Rob Wilson on Self-Care, Emotional Intelligence, and the Real Cost of Burnout

In this episode of the PT Entrepreneur Podcast, Danny sits down with longtime friend and colleague Rob Wilson—performance coach, breathwork expert, and author of Check Engine Light. What starts as a fun trip down memory lane quickly turns into a deep conversation about emotional intelligence, self-care, and what it really takes to build sustainable health—for patients and practitioners alike.

Rob has spent years working with Navy SEALs, tactical operators, and elite athletes. But his insights are just as powerful for everyday clinicians who are burning out trying to do it all. His mission? Help high-performers reconnect with themselves, use practical systems to manage stress, and create space to thrive in both work and life.

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🎯 Topics Covered

• Why most clinicians and athletes resist self-care—and what it costs them

• The origin of the "Check Engine Light" framework

• Real-world lessons from Naval Special Warfare and SOCOM

• Why human connection is a performance enhancer

• How to assess and coach the whole person: Mind, Movement, and Matter

• The truth about HRV and other misunderstood health metrics

• Emotional intelligence as a business and clinical superpower

• What it looks like to truly care for your clients and yourself

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💬 Key Quotes

"Credibility is won in drops and lost in buckets."

"People don’t remember bullet points. They remember stories."

"You're not just a PT or coach—you’re a human performance consultant."

"Fail smaller, faster. That’s the real skill."

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🧠 Rob’s Pro Tips

• Invite ownership: Reposition your clients as collaborators in the process, not just passive recipients of care.

• Track what matters: Use simple, repeatable tests to measure progress and guide decisions.

• Teach self-reflection: Journaling, breathing, and awareness exercises are as valuable as mobility drills.

• Protect your energy: If you're naturally empathetic, build in time to decompress. It’s not weakness—it’s strategy.

• Build from trust: The work starts once someone feels heard. Listening well is your best tool.

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🔗 Resources

• Check Engine Light Book & Course: wilsonhealthandperformance.com/check-engine-light

• Follow Rob on IG: @thecheckenginelight

• Build Your Practice: 5-Day PT Biz Challenge

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🧭 Final Thought

Helping someone get out of pain is just the start. If you want to build a meaningful practice—and a life that lasts—you have to do more than fix injuries. You have to guide people through long-term change. Rob reminds us that real transformation comes from trust, clarity, and consistent communication. Whether you're working with special forces or stay-at-home parents, the path is the same: help people feel seen, take ownership, and keep moving forward.

Want help navigating these phases?
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Podcast Transcript

Danny: [00:00:00] What's going on? Danny Matta here. PT Entrepreneur Podcast. Uh, we're back again with another interview. I haven't done too many of these recently, but I feel like I've been, like this week in particular, I've had a few just awesome conversations that I've had to have, uh, had the chance to have with friends and, and, uh, I'm excited today to chat with Rob Wilson.

Rob this, let me, let me go back in time for a second. So, when I was teaching for, at the time, mobility wa um, I had people that I got a chance to teach with many people that I got a chance to teach with very smart people that the Tourettes aggregated somehow they, they found some, some, some killers.

There's not a single person that, uh, that I taught with. They was smarter than Rob. You're the smartest person I've ever taught with my friend. And I remember being in, in Philadelphia, uh, teaching in this dungeon of a place that somehow they set us up with. It was a completely shit show. Try to teach this course.

And when you presented on some stuff, I remember thinking to myself, holy shit. Like, you know, this. So much better than I do. And I was [00:01:00] just so thankful to be able to teach with you, you know, and to learn from you. So, you know, long story short, we've known each other for a long time. Yeah. And, uh, and Rob wrote a book, check Engine Light is what it's called, and it's, it recently has come out.

I just got a copy of this that he sent me. Thank you very much for the signed copy. Um, and it's such a cool book and I wanted to be able to highlight it. So Rob, thanks for a writing the book, but thanks for coming on the podcast today.

Rob: Yeah, of course. Thanks for having me on. That was a long time ago.

Danny: That was a long time ago.

Um, yeah, and I, you know what else I remember from that is we went and we ate like a giant burger afterward. I don't know if you remember this, I couldn't finish mine. You house yours and, uh, and you, you basically, you, you told me, you go, Hey man. If you want to get up to 250 pounds, you gotta eat more food, you know?

And I weigh 180 pounds.

Rob: Yeah. Yeah. I was a big boy in those days. Were, yeah, I was probably floating like two 50 plus right back then. That that was, that was Rob Wilson's tick boy, [00:02:00] where I was squatting twice a day and just, I was in the barbell life. Yeah. Back then. Um. But not now. I mean, I don't weigh 180 now, but I don't weigh two 50 plus.

Danny: No, no chance. No. You're, you're built like a Viking. It's, it's definitely, uh, you know, the, the, it was, it was fun to be able to teach with people like yourself. It's funny how, how size can, like command attention as well. I've noticed that with like Kelly, he's just a big person, you know, and it's like, this is a big person, but he's smart.

I better pay attention. You know, it's just like, uh, I don't know what it is. It's like, must be a tribal thing.

Rob: I remember you told me back then you were like, uh, maybe it was like a general that you worked for when you're in the Army. He was like, yeah, the first rule, public speaking is be tall.

Danny: Yeah, so this was, this was advice that I got whenever I went into the Army.

This was one of my professors, he was a colonel, and he pulled me aside. This was the first or second day that I was at my, like, you know, physical therapy school in, in the, in the military. So I'm in, you know, I walk in and he, he's, he goes, Hey. He goes, Hey, Lieutenant Matea, come here for a second. And I thought I [00:03:00] was in trouble, dude, like, this is, you know, I didn't know this person.

He sat me down and he goes, I'm going to tell you my rules of success in the military. He goes, rule number one, be tall. That's why you're in my office. Because I, and then he went on to tell me like, I don't know, maybe like six or seven other rules that seemed ridiculous at the time, like. He told me whenever I get assigned to like a base, like if I, if I'm in a brigade in particular, which a lot of us were going to these infantry, uh, divisions, which is, you know, nobody can really tell that you're medical there because your insignia, you have your patch is the same as the, you know, whatever your battalion or your, your brigade is.

Um, or I guess your division. So I was 25th ID and I had a 25th Id little, you know, patch. Right. And, um, so there's, it's not medical. They don't see the medical patch, so they just assume that you're a infantry officer. Right. Um, so he told me some really interesting stuff. One of those was like, if you're walking anywhere, always carry something.

Like you have something important to do. Uh, and also to walk really fast anywhere you go, like, you're like, you're like trying to like get [00:04:00] somewhere for an important meeting. And I just, those two things beside three things, be tall, walk fast, carry something that got me like. Like through my time there in, in, in, in such a more, uh, you know, significant way.

Like I just, I don't know, people kind of looked at what I was doing differently. Uh, and I got all these great reviews for stuff that had nothing to do with what I was doing as a physical therapist.

Rob: You had a notebook all the time. I felt like it was really on it. Write stuff down. Yeah. This guy's, this guy's got it together.

Danny: Well, you work with, you know, military and I'm sure you can see some of those things. It's just like surface level. You're like, oh yeah, that, that does add up. But then yeah, if, if they really knew what was going on, I had no fucking clue what I was doing there because I got dropped into like 3000 soldiers and told injury treatment, injury prevention, human performance.

Go for it. You know, and I'm just like, oh,

Rob: I dunno what to do. Yeah. With NSW guys. It's more like, uh, sweaty ball cap and flip [00:05:00] flops and walk, walk slow. Like you'll get there, like you'll get there eventually.

Danny: Yeah. Yeah. And let's, we'll, you used to dive into some of that because like you, you know, you work with some high level people.

You, you know, and you, I feel like you got your, your your sort of like hands in all kinds of different cool little areas where you can test this stuff, right? Like, so let, let's, let's talk about that for a second because yeah, we got a chance to teach together. And then from there, you know, you ended up going into a lot of breathing work and, uh, a lot of military special operations, community work and even fighters and things like that.

