look at it, you know, and it it's like >> it's frustrating not being able to control, you know, that >> that part of your brain where you're like, why why can't you just be normal, you know, like I have a great life. Um, you know, and things things are going so great and then like my brain won't let me just be normal. So, I've been sleeping on a Birch mattress for better part of about five years at this point. [music] And one thing I would say is that having a great mattress is one of those things you don't really fully appreciate [music] until you experience the difference after night. 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Try Mill risk-free for 90 days and get $75 off at mill.com/richroll. And use the code richoll. That's $75 off at mill.com/richroll [music] and use code rich roll. What was the decision to share this stuff publicly? It's one thing to say, I want to try these ultras and get into this world. It's another thing to take people along with you. I've always kind of like filming my life, but I never really had the ability to edit it. you know, like uh you'd have a GoPro and when I first started doing my ultras, I'd like film myself, but then I didn't have a computer that could like edit the GoPro footage because GoPro would make, you know, it was just I'd have to buy like a $6,000 computer in order to edit, you know, a $100 GoPro. And then when reals and Tik Tok came out, it allowed me to edit videos on my phone like with, you know, no barrier to entry. So, I just started making videos and they they like went viral and it was like >> from the get-go. I mean, there was the one where you were like, I'm going to run 100 miles, come with me kind of thing that went nuts, right, on >> Tik Tok. But yeah, that was kind of that was kind of the beginning of Tik Tok. I mean, the first reel I ever made got 70,000 views and I was like, what is going on? Like, you know, you don't back then 70,000 views was like insane. Mhm. >> So I I kind of stumbled into it. I I never when I started thought to myself, "Oh, I'm going to have all these followers or, you know, this is like the future." If you had told me 5 years ago, like if we went back into a time machine and said, "Hey, Andy, you're going to have millions of followers and all this stuff." I would have been like, "What are you what are you talking about millions of followers? Like I have a thousand followers. Like they're all friends and family and people I went to college with, you know." So what is your sense of why what you were sharing connected with people? >> Well, it started just like the the humors of running. I mean, there's so many funny aspects of being a runner, you know, and there's so many runners >> and then I think it got into nobody had ever like really shown the nitty-gritty aspects of running a 100 mile race. you see these beautiful movies that people make on YouTube and you know they're polished and you know there'd be like you know some stuff but it was just beautiful. It was like watching a movie and then all of a sudden I'm >> showing like all this like kind of lowfi footage and talking about hallucinating and doing all this stuff and nobody had ever really seen or heard about that before. And like I said, those platforms just made it so easy to share and consume it. And you know, once you start getting millions of people watching your stuff, it's it's just like it's a game changer. >> Where does the smile or you're doing it wrong mantra come from? >> So, you know what Strava is? >> Yeah. >> Okay. So, Strava has >> Come on, dude. >> Well, I mean, [laughter] Strava is an app and there's segments, right? you could like make a segment >> and there's a trail by my house called you're either smiling or you're crying and um it's like I love running it and one day I was running it and I was like who would be crying on this? this is like amazing. And I like in my head said something like if if if somebody's not smiling, they're like they're doing it wrong. And I said it to my friend and then it just I mean this is probably >> 10 years ago. I started just saying it, putting it in my Instagram. This is back when there was just pictures and no videos or anything. And it it just sort of it it blossomed from there into like a whole life philosophy. But it really was just the idea that Yeah. like this trail, right? If you're running up it, I I guess you could be crying and if you're running down it, you could be smiling. But either way, you're still running. You're still like out in nature and you're on this beautiful trail. So, again, it was just that like mental like you really should be smiling in a situation like this >> and what is the life philosophy then? Well, just, you know, always looking for the positive, you know, aspects of life and um also trying to to reach other people because a smile, if you're smiling by yourself, that's great, but if you smile at somebody else, a lot of times they'll smile back at you, which, you know, will give them a chemical reaction in their brain and maybe that will help them. You know, like when you smile, you have like a chemical reaction in your brain. So, if I smile at you and you smile back, you know, maybe you're at a horrible point in the race or you're at a horrible point in life, >> but that smile might be the thing that just changes your brain chemistry just enough >> to to get you into a different direction, that springboard, right? >> I know it's it sounds very minimal and small, but like some I've seen it I've seen it work and I and people have done it to me and it's worked. So, >> I want to talk about change and transformation. What are some of the biggest lessons that you've