So like, you know, what areas have you been testing this in that you feel like are the bedrock of like, where the book came from?

Rob: I mean, where the book came from for sure. Uh, Naval Special Operations Community. So, um, after the time, you know, we were working together, we were sort of, uh. Simultaneously, I had a gym I was working with, you know, I'm in Virginia Beach, so I was working with a lot of people in the NSW community during peak g [00:06:00] watt time, right.

Because that's when we were out slang in lacrosse balls was peak g watt and that I had a treatment room, right? 'cause I have a, you know, um, manual therapy and strength and conditioning background. So I was coaching and doing hands-on therapy. Many of those people were NSW operators, um, who would be home sort of pre and post deployment and then breath work for a while, travel around teaching.

And I, I had this juncture where I was still teaching breath work, but a facility opened up down the street from my house, which is Virginia High Performance. And that's, uh, owned and operated by Alex Oliver, who's a retired seal. He had played a big part in the evolution of human performance in the seal teams during his time in, and I was walking my dogs and just walked in the front door.

I was like, oh look, this is cool. This is a gym. And I just walked in the front door and shook hands and I was like, oh wow. What are you guys doing here? [00:07:00] I'm a coach. And just started, you know, shooting the poop with everybody there. And, um, started working with the s and c staff that was there 'cause it was a really young s and c staff.

And then I transitioned away after a few years from traveling, teaching breath work. And I knew that I really enjoy working with the guys in that community. It's just a different sort of ilk o of, of human being. And I had this running analogy from talking to individuals from the NSW community, which is this idea of a check engine light.

And, uh, my friend Alex, who runs VHP. He goes, uh, man, this is really good. I feel like this makes a lot of sense to me. I think this resonates with guys like you think you could make a class out of this that would integrate with the program and the program that they run there is called Continue Mission, where basically active duty veteran NSW [00:08:00] operators come in for four weeks and they get a hard reset.

So they get manual therapy, meditation, nutrition based on blood work panels, DEXA scans, strength and conditioning, twice a day, every day for four weeks. I mean, it's a full service. Holistic Is this, who funds this for, does it Navy fund this or is this privately funded? It's privately funded through the Navy Seal Foundation.

Mm, okay. All the funding comes through a nonprofit, so nobody that goes through the program pays, so they don't pay for anything if they're from out of town. They have a rental car that's paid for, they have an apartment or an Airbnb that's taken care of. Um, it's a really awesome program. So, um, guys will come through and they have all these modalities and essentially the class, this curriculum that I built is this framework that unifies everything together.

And one of the hardest things to do is to get high performing people, [00:09:00] especially in the special operations community too. Engage in self care, right. Oh, so right. Self-care is one of the hardest things to get people to do, to drive adherence to, but if you have really forward focused and tough, tough people, making the case for self care, um, can be really difficult.

And there are some cultural obstacles that you have to deal with. So over the last three years, I've been basically teaching this evolving curriculum, both within that program and then, uh, socom, right? So the special operations command has this billet called po Diff, which is preservation of the force and family.

So I've taught to active duty operators and their families like, Hey, what's family self care look like? And then also to Gold star families. So families who have. Um, lost guys who were killed in action and had a chance to go talk with them about these concepts. [00:10:00] So a lot of it is in sort of this nucleus of naval special warfare, but then also some of the outer rings.

And then because of that, I've had some opportunities to talk to businesses and other tactical professions like fire and law enforcement. So that's, that's sort of the inception of this. And then along came this book.

Danny: Well, what's interesting, it's funny you bring up a population where, uh, I think self-care for most people is a hard sell, to be honest with you.

Like, they have to actually get into a pretty bad spot before most people are like, okay, maybe I need to change some things. And I, I don't know how many people can learn that without having to learn it the hard way. Uh, I think it's very few, but in the tactical community, um, or even if you, if, and I know you've done a good bit of work with like fighters, like it's probably even more so there, where it's just like.

They're not gonna tell you if they're hurt. Like they're always hurt. You know, they're like, this is normal. Like, what are we talking about? Or they're not gonna tell you because their sleep is bad, or if they're stressed out with [00:11:00] their, you know, relationship with their spouse. Or, like, these are just not things that are typically gonna be brought up in, in the, in, in the traditional military, at least, at least in my experience, not at all.

Right? So, building trust with that community and getting them to realize that like, uh, you know, a, there's a career after this. You're gonna do something after this. So if you kill yourself in the process and you're not unable to enjoy whatever the second chapter of your life is, what a shame, right?

Versus, Hey, let's. Talk about how to take care of yourself, which we can add some performance some years, like, you know, and miles on your, on, on, on what you can do when you're outta here. Because I know you and I have both worked with some people that have some cool ass stories and they are crippled by the time that they're like 50 years old, you know?

Yeah. Like, it's so, so it's interesting to test with a population like that where it's such a hard sell versus now you can expand that out to the general population, uh, and it's gonna, obviously it's much easier to get them to do that, but I mean, if you can sell it to that audience, you probably sell self care to pretty much anybody.

Rob: Yeah. I mean, I'll tell you. [00:12:00] So for the last three years, four times a week, I'm talking to a room of around a dozen. And if you can keep the attention and interest of that population of people, every other group is far less intimidating. Oh, yeah. To, to speak in front of, um, not because like nobody in that community will be outright rude to you, but they're definitely not afraid to assert challenge.

So if you're not, if your argument isn't tight, like guys won't just buy it because you're the person at the front of the room. Um, especially because that community is taught to challenge authority, right? So challenging authority is way more accepted in that pocket of the military than other pockets of the military.

So those guys will pipe up and be like, man, I don't know about that, that that has been my experience. And they'll just tell you straight up, um, that can be uncomfortable, but. It's also also makes it so easy to iterate [00:13:00] and get faster. So if you take those moments and go, I don't know enough about this, or that example wasn't good enough, and you iterate really fast, that kind of, that kind of testing environment gets you so good at teaching materials so fast because the feedback loop is, is really fast.

Um, not only because guys will say something outright, but because they also might not show up to your next class, right? Um, if they don't feel like what you're providing is valuable. So that's always a tester for me is do I see the same guys in class week to week? And if not. Ooh, did I get something wrong?

That's interesting.

Danny: Well, that, that I feel like, uh, the, the same thing, I find the same thing with high level entrepreneurs, with, uh, with people that are coming from prof, prof, uh, professional sports that have had exposure to high level, uh, you know, clinicians and, um, [00:14:00] and strength coaches. And they, they're, they know a lot.

Like, and in that community in particular, like, I remember I didn't, I didn't work with the Navy, um, as much as the Air Force and the Army and in particular, like, uh, combined arms, uh, you know, groups where it's a much, I mean, it's very similar population and it's very intense. It's, it's the most intimidating, uh, area or place I've ever presented because of exactly what you're talking about.

Highly intelligent, confident people that. Have a very high bullshit meter. So if you do not have like a very concrete idea of what you're talking about and how this benefits them and why they would wanna learn it, they just, yeah. You, you, you come back after lunch and half the people are not there. Yeah.

You know, and you're, you're like, oh, okay. So, but yeah. I mean, but it, for you in particular with these concepts that you're trying to organize, to be able to share, to, to help them, you know, with the things that you're working on with them, like, I feel like that helps you [00:15:00] iterate really quickly. Right. And, and then to be able to 'cause to get concepts down, to put in a book where you're not there to explain it, it's very hard.

Right? Like, you have to really think through how are you gonna to explain this to somebody who's gonna read this that maybe has completely varying levels of understanding, you know, of, of health and fitness.

Rob: Yeah. You know, so there's a lot of things that come to mind with that. And, you know, when it comes to like the, the bullshit meter, it's also like they don't have time.

Especially if we're talking about active duty guys, right? They have so much other stuff that they're thinking about that's on their plate. It's like, okay, am I gonna take an hour out for this guy's class or am I gonna go home early and like, see my kids today? Sure. 'cause I might not see 'em for a week. So you gotta, you gotta come.

Correct. Good. Um, but I also find with that community being open and explicit about the limitations of your knowledge goes a long way. And saying like, [00:16:00] Hey, I don't know. I don't have the answer to that question. Like, I don't know that. Or if they ask you something that's in direct reference to their experience, you know, for me I'll be like, I don't know.

I'm a civilian. Like, I'm not the right person to ask that question. Here's what I can tell you based on my perspective. How does that, how does that totally mesh with your environment? I don't know, man. I've never done your job. And so that actually garners a lot of. Respect and credibility. And I think this is true in general, but in my experience working with operators, it's especially true credibility is one in drops and lost in buckets.

Yeah. And you don't really get a first impression with that community. You get an impression. It's just, there's no reason saying first, 'cause there is no second one. It's just your impression and you gotta come sharp with what you really know, offer what you can to help and then be honest about the limitations, the current limitations of your knowledge, and then [00:17:00] come with a, an answer.

So if somebody asks you a question also and you don't have the answer finding out and then going, Hey man, I got, I figured out that thing. Or I thought about the thing you asked me, or I went and looked that up, here's what I learned so far. Like that kind of initiative. Is with those guys, it's like game, recognize game, you know?

'cause they're expected to do those kind of things. Like they don't, they shouldn't be babysat. None of those guys need to be babysat. They're very autonomous. It's like, you know what your job is, you know what you're supposed to be doing. Do it. And that's the expectation of everybody who's around and attached to that community.

And so if you show that you take initiative, those are all subtle cultural cues that really matter. When we talk about more concrete things like driving self-care adherence because who it came from is at least as important as what it is. So it's like, oh, I trust [00:18:00] what you said, your, your character matches what I think is, you know, a high value person.

And so I'm gonna try this thing because I trust you. And, and I think that's. Something that practitioners miss a lot is they just think about the sort of tactical application of the homework they give. Like, oh, this is good homework, this'll help you. And then the proof is just sort of in the pudding. But everything that you provide is a representation of you.

So you have to embody those things. You have to be doing your own self care. You have to have experience that you draw from and know how to connect that to what the people you're talking to care about. And it doesn't even matter if it's special operations or you work with entrepreneurs or you're into, you work with golfers or whatever.

You gotta know what is the person you're talking to care about, and then how can I connect what I know to helping them do that.

Danny: Dude, what you're saying is so important. Like this is [00:19:00] the thing that, uh, hopefully people that are listening to this can, um, can take this for, for the context that you're in because like what you're saying Yes.

Is, is being around special operations community and, and being in a position where you're trying to teach people you know, that are, um, that, that are difficult sometimes to, to get buy-in with, uh, whatever it's you're doing. If that's great, if you can do that, fantastic. Like, but on a smaller scale, let's say you're working with a runner and you know, for you, for you to be able to understand what drives.

The the change that they need to make, what motivates them. Um, and also that maybe you don't know everything about running. And the more that you can be, that you can put that out there. And my friend calls it eight Miling Yourself. She says like, you know, the end to eight mile, like, uh, eight, eight mile, uh, Eminem is, uh, you know, he basically says all this negative shit about himself that the other rapper's gonna say in the rap battle.

And he has nothing left to say. You know, it's just like, okay, eight mile yourself. Look, I'm not a runner, I'm not a lead runner like you. [00:20:00] And uh, and so I don't know the ins and outs of it as well as you will, but here's what I do know. We found these things today and these things are bleeding performance.

And if you want to really like, do well, this is gonna add to your ability to, to build, do that as well as training at the volume you need to be able to hit the PRS that you want. Whatever, right? So you just basically said, I'm not here with this. I'm not gonna act like I am. 'cause if you act like you are somebody that you're not, there's nothing that discredits you more Absolutely.

But more on their level about, hey, hey, here's what I don't know, but here's what I do know and you're in the right spot and here's why. 'cause I care about these things. Dude, people, they love that shit. And, and so do I and so do you, because of course, it's like genuine. You're just being honest with them.

You don't, you don't have to have, here's my degree, just listen to what I say and do that. Like, that's what, uh, too many people do, frankly. And it, it's really not great for, uh, Bain. Yeah.

Rob: My, my friend, uh, jacobowsky, who's a, oh, he's my boy, dude. Jacob is the man I know. Oh, you know Jacob, don't you? Yeah. Yeah.

Oh yeah. Jacob and I are good friends and he has this great saying, which is, we have all the knowledge, but they have all the information. Yeah. And [00:21:00] you have to know that, that you can't feel. What your clients feel, your patients feel you, even if you've done similar things, you're not them. You're not that person.

And so you have to know that the perspective and the lens that they're looking through is unique to them. And the only way to reconcile that is by being insanely curious and just constantly asking questions and being iterative. And to know that this human being that you have in front of you, whether they're a hobbyist weekend runner, or they're a tier one operator, that they have a unique experience that you don't have access to.

Because of that, asking lots of questions gives you access to the information that can help you be way more precise with the types of solutions that you present and take into account a lot more of the complexity that's going on with that human being. And that's the thing, you know, a lot of people, you know, I work with, um, [00:22:00] practitioners who are tied to the special operations community in the US and, and in allied nations.

And then one of the questions I get a lot is like, how do you connect to the guys? And everybody is sort of like this intimidation to talk to these dudes because they are very sure of themselves and they are very assertive people. And I'm like, well, they do awesome, amazing things, but they're human beings.

They're just people and they have, uh, this narrow scope of expertise that they are extraordinarily good at. They're the best. So. You know, if we talk about NSW, well, they're the best at Gorilla Maritime warfare. That's their job. They're the best in the world at it, no question about it. What do they know about return to play for their ankle that they sprain for the fifth time?

Nothing. They don't know anything about that they don't know about, uh, tissue healing. [00:23:00] They don't know about load management. Um, they don't know about how nutrition supports, you know, um, or detracts from tendinopathies. That's not their expertise, and that's okay. It doesn't need to be. But what you can do if you're a practitioner, say, Hey, what is it like on the job?

How does this stuff work? How does it feel when you do X, Y, Z? Let's try this thing for a while. Tell me how it worked for you and not go like, well, I have this diploma, so you gotta do these things or else. You know? Yeah. All is lost.

Danny: Oh, you lose it. I mean, well, I mean, you're, you're, you're just getting to the, you know, the root of just behavioral change, habitual lifestyle changes are hard to get people to, to, to make those adjustments.

Right. And I think one unique advantage that we have and, um, when, when we get people that are in pain and we can get them out of pain, we build a massive amount of trust. Like there's, I don't know if there's many other things you can do for, [00:24:00] to, for somebody to help them. Literally, like, let's say they can't get outta bed and take a few steps in the morning without debilitating pain, and all of a sudden.

They can and they can get back to things that they enjoy physically. And, and I think for a lot of people that have had, uh, been in situations like that, they sort of catastrophize the, oh, what if I never, I can never do this again. It's like, it's all downhill or whatever. And, and you've just given them this like hope for things they wanna do with their friends and family and activities they wanna do in the world that they exist in back.

And that's like a fantastic place to be, to then open the conversation to other things. And this is where we were kind of talking before the podcast. This is where I feel like a lot of clinicians struggle to take that next step with clients, with patients that they have to help them really create like lifelong positive changes in not just injuries, not just pain.

But in, I guess what people would consider like lifestyle medicine, like longevity and, and, and being able to actually do the things they wanna do for as long as they wanna do. And that's like a whole [00:25:00] new world now, you know, the, the, the term lifestyle medicine or whatever people want to put on it. For, for me, I read this book and it's like, this is like a blueprint of what to do with people.

Uh, some of it is okay, pain related, but, but a lot of it is, do you know what to look for? Do you know what to teach them? Do you know what to test and retest and do, do you know how to hold them accountable so that they can actually get these outcomes? Because for, for you and I, I think that I. We, yes. Okay.