learned about the potential that we all have to change our lives, to transform our lives that that you've learned from your life experiences and from all of these ultra running races that you've done? I think it's my acknowledgement that like it's it's it's a good thing to fail. I when I was younger, I I definitely did not see the value in failure and I was embarrassed by it and I was like scared that people would make fun of me or or you know people would talk poorly behind my back if I failed. And now it's a recognition that in order to succeed I have to do things that have a high chance of failure. And so if I do fail, then that's okay. But I have to then take that failure and like figure out what went wrong and then try to fix it. You know, I've done that in ultras. I do it in life. Um I talk, you know, I have a lot of DNFS and races that I didn't that I wasn't successful in. And then I think a lot of times people like are so scared that they're going to fail that they don't do it. And that that's everything in life. But ultras really helped me with that because I fail so much in ultras. It's so hard, right? And there's so many things that can go wrong that it's helped me like bring that into my my normal life of like, it's okay. So, when you get an email from somebody or a DM or a text from somebody who saw some of your content and they say to you, as I'm sure they do, "Oh, you're so inspiring. Uh, I wish I could do what you do. I want to be better. or I want to be I want to get off drugs or I want to, you know, enter a race. >> Yeah. >> But insert XYZ. How do you respond to that person? >> I mean, normally I just I just tell them to like, you know, you got to just you got to do one small thing a day. Um, I I I a lot of times go on like a a tangent about doing 30 minutes a day and how it it seems like nothing, but if you look at it over like a huge amount of time, it adds up to a lot. And sometimes that's when people are in those really dark moments and they feel like they can't get out. They just need like a small little light at the end of the tunnel to know that if they keep heading in this direction, they'll get there. And sometimes that's just 30 minutes of something, whatever it is. If they need to go for a walk for 30 minutes, if it's reading a book, whatever they need to do, but 30 minutes a day, everybody's got 30 minutes a day. I don't care how busy you are, you can find 30 minutes. 30 minutes in a month, how I mean, how many hours is that, right? I mean, it's 15 hours >> times a year, you know? You're talking days. I think it's like five and a half days of of of doing something. And what I know is that if they do 30 minutes a day, that will end up being an hour a day, which will end up being an hour and a half a day. And, you know, it'll it'll form a pattern and the consistency will build and build and build, and they'll be able to get out of that hole. >> But that's normally what I do. I mean, if it's like really drugs and alcohol related, then I, you know, encourage them to to to like find an AA meeting because I think >> like we've we've had people at our department that have had issues and like, you know, I'm always I I think when you're in a dark hole, I think, you know, encouraging people to go to a meeting is always like a a good way to start. And, you know, at least they can maybe find a sponsor or do something to help them pull themselves out because they probably can't do it themselves. >> They're going to need that help. Um, those are probably the two two main things I I I push. >> What year was it when you were first encouraged to go to the gym? >> Probably like 200 two maybe, >> right? So, 24 years ago. >> Yeah. >> And I asked that knowing that it was a long time ago to kind of underscore like these things don't happen overnight. I feel like people are in a they see what you're doing and they want to be there right away and they don't appreciate or understand that this is 24 years in the making, you know, and and >> I think we would all benefit from a little dose of patience when it comes to this sort of thing. Like when you went into that gym, it was probably no more than 30 minutes the first time that you went in. And these things build upon each other. And it's really a tortois' race. You know, if you're playing the long game and you start to fall in love with movement, whatever that looks like, you'll go on some journey and maybe 24 years later, you're running 100 miles a week for the 300th odd week in a row and you're you're writing books and on a podcast. But the point is, you know, in my life, like I've never accomplished anything that I've accomplished was at least a decade in the making. And I think everybody is >> overindexing on what they can do in a period of a few months or or maybe even a year because we're just not we're not wired to think in decades. But truly, all of these things happen very slowly over time. I like setting lofty goals that are like really far away, you know, like decade goals or like 20-year goals, things like that, because then you're always kind of focused on something, but it's also very far away. And then you have to like break it up and be like, "All right, well, that's a 20-year goal, but what's a one-year goal that I can work on that will get me to that 20-year goal?" And I just >> One year goal is the the little step, >> right? like but far far away I'm like ah I really want that but in order to get that I have to do all these steps so let's just focus on the first step. Um, but yeah, you're right. I mean, I I started with running that mile and a half. Now I run a lot, but like even before I started doing ultras, I probably ran for, you