We could use our hands, we can program things. But more than anything, I think we function more in a role of like a human body consultant than we do of sort of anything else. Because we can address the, the whole person. And if we, uh, have things that are over our pay grade, we refer to other great people that we know.

And, and that is like a very unique position to quarterback that health and wellness for people. And I think it's a huge part of practices that doesn't exist that really should, that benefits the patient and benefits the business that they have as well, which is pretty much everybody that listens to this podcast.

So when you're working with somebody, or you see people that get, get out of [00:26:00] like a pain state, where do you go? Like first, what are things that you would do with somebody that you want to help, you know, create long-term changes with, and let's say they're, they're down, they're like, Rob, I want to, I wanna work with you for the next couple years.

We don't have to rush anything. This is a huge investment in my health. Like, what areas are you diving into, do you think most people are missing?

Rob: So this, that's a lot. There's a lot to unpack there. And I think. There. This ties two things together is if you're a domain subject matter expert, then the first thing that you do before offering any kind of solutions is you more explicitly clarify what the problems and goals are.

So that's number one, is if you're, if you're a PT and you're talking about patients or clients or whatever, a lot of times. You're somebody who's not a, a domain expert, their idea of what has to be accomplished is very fuzzy. I, I want this thing to hurt and I just want it to [00:27:00] not hurt. Like that's a really vague goal.

And then they come to you and you go, oh, well actually it's that like you have no dorsiflexion, like your knee actually hurts because you have no, no access to dorsiflexion on this side of your body. And so then the target or the goal actually becomes improved dorsiflexion. That's the short term. And then it's improved dorsiflexion under load.

And then it's can you express dorsiflexion while running? Can you do it while running for distance? And so then you have all these concentric rings of these goals. And then this person isn't even like, not pain, it's just like layer one. And then it's actually like, oh, well if I could run without any pain at all, what else can I do?

Yeah. And so that's where the transition happens because the removal of pain, man pain is really complex. And the reason people experience pain is [00:28:00] multifactorial. Somebody could experience pain because they're depressed. They could feel pain in their body because their parent died. They could experience pain in their body 'cause their diet is poor 'cause they don't sleep enough.

It's not just orthopedics that generate pain. And so having pain relief as the only goal, I think is very shortsighted when it comes to helping clients and patients with health. Because, I mean, if it's just pain relief, then they should just take enough Motrin and it'll go away probably for most people.

Right. And so what are we really talking about? We're talking about. The restoration of function, so that pain is less likely to emerge. And if we look at that on a continuum and you have this client who has two years, then what we want to do is make the system so robust that it can handle a lot more intensity, frequency, and volume of [00:29:00] stress before something negative emerges.

That's actually what health and fitness means. It means I can handle a lot more from life and sport before the system breaks down. And so if you're working on a continuum as a human performance professional, if you're, you know, a physio coach, right? Because that's like a new thing. Now, in the last 20 years, those 20 years ago, that wasn't a thing.

You were a physio or you were a coach. Now there's a lot of physio coaches, right? And so the cool thing about that is you can actually help someone through the entire continuum. You might get somebody who had an incident or an injury. It stopped them from the direct pursuit of the thing that they enjoy.

But getting them out of pain is just like, it's basically like getting the light to shut off on the dashboard. It doesn't mean your car runs well though. And so following that continuum is what is the next KPI that lets us know the system's running [00:30:00] better, and then what's the next standard of the next KPI and what's the next one?

And what's the next one? And then eventually what you do is you get so far away from the stuff that led to this that you go, oh man, I'm healthy and I can do a lot of awesome shit. Is that, does that

Danny: No, no, no. I, I real

Rob: tangential, but

Danny: No, no, that's, that's spot, that's spot on. But I think, I think that what, what we're talking about to you and I, it's what we do, it's how we work with people, right?

And this idea of like, like a physio coach or somebody that is, um, you know, understands the. Why things hurt, how to get them to not hurt, but then also all the variables that go into that to be able to help somebody with that over extended period of time is where I see a lot of the drop off. And, and for most people, I think they bias to, to two, two different tracks if they're keeping people around at all.

Um, and one is they just, uh, primarily, primarily rely on hands-on work. [00:31:00] Like, plenty of people see lots of value in that. They feel much better with it. There's something very positive about human touch. There's nothing wrong with that. And if you're a, a great manual therapist and that's what somebody, you know, they want that, they, they like that as part of their like, training routine.

Great. All, all for it. The other side of it though, I think is the ability to take on more of this sort of consultant approach where you are helping them make these changes in their life. Sometimes minor changes that lead to massive, you know, compounding effects over, over time. But I think that there's a knowledge gap there, man.

I mean, like we, and, and like, I haven't been in PT school. I graduated in 2010, but I didn't learn about. Uh, sleep. I didn't learn about, uh, basic, you know, nutrition. I didn't learn about what I should look at at a, on a blood panel. I didn't look at, I didn't have a, a wearable, you know, that can give me some basic data and, and allow me to test things with people and, and get feedback and help them learn things.

But I see a lot of people that are trying to go that direction, that are, that are, that are not in the health and wellness field. And, and I'll give [00:32:00] you a great example. This was like a light bulb moment for me. I was at the HubSpot conference, which is a, a, a software that does, you know, CRM work. It, it manages your contact list.

This was in Boston two years ago basically. And the keynote, one of the keynote guys that the, that one day that, that we're at the conference was Andrew Huberman. And I'm like, what is this guy doing at the HubSpot conference? And it turned out that one of the executives there had been working with him.

And he, he brought him in and they had this long conversation about, you know, whatever, uh, human optimization stuff. And it was packed. It was packed full of people that sell or use this software. Right. And it's, it's not a room full of coaches or, or clinicians and people are interested in this stuff. But this is where I think something like your book that helps pull this stuff together is so important.

It's so confusing at the same time. Like, am I gonna listen to a three hour, uh, podcast on a DHD and actually take anything from that and apply it? Maybe. But more than anything, it's probably an overwhelming amount of information that [00:33:00] I can't really apply and understand it. And I need somebody to help me with that, that can aggregate all the information around me, distill it down to the shit that I actually need to know so that I can get the outcome that I want.

And, and that's the area that I think people like you and I fell into and didn't know it. And maybe people weren't looking for it as much 10, 15 years ago, but they definitely are now, you know, and they're more open and receptive to it.

Rob: Yeah. You know.

I think, I think with a lot of that, what happens is as practitioners, we get a lot of domain specific training. So if you go to physical therapy school, you get basic biology, but then you also get, if you're a manual specialist, okay, here's how to do some orthopedic assessment testing in this specific context.

You use your hands or some technology to relieve that thing. You hit a certain mark and then you discharge the patient. And if you're, if you're woven into the medical [00:34:00] system or a human performance system, then some of the other components that you're talking about, like sleep and nutrition, et cetera, are outsourced to other professionals in the team.

Yeah, right. And so. What happens in those situations, like if you're working professional sports or, um, in, in the military, especially in special warfare where there's a bunch of specialists around is those teams have to have a lot of cohesion in order to move the needle in the, in the right direction. If you're a privatized physio coach, then you have to be, if you're gonna be a consultant, you have to be all of those professionals unless you build a team.

And then usually what happens is there's some sort of like human performance czar that is the lead and understands all the moving parts and puts it all together. The pur, the purpose of this curriculum in this book is to take the tacit understanding [00:35:00] that connects all of those professions together in their specific domain and pulls the, pulls the curtain open and says, here's actually how.

This is the underlying philosophy of information management that drives all of these professions, oftentimes without the professionals even knowing it. So understanding things like trends, measurements of performance, how to build, how to take into account multifactorial influences on outcomes. Like if you're a PT or you're a coach, you understand that nutrition and sleep and pain management and movement and your attitude and your family and all that stuff is baked in and you just know it because it's your job to know it.

And you pro you might not even know that you have that understanding. You can't describe why it's important. And what [00:36:00] I tried to do with the check engine like course and the book is what are all the subtle things that are non explicit? All of these human performance professions and then build them into a cohesive framework that is outward, that's explicit, and then you can apply it to whatever domain that you, that you're working in or that you care about.

And it makes it easier if you're a professional to explain to clients why you're doing the thing you're doing or why you want them to do that thing. And you say like, if you work with an executive, you know, and I was working with, um, some people who were C-suite executives and very busy people, they would, we would talk about things like whether HRV or sleep, and it'd be like, why do we need to do this?

And like, well, don't you have KPIs for your business? Yeah. Like, and, and when you track those KPIs, if there's changes day to day, do you freak out? [00:37:00] Well, no. But you know what ranges things need to be and in order for your business to be healthy. Well, yeah. That's the same way that you monitor your health metrics.

Oh, and that's because that's how information works. It's not like Rob Wilson's opinion about sleep. That's just the way we monitor complex behaviors of things. So if you're an entrepreneur, you look at inputs and outputs in your business and you understand that those are contextual and they'll change over time and times of year.

And when your finances are robust enough to hire a new person without it sinking the ship, right? And all of that same kind of information management is also applicable to managing health. Do I know what my ranges are? What are the different KPIs that give me a broad picture of what's going on? Right? In the book, I call it a dashboard.

So what are the things that at a glance, I can go, what's the general state of the system, and then move on [00:38:00] Now. Applying that to clientele and health. My bias is towards simplicity. So I want to give them the easiest things for them to pay attention to that are relevant to the outcomes they care about and not overwhelm them with the newest thing I read about, or an expensive piece of technology or something that requires a lot of specialized knowledge to use.

But instead, I'm gonna take whatever this ankle stretch or this rolling out thing or this, whatever, this exercise that I give them and go, this is how this directly relates to what it is you're trying to accomplish. And when people make a connection between some measurement of their state or some monitoring of their state and the outcome they want, then they pay attention to it because it's meaningful to them.

But if it's just like some stuff that you said and you keep the tacit understanding to [00:39:00] yourself. Then people will guess. They don't really know why they're on the journey. They're just kind of like, well, I hope he is right. And how much effort and attention do you get when it's like that? Less in my experience, but if people understand why it's relevant and they, and it helps them make sense of why they're doing the thing and, and how it's, uh, leads to what they care about, then the buy-in is so much higher.

And buy-in is such a trope now. Like, it's so much, it's like so tropish like, oh, we gotta have a client buy-in. But it's a trope because it's really important and it's the most ignored, like interpersonal communication and education skills are probably the most necessary and the most ignored.

Danny: Yeah. Yeah, you're right.

I mean, you know, it, I, I think that you're just talking about the ability to relate to another person and to do so in a manner that, I mean, [00:40:00] everybody's, for the most part, pretty selfish about they want to, they want what they want to get from their time and their money and their, their, their energy they're putting out.

That's normal, right? It's just up to us to understand what are you trying to get, and then how do we, how do we intertwine that with what you actually need to do? And sometimes that means shit that you don't want to do, right? And so, so tying it back to that, whatever that core thing is that people want is so important.

And it's, it's funny, man, it's like, I don't remember learning a single thing about, uh, in getting, uh, buy-in from a patient. I don't know, maybe they'd call it something different at that point in time. But like, just this ability to, to build trust and rapport with people. I don't remember getting anything on that.

Right. Well

Rob: I think, I think the medical profession and even human performance professions have historically been very dictatorial. I'm the expert. I give you this thing, you do it, then everything works out right. And what we [00:41:00] figured out is that like even really smart people who do know stuff don't have all the answers, and it's not because they're, they're bad people.

It's because the answers are so, like the problems they're dealing with are really complex. Yeah. That it's hard to know. And so you actually need client and patient participation. And I think, you know, with the concepts that are, are in this book,

I don't think, um, any decent PT or coach will read this and go. Oh, this is like rocket science. What they're gonna read it and go is, I didn't have the words for that before. That's the feedback I've been getting from professionals is that, like you said, nobody's teaching communication strategies and there's this assumption that's underlying a lot of medical and performance professionals where [00:42:00] it's like if you have the tactical and technical knowledge.

To solve like an orthopedic problem. That means you know how to communicate with people that are in front of you. And I mean, we've all been to both, like physicians who had really good bedside manner and ones who didn't. And the ones who have really good bedside manner, you listen way more carefully totally to the explanations that they're giving you.

And you walk out and you go, oh, I know exactly what the problem is and, and what I need to do. And the ones that seem like you're a number on a piece of paper, you're like, what did he say? Or she say like, I have to go get this paperwork. I gotta reread it again. And so, man, those subtle, um, communication capacities are massively important.

So my hope is if for the average person or the non-professional who reads this, they'll start to understand. [00:43:00] Some of the tacit information processing that happens in the background of a human performance professional's thinking. And then if you are a professional, you might have more concise language with which to explain the process you're asking your client to undergo.

Like, here's why we're doing this stuff. You know? So like in here I talk about formal movement systems. It's like, well, who cares how many degrees of shoulder rotation I have? I'm almost like, well, who cares how much money you have in the bank account? Like, do you want to wait until you swipe your debit card and it's like, sorry, zero.

Or, or do you want to have like some monthly bank statement that tells you like, okay, I'm in ranges so I don't go broke and like that's all, this is like having some movement standards when you exercise is just so you know what's happening, so you can do stuff you want. So it's like you don't wanna be on vacation with your family and swipe your debit card and get denied.[00:44:00]

That was sad. Yeah. Yeah. Same thing with not having enough shoulder flexion. It's like my shoulder doesn't work, but I don't know. And so what's gonna happen? I'm gonna dive into the swimming pool on vacation and tear my labrum. And those are stories that every PT who listens to this can relate to. Oh, oh, how'd you do this?

It wasn't like I, this, most people are doing some crap. I was saving a baby from a fire. Most of it's dumb shit. Like, oh, I went zip lining with my kids and I didn't realize that I couldn't hang on like this anymore. And I, you know, you know, I have a cervical sprain now. And it's like, well, when was the last time you put your arms over your head?

I don't know.

Danny: Dude. It's so true. Like this is, did you just like check the boxes? Right. And I mean, and yeah, we all have examples of just weird, like last straw event stuff. Like, you know, I, I remember one of the very first patients I saw this was at Brook Army Medical Center. I was a student, this guy was an inpatient patient.

He had had, uh, uh, lower back surgery. And when I was talking to him, I was [00:45:00] like, what happened? And he goes, man, it's embarrassing. And I go, well. I gotta write it down. I gotta document it. Tell me what happened. And he goes, I was trying to throw a sprinkler out into my grass. Like I didn't wanna step on it because, you know, it's nice.

And I, I was trying to avoid stepping on my grass. So he's bent over trying to toss a sprinkler further out in his yard while he was like, kind of kinking the hose and his back. It just like completely, you know, like gave out on him. He passed out, he pissed his pants. He like, basically just like exploded at this, the, uh, the, the whatever, like, you know, inflammatory process that proceeded.

He thought he had, you know, had some sort of like spinal cord injury or whatever, and he's like, I just don't get it. Like, what, what was it about the sprinkler system that put so much stress in my back? And I go. It wasn't the sprinkler that did this. It was who knows how many reps of shit that you were doing that stressed this thing.

It should be there your whole life. To a point where it literally just completely ruptured. Right? Like, and he was like, what are you talking about? He was so, he, he was so confused. And granted I was like, you know, [00:46:00] second year in school and it was even hard for me to explain it to him what was going on.

But I was just like, this isn't a one rep thing, dude. This is a last straw event. This is the last thing. So you know what you're talking about is, yeah, exactly. Right. It's like you dove into a pool and you tore your labrum. You think that was what did it? Or was it the fact that you haven't put your arms over your head in a decade and then you tried to do it while you jumped into water at a weird angle or whatever and landed.

So, you know, like these are things that. I don't think the average person understands. We definitely do. But having a process and, and a system to be able to evaluate those things and then be able to help them see progress, I think that's what's so important, right? It's just like for somebody to see, okay, I try to do this.