know, 15 years before I started doing ultras. I wasn't running all that far, you know, half marathons, 10ks, 5ks, stuff like that. I mean, I was just just normal running. >> You didn't set a goal to run an ultra when you first walked into the gym. Like these these things happen. They percolate out organically. Yeah. >> From what your curiosity is finding interesting, true or false, transformation is available to everybody. It's always within your power. Um, but like you said, it it takes time. You have to be very patient. Um, and you can't rush it. I I love to use the analogy about, you know, water through a stone, right? It's like, does water go through a stone? Yes, it does. How does it do it? Very, very slowly. It just slowly goes over that stone and over a hundred years all of a sudden you have two stones, right? I mean that's that's really accomplishing most things in life. When you when you try to rush it, it's not going to really work. >> And why is it worth it? All the effort and the toil and the failure and the hardship and the suffering. Well, hopefully because the goal is going to make you or someone a better person and you know that would be that would be the reward. I mean most people don't set goals that are not a positive thing in their life. So if like if you work and work and work and and reach that goal then you know you're working towards either making yourself better or making something else better you know whether it's the world or your local community or your family or whatever it is. Um, the key is that you have to keep setting goals. You can't just like set a goal, get there, and be like, "All right, well, we're done. I did it." You know? I mean, life is always about just improvement and change. So, you just always have to be working on those two things. >> One of the things I appreciated the most about your book is that you couch personal transformation as an act of service. It's like when you make that investment in yourself, you are positively impacting the people around you. So, it takes it out of this selfobsession paradigm that I think we see a lot of online like it's just all about me and my routine and my I'm going to get what I'm going to get, you know, for my own, you know, kind of ingratiation or whatever. And you're like, no, this is this is not really about you. It's about how you can impact the people you care about and your community. Well, and a lot I get a lot of messages obviously like, "Hey, you inspire me." And that's great. My response normally is great. Go inspire somebody else, you know? Like, let's let's pass pass it along, right? If if I inspire you, then you go inspire somebody else, then they'll go inspire somebody else, and we'll have this, you know, ripple effect, butterfly effect, whatever you want to call it. And in the end, the world will be a better place, right? And it'll it wherever it starts, it doesn't matter. Three people down the line will have never heard of me. That's great. I don't care. I just want them to, you know, get inspired and do something great with their lives. >> The most effective way to inspire other people is to uplevel your own, though, right? Like Yeah. I mean, and you got to like walk that talk. You can't just like pull a camera out and talk it. Like, you actually have to do something. >> Yeah. Well, and you know, I I do do things. So, >> yeah. No, you do. I'm just saying like, you know, for >> for other people out there, like if you're just talking your talk, but you're not doing it, it it's a fool's errand, right? Like, and people it's transparent. People see through that. Like you you have to actually, you know, put in the work and then you then are like vibrating at a different like resonance, you know, and people can feel that. They know that. Well, I can I mean I can inspire more people because of what I'm doing, but like say I inspire this guy over here and he goes, "You know what? I'm gonna train and run a marathon." Okay. Now, he's training and running a marathon and he's going to of course talk about it because we all, you know, hey, did you did you hear I'm running a marathon? You know, maybe he inspires some people at work. Hey, you know what? I want to run a marathon, too. Maybe he's got kids at home and they're watching their dad doing hard work and he doesn't know it, but in 10 years when they're older, they're going to like remember that when they're, you know, that their dad was doing this. I mean, it just, you just don't know. It won't be as big as like my splash, but it might only be two people at work and maybe a random uncle that, you know, follows him on Facebook. They're like, "Oh, wow. Joe's running a marathon. You know, maybe I will, too." And it's it's still possible to make a small ripple even if you're not doing as much. You know, I think >> the size of the ripple doesn't matter. It's, you know, it it's it's still it's still going to move it on and like people are still going to get inspired. >> Even if it's smaller, you know, maybe it's a 5K. Maybe maybe Joe's overweight and he's like trying to lose weight and he's just going to run a 5K. It's going to be a big thing. That can be really inspiring to people like, "Hey, if Joe can do a 5K, I can do a 5K. What am I doing?" You know, Joe's 300 pounds like, and he's out there training, like, you know, and and maybe that's the ripple effect. You just You just never know. >> Yeah. >> All right. One final banger before I release you back to your life. Uh, the magic of life lives between I can't and I did. >> Yeah. >> What does that mean? >> I mean, you never know if you can do it until you try. Um, a lot of times everything seems impossible until