I'm not very good at it, I'm getting better now all of a sudden there's positive reinforcements from something that for the, for the average person, them not tearing their labrum, diving into a pool probably doesn't motivate 'em too much because they don't even know how to associate that. They're like, not me.

I'm not gonna be the person that that's gonna happen to. Well, you don't know. Like you're already, you know, we can look at this [00:47:00] proactively and just see what we have, but, but that ability to actually see the progress is huge. Right? So in the book you have a lot of different tests and things that people can do.

Uh, and some of this is, some of this is mental. That was a big part that, that I, that you covered that. I was like, this is really interesting. There's not a lot of people that are sort of covering that side of it. So you have mind, movement and matter. Right. So on the, on the mind side, you know, do you find it's maybe not as objective as we're talking about, can you put your arm over your head with your, your know, your elbow straight or whatever, right?

Like, that's pretty objective, but on the mind side it gets a little bit more subjective.

Rob: It is, it's a lot more squirrely. And, you know, in the book I talk about some different layers within mind and some of it in terms of just nervous system behavior, like stress management. And of course probably most, if not everybody listens to this podcast will be familiar with heart rate variability.

Um, probably one of, if not the most misused, uh, metrics [00:48:00] anywhere is like horribly marketed and used, in my opinion. What do you use it for? Like

Danny: what, what do you do? Like HRV is good for what? For you?

Rob: It's a reflection of long-term responses to allostatic load, which is very, very complex. It, it doesn't tell you how hard yesterday's workout was though.

Danny: I'd tell you what it tells me is if I drank the day before, like if I, if I have a one damn beer, bro, I, I pretty much stopped drinking because if I have one alcoholic beverage of any sort, my HRV will drop 30%.

It's crazy.

Rob: Yeah. Well see, there's a thing you said right there, percent. So we look at it in terms of percentiles, right? But also know, like individuals are different that those things can change over time. So if you were wearing a, I think I saw you wearing a whoop, right? Yeah. So if you were wearing a whoop 10 years ago, you might've been able to have four [00:49:00] beers Yeah.

Before it happened. We don't know. I don't. Right? Right. So we don't know. But now it might be that like your stress load, because you're a busy entrepreneur with multiple businesses, that the system doesn't have room for that. And or maybe another person who's an entrepreneur that's the same age with a similar background, maybe they're genetically different and they can handle two.

We don't, we just don't know. And so what it doesn't do is give these sort of clear cut definitive answers of dos, don't dos, it looks at, it can help us understand ranges and changes over time. So what's normal for me? How does this work in different contexts considering my history? How does my body respond to these inputs?

But what it can't do is tell a person if they should exercise hard or not today, because you definitely see unexpected bifurcations in HRV behavior. Like when, uh, this is a little bit of a [00:50:00] tangent, but recently I was having this downtick in HRV, high stress load, high workload. I got a really bad sinus infection and then I got on, um, this pretty.

Uh, heavy dose of anti-inflammatories. Right. I was on, um, prednisone, right. So was is strong, right. And I, I'm not, I don't take a lot of stuff. So I got on this super dose of prednisone from ENT and I was waking up at like two in the morning every night. And I was like, man, I'm gonna be so tired. I'm gonna just be smoke.

This is gonna fatigue me. And my HRV was on its way down, so it was like in the low twenties. And then my third day on prednisone, it went into the seventies. Hmm. Wow. And then stayed in the sixties for another week until I came off of it and I was like, Hmm, maybe I had some like systemic inflammation in my body that was pushing, pushing my allostatic [00:51:00] load higher than I realized.

And so I took away all this inflammation very, very quickly. My body was probably like, ah. Even though I was sleeping like, like four or five hours a night, I, it still went up and then stayed steady and it, and so there's these weird, unpredictable things that happen with HRV that we often just go, ah, anomaly.

We just disregard it until we see something that makes linear sense. But things like heart rate variability are very, very non-linear and they're complex and, and can be quite individual.

Danny: Um, and people compare 'em to each other like their 5K pr, you know, it's just like, oh, my HR Visa 75, yours is 25. I must be better.

You're like, wait a second. That's not the way it is. Like, it's not, uh,

Rob: it just, it's very individual. I met a guy recently at a Naval special warfare event, pulled me aside after and was like, Hey man, can I talk to you for a minute? Yeah, sure. And he's been wearing a aura ring. [00:52:00] For three or four years. And he was like, look at this.

This doesn't make sense to me. And he's like, everybody at command tells me like they're so impressed. His HRV was 1 98 to 2 0 5. I've never seen HRV that I, me neither. That's like the upper limit of what's measurable. I was like, holy cow. And I'm like, well, what's the problem? He is like, well, I feel like shit.

I feel terrible every day. I'm tired. I'm cranky. I don't feel good. I'm like, and he is like, but everybody at command's, like, your HRV is high. You win the HRV challenge. Don't worry about, I'm like, exactly. Who cares If you feel like shit and you have HR high HRV, then it doesn't mean anything. Yeah, so we got, we were talking and his, both his brother and sister, they're like a family of sports people, so they're all into their stuff.

They both wearing an aura ring. This is like a complete. Completely unique case. And he was like, well, my brother and sister both have in the upper one nineties like I do. And I'm like, oh. So what we're looking at is a [00:53:00] genetic cardiac robustness to stress. So this probably isn't a good metric for you. So there's probably something else we should pay attention to or pay attention to this in relationship to other data points.

But, you know, HRV isn't like the, the ring that Frodo carries to Mordor. It's not like the one ring to rule them all. It's just one data point on the dashboard that can help you make sense of the, your cardiac response to total stress load. And so for some people, their cardiac response to stress load is very sensitive and some people aren't.

And that that could be because of VO two max and genetic history and vascular resistance and. And, uh, if you've, if you were a smoker at one point, but now you're not, or if you're still a smoker or if you use other nicotine products, there's a bunch of things that influence that all at once. Now, with all that said, is it helpful?

Absolutely. [00:54:00] Going, even just measuring for a long period of time, even if you don't measure it forever, can be helpful. And with all these kind of metrics, the idea is to calibrate perception. And when we talk about mind, it's really hard to calibrate our own perception of our mind because we're using our mind to do it.

So if self evaluating can be difficult, although there are some strategies, some that are technological like HRV, but they're also like mindfulness or meditative exercises that people can do where you sort of watch the patterns of your own thoughts. I'm a big fan of writing, right? So one thing I've taken, um, from this book called Morning, uh, from the Artist's Way is this exercise called Morning Pages, where you just freehand one to three pages every day.

No punctuation, no spelling. You just go for it. And sometimes you get, it doesn't have to be cathartic, like dear [00:55:00] diary, you know, I think Timmy's cute, but he doesn't know I'm alive, right? Like, it can be that, but it's more like expose you to your own thought patterns. And then you go a couple days later and you're like, man, I was in a shitty mood when I did those the other day and I didn't even realize it.

Right? Um, so having those kind of mechanisms, but also social cues, right? So the old joke is like, how do you know if you're in a bad mood? Your wife tells you. And so paying attention to like common social signals is, is really important. Not because you have to buy into every piece of feedback that everybody gives you, but probably you should have some good faith players in your life who, if you're like, okay, this is the third day in a row, or this is the third time today, my spouse has reacted negatively to us interacting, I should at least stop and ask myself a question.

Mm. Yeah. Like, is this me? [00:56:00] Am I being a little bit short? Am I being less understanding than normal? Maybe this person is also in a bad mood, but could I give them a little bit more space? Like, is it affecting me? Are we just playing off each other? And those kind of things are important for health because if you wanna talk about limiters to performance expression.

Emotional regulation and stability and social and familial stability are massive limiters to performance and health outcomes. And like you can give all the best orthopedic and movement structure and advice and people don't have good social support, man, they'll go in the shit can. Sometimes that's a big benefit to finding a physical therapist or a coach or a gym community that just gives a shit about you.

Yeah. Like sometimes you go in with pain and it feels like somebody is actually listening and gives a shit what happens. That is a big deal for a lot of people, especially somebody who [00:57:00] has sort of mysterious chronic pain where they've been sort of written off and like, ah, I don't know what's wrong with you.

You know, just get outta here. And like they go to a private practice and the therapist can sit and listen. That's one of the biggest benefits I ever saw. Was, or one of the biggest piece of feedback I got while I was in private practice was people will come in and be like, nobody ever listened to me this long.

Yeah. This 'cause I'm, and I was like, well, you know what? I'm not gonna shit on the the system because that's what's allotted for, but I have 90 minutes, so this is your 90 minutes. So we can, you wanna tell me stories about what happened to you for 90 minutes? That's how you chose to spend your time. I'll listen to all of it, you know.

But to be able to sit and listen to the entire narrative, because people don't remember, they don't represent what's going on in their mind with bullet points. [00:58:00] They represent what's going on in their mind with a story about their experience. And so if you can get into those layers of mind as a practitioner, then you can understand all this context around this person's ankle, not just like missing.

11 degrees of dorsiflexion, but what they tried, who they tried it with, how long it's been hurting, how it's affecting their life. Like sometimes you get the into stuff and you're like, boy, this person's back's been hurting for two years. Like I bet that's affecting their sex life. It's making it hard for them to be intimate with their partner.

Oh, you're having, you're having some friction at home too. Like in the back of your mind you're like, I bet you are. And then you don't have to say that. But to be aware of all of those factors that are going on and then maybe give them some tools of self-reflection that can be added on that are just another, another [00:59:00] force multiplier in the outcomes.

It doesn't mean if you do mindful exercises, it will magically heal. Your Achilles, like, I think that's silly. And you know, that's, that's, that's not how things work. But what might happen is you might contribute to a healthier total environment where this person is like, man, how am I really thinking and feeling?

Where am my behaviors coming from? I have been stressed out, boy, I haven't been taking a break from work. And to have both internal audits and external audits for that. And I think it's important not only that we have those things as professionals for people that we care for, but also for ourselves.

Because a lot of people in service oriented professions are always outward. What does, what do others need to do? What do I need to be doing for others? What's the next problem? The next patient, the next business thing, the next, the next, the next. And that's a big contributor to burnout.

Danny: Oh, we, we absorb it, dude.

[01:00:00] Like we, you can be empathetic to somebody without taking their. Their pain, right? Like taking, like feeling that as deeply as a lot of people that are in those types of careers, they really, they really, truly wanna help other people. They feel, uh, very, you know, they a lot of personal satisfaction with being able to help another person.

And if someone's not doing well, or maybe they're, you know, something negative is happening with them, it can create a lot of, you know, sort of stress for them, uh, that they can carry out of the office with them. Right?

Rob: Yeah. And I think if you're, if you,

this kind of like awareness around mind can help you recognize if you are highly empathic. Because if you are a highly empathic person, that might not be something you can completely alleviate and, and you might not want to. Sure. If you're really empathic, it might be part of what makes you a really good provider because you can, you really listen and you get in deep and you invest [01:01:00] in people, but you have to also know that that's not free.

That's expensive and that you might have to create space for yourself so that you can keep doing it. So it's back to the same exact theme I was talking about with operators. It's like the point isn't to like try to make anybody fight against their own nature. I don't wanna make operators, not operators, and I don't wanna make extremely high, highly empathetic therapists and coaches less empathetic.

What I want is for them to realize how much things that they're doing are costing so that they can do a fair cost analysis. Right. And that's the thing is like most of the time we don't know how much things cost. We're not even looking because. Biological organisms that human beings are, we're super adaptable.

So we'll just compensate and cope on top of it, and we'll pay the price somewhere else, right? Whether that's because you're a [01:02:00] busy PT clinician or because you're an operator, just pay the price somewhere else until everything comes for a head. Comes to a head and you realize you're working 90 hours a week and you don't see your spouse or your kids, and you're totally fried and you're drinking alcohol every night, and you're sleeping like shit, and then you're cooked, and by the time things are going well, there's no more energy.

That's what happens. And it doesn't happen because people are stupid. It happens because it happens really slow. The process is insidious and human beings are adaptable. So we cope along the way. It's not any different than when you look at a client's orthopedic problem and they throw the sprinkler. It's just like, that was the moment where everything finally came to a head.

Usually socially. It's like a dear John moment, right? You come home from work and you're like, I'm successful, and your wife's standing there with a suitcase and you're like, what the fuck? Right? And she's like, dude, I've been [01:03:00] giving you signals for two years. Like, we don't talk to each other like, you're not here.

Danny: Well, it's just the, it's the whole human, right? I mean, like, this is, this is exactly, well, also, I, I feel like, uh. It. I don't know, man. I think it would've been hard for me to understand what you're talking about or maybe what we're, we're discussing if, when I had just graduated from PT school, you know what I'm saying?

Like, I don't have any life experience. I didn't really understand it. Just, I, I would've, when I graduated, I was 25, you know, and, uh, I, I, I would've just been like, well, the research says this, so I'm gonna do that. You know? 'cause my professor just told me this, this, and this. And, uh, and then I feel like in the, in our profession, we, we work with people, uh, you know, on a daily basis.

And you get a, you get a chance to really, uh, learn a lot about many different types of people and many different types of reasons that they're there. And you, you develop this massive amount of emotional intelligence because [01:04:00] it's, you have to, in order to be able to, to do that job. It's, it's not like you're sitting at a computer and you're coding something and you're not having these.

Interactions every single day. Like sometimes 15, 20 different people per day are coming in that you're working with and you're having to try to help them achieve something. And what we don't, what what we, what we discount oftentimes early on is the human element of it. And as I, as I've gotten older, like I'm not treating patients right now, but I feel pretty confident that if I went back into the office.

I could definitely relate to people better, uh, than, than I could have, you know, five years ago. Uh, even though maybe I, I'm not as good at diagnosing and understanding what they should do next. But the side of it that's, that in many ways is just as important, is the fact that you can, can relate to somebody.

You can listen to them, you can understand what's driving them to help them achieve the things they want, and know why they want those things. And for them to trust you enough to tell you that. 'cause they may not actually want to do that. And, and this is like the soft skills. [01:05:00] This is the stuff that is, uh, it's so, it's so hard to like understand what you're doing, right?

Right. What you're doing wrong. And uh, and, and you need iteration and time and you need to realize that like, oh. This is what they're talking about. And, and to have the humility to know that you don't know it, you know, and that you can't really, uh, understand somebody until you take the time to, to, to ask.

Listen, more than anything, just like let them tell you their story. Let them, uh, express their frustrations. And the more people cry in your office. And I would tell people this all the time, like the first time somebody cried in my office, I was with a staff member or with a, uh, ci, I had a clinical instructor, and he got up and left, just walked outta the room.

And I was like, I just was left there. I was at, you know, I was, I was in school. It was my first rotation in Augusta, Georgia. And this guy's, like, he just broke down. He's got up and walked out. And, uh, he's like, I'm gonna give you some time. And I just sat there and I was like, dude, what's wrong? You know, like it was crazy that this guy just left.

I couldn't believe it. And [01:06:00] the, the more that I see people that like, they just kind of, not that them breaking down was a good thing. It's, but it's a sign that they are like. Uh, they trust you enough to be vulnerable and say something that maybe like triggers them in a, a negative way or, or maybe they're proud of something or whatever.

It's like, but like those moments that people experience like that, that's a really good sign. It's a good sign that you're like connecting with people, you know, and the last thing you should do is walk outta the room. But, but like, just getting that outcome is, is a huge sign. Right. So tell you how

Rob: uncomfortable that individual was with themselves.

Right. Well,

Danny: for sure. And also, you know, there's, this is an interesting person. I don't have time to get into this guy's backstory, but like, but, but you know, it, it's, to me, I just find the more that, uh, that people that, that I work with, which are clinician business owners now, right? But they're clinicians first.