somebody does it, right? So, it's like I've done a lot of things where people would say, "Oh, you that's that's impossible. Nobody can do that." And and then I do it and then people are like, "Oh, maybe maybe I'll try that, too. Maybe maybe that that sounds like a good idea." You know, but until somebody does it, it it's it's an impossible feat. So, >> yeah. Which a perfect example of that might be what happened at the London Marathon this past weekend. Nobody's broken two hours in a sanctioned marathon and then two guys do it in the same day. Can you imagine being somebody who runs 159 and gets second place? Like the idea that that barrier got broken, you know, in the same race by those two guys at the same time. I mean we we all know like once Roger Banister broke the four-minute mile barrier then suddenly you know that once it was broken other people did it. This illustrates your point but the fact that >> you know two people in that race and you can >> super shoes yes you know Morton gels or you know you can deconstruct all of this but like >> honestly until this past weekend it had never happened and now it has and like now how many people are going to run under two hours? >> Yeah. Yeah. I mean the the more we get like like you said the shoes the I mean all that plays a factor the shoes the nutrition all that when you get that more and more dialed in and everything becomes you know it's an engine so >> if it can if it can do it somebody will figure out how to do it and emulate it and you replicate it next it'll be like who's going to be break 155 you know I mean oh that's impossible and then someone will do that so >> what's the barrier that you're looking to break next for yourself? [sighs] >> Maybe like getting into hard rock. [laughter] I'd love to I'd love to do hard rock really really bad and and and try that race out. Um I have a race in June called the Summer Spine. It's in the UK. It's uh 268 miles from England to Scotland. >> Whoa. >> And it's um sell there's no crew, no pacers, and there's only five aid stations. >> Wow. So each age station, >> it's like Speed Project UK. >> Well, each age station's like 50 to 65 miles apart. So that's my that's my big race of this year. And I'm terrified of it. Like so scared. >> But you know, that's why that's why I'm doing it and that's why I'm excited. But it's Yeah, it's going to be it's going to it's going to test me for sure. >> What is the one thing that you want people to get out of reading your book? Well, I hope you know I hope people in a low point can read my book and realize that that there is a light at the end of the tunnel, but that it's might take a while to get there. And just to be patient with the process, but through like time and consistency, like they they should be able to get themselves out of it. I wrote it hoping that because I know not everybody's in the same spot, right? And there's a lot of people that are in low points like going through divorces, you know, maybe just getting out of jail, maybe just getting sober, whatever, and reading my book and going, "Well, here's somebody that's like pretty successful, and here's the messy, curvy road he took to get here. It's not a straight line. It's a lot of this, a lot of mistakes, and then coming back. a lot of mistakes, you know, like like you said in the beginning, like my sobriety hasn't been this like perfect, oh, I got sober and then never did anything again. I mean, even there was even a point where after my divorce, a doctor prescribed me medication and I just took it and it, [clears throat] you know, and I shouldn't have because it was, you know, it was anti-anxiety medicine and, you know, sleep aids and then, you know, then my body's like, "Oh, these are amazing. like we should just keep taking these, you know, and that's that's what an addict does, right? They like, oh, this I feel so good. Like it makes me feel so I don't I don't feel anxious anymore. I can sleep perfectly. But yeah, you're going to keep making mistakes. And the key is just to keep fa failing forward is what I say, you know, fail forward, you know, >> and for the person who is listening to this or watching and feels stuck. They're inspired by what you've shared today, but they just they're stuck. They don't know what what do I do first? How do I break this pattern? How do I get out of this rut that I'm in? What is the advice? >> Start fresh every Monday. Pick a 30 minute goal. Try to do 30 minutes of something every day. Whatever that is. If it's walking, if it's jogging, if it's riding a bike, swimming, some sort of movement. If you're injured and you can't move, then you know, pick something that you that uses your brain, write a journal, read a book, do something to like try to improve yourself and do it 30 minutes every day >> and put a smile on your face. >> Yeah. And put a smile on your face. You're doing it wrong. Yeah. Try to find that positive. >> Yeah. Thanks, man. >> Yeah. No, thank you. I appreciate it. Yeah, this is great. Uh, super nice to meet you. Your book is fantastic. Everybody, um, pick it up right away. Your favorite independent book seller or Amazon or wherever you >> Unfortunately, I self-publish. >> Oh, that's right. So, Amazon is the place to get it. >> I I mean, you can get signed copies on my website, but yeah, Amazon has me on a chokeold right now. >> And get yourself one of these smile hats. >> Yes, there you go. >> Um, cool, man. We'll come back and uh share more of your adventures. >> I will. I'm I'm sure we could talk for another couple hours, >> but uh I'm a fan and I'll be cheering for you. >> Thank you. Fan as well. >> Thanks, Andy. >> Thank you. Peace. >> Peace. Plants.