So, so, you know, everybody starts there. But this is no different than what we're talking about from a standpoint of you got that employee that maybe isn't doing what you're asking them to do. You got that, you got that, that staff member that keeps [01:07:00] showing up late. You know, you, you got that, that, that person that you're, that you know has the potential to be great at what they're doing.

For some reason, they're something's holding them back, right? And or you have to have a difficult conversation with somebody. Uh, these are things we have to do on an ongoing basis. You have to have a difficult conversation with a, with a, uh, a, a, a patient, maybe a client that is unhappy about something. Th this is no different.

Like it's the same skillset. It's just applied in different ways. And, you know, to be able to understand that and lean into it and appreciate it, for me at least, it's helped me as a clinician, as a, uh, as, as a business owner, uh, educator, parents, everything. Right? Spouse across the board. So I, I think of anything we talked about, like, this is the stuff that I think is most important and, and I, I'll even throw a reference out there.

You know, I know, uh, Brett Bartholomew, who I believe is a mutual friend with, uh, conscious, conscious coaching. He, he wrote, uh, he, he does, you know, great courses on this kind of stuff, and they're quite uncomfortable for a lot of people to go to. Uh, and, and, but they can be fantastic for people that struggle with [01:08:00] emotional intelligence.

Things like that, or what we're talking about, I think are a game changer.

Rob: Yeah. You know, I think there's some things that you can only glean from experience. You just have to be, you have to be in it, you have to be doing it. Emotional intelligence is, is really important. It's definitely a skill that can be, that can be developed.

And I think one of the things I tried to do with the book, and one of the things that, this is just sort of like a general philosophy as well, is give people permission to iterate and to try and to know that the best outcome isn't having final solutions because it's not possible. Um, but. To instead learn how to fail smaller and faster.

That's actually developing skill is recognizing a [01:09:00] failure sooner and then changing course. And if you're talking, we're saying,

Danny: sorry, faster by the way. Like that. Imagine dude, this is the same thing. You pissed your wife off 'cause you did something dumb. The and that this happens to me frequently and the faster that I apologize the better it is for everybody.

Rob: Yeah, me too. And that's something you can just, you gotta pay the piper. You gotta pay the piper for, you kinda learn that over time and you know, there's some like funny adages, happy wife, happy life, but also it's just taking ownership over your, your own part in a problem. Yes. And stop being like they did that happened.

And just whatever other bullshit we tell ourselves to feel better and instead go back to this like mind like, hold on a second. Could I have done better and do I want to do better? Hmm. If that's yes, then I have to go like, Hey, [01:10:00] I could have done better, my bad. And then after that, do better. And that's it.

And like, that's the game. That's the like, generally like the game is that, um, I think in a lot of these contexts, especially on, you know, when people are younger, they get. Fixated on things turning out like certain ways, and we have mechanisms for protecting ourselves when they don't. Um, but developing that emotional intelligence is, is really important, um, for, for driving the kinds of outcomes that I think we want.

And, and not just that in professional life, but also like personal life. It's really important.

Danny: Yeah. No, I agree, man. I mean, you know, uh, I I'm, I'm glad we had a conversation about this stuff, you know, and, and obviously the, the book encompasses a lot of this. And, uh, and, and the, the exercises in there are really cool, man.

It's almost like, [01:11:00] uh, it's, it's almost like a, uh, like exercises in each chapter that you can, you can kinda like, you know, answer. It's like the uh, uh, daily stoic workbook that, uh, Ryan Holiday wrote where it's like, it's a journal and it's a, it's, it's a book together, right? Yeah. And it's really, that's a really powerful way to write a book because I found, like when I went through something like that.

I just understood, I, I retained the information better 'cause I was actively a part of like, going through it.

Rob: I, I don't think that there's many health books that are written where there's a required like, self-reflection component, right? There's like in the domain of health and performance, it's more like we deliver a recipe to people, do this, put it in the oven this long.

If you do it for the right amount of time with the right ingredients, boom, you got a cake. Yeah. And, but we don't really teach people how to cook. So why do we put salt? Like why do we add. Acid. What's the point of doing it [01:12:00] like this? What I wanted to do here was teach people how to cook when it comes to health.

Like the basics of cooking, not, it's not chef school, right? It's not full culinary, but it's like the basics of cooking with performance. And the only way that that can be done is by trying something, or in this case, reading something and then going, hold on, do I do that? How'd that work out? Let me think about this thing rather than, and, and what happens a lot, I think in, because our culture especially is we're just like data, right?

You look at people's stuff and they like, take the Instagram picture. Here's all the books I read this year. And it's like, that's cool and I'm happy people are reading. But also like, what'd you do different? Because you read that stuff. Are you any different? Do you think any different? Or are you just like, I finished it close.

Next one. Is it just some compulsive thing that you're doing or is it like actual nutrition? Did you sit and ponder [01:13:00] this information? Like what does this mean to me? Let me reflect on this. How, how might this change my perspective? What else could I think about? What else could I learn about? Instead of just like beginning, middle, and over, next thing done, right?

Yeah. And um, I mentioned this researcher in the book, her name's Mc Rafle. Um, she's a human computer interface researcher, but specializes in health technology, which in the uk and they look at like adult learning and especially adult health adherence and what actually makes adults stick to health plans.

And what they found was one. Giving, um, self-determined, but structured experiments and having self-reflection questionnaires as long as they were concise, as long as they weren't time expensive, that when they looked [01:14:00] at longitudinally, the difference between that and just giving someone a protocol. The difference would be like, give someone a protocol.

And I think it was upwards of 70% of people in experiments would just, like, after 30 days, wouldn't be doing it all 90 days. They would forget the experiment ever existed. When they would do things that were self-determined and autonomous, not only would people stick with things longer, they would have learned new things that helped them achieve that goal, or a similar goal that they self-identified.

And we're talking 6, 9, 12, and 15 months after initial experiment. So where people took the reins over it because they did something and because they were regularly asked about how did that affect you? Could it be done better? Would you like, what didn't you like? Then they went, oh, well you know what? I didn't like this.

Maybe I'll try that. And it's [01:15:00] the same thing that happens if you react with a professional or if you have a, if you have a patient who comes in to see you weekly or biweekly. You don't just like go high. Five, get outta here. Right? You go, oh, what happened since last time I saw you? Have you been doing your homework?

How was it? Oh, this thing kind of worked, but you had a hard time finding time for this. Well, let's make this adjustment. And so what ends up things like this, this kind of approach puts the coach in your head. And so then you can go, oh, how do I iterate? What should I try? Let me do another experiment. And so the book has self-reflection questions, but in the end, at the end of the book, there's a workbook where there's experiments in each of those categories, right?

Mind, movement, and matter. That's

Danny: a cool part of it. Dude, I like the workbooks side, right? It's just like, it's, it's a big part of the book, and there's a lot you can go through there, you know, and it's, and all of a sudden you can kind of play around. It's like, oh, can you do this position? Can you hold the isometric?

You know, can you, these are basic things. These are really [01:16:00] good ways to find, uh, limitations. And I think this is a great place for clinicians to even look at this because for a lot of people, we, we lack ongoing frameworks of what to do with people when they feel better once they're not in pain, you know?

And it's like, okay, cool. Can you hold, you know, this position for X amount of time without breaking down? Can you breathe in that position? Basic things like that.

Rob: Yeah, and here's the other thing too. It's, if you, let's say you get a patient. You work with them for a while, they go away, some new thing happens, they come back, they haven't been doing shit to monitor their own function in between.

How much more time do you have to spend identifying the real problem? A lot. Yeah. If you have a patient who you see there's a gap, but in between there, they're doing a lot of self-monitoring. They're very, you know, we all know we have these clients and patients where they're really self-aware. Uh, I do yoga, I lift some weights.

I go for a run. And then they come back to you and they go, you know what I noticed is that when I do shoulder presses lately, it's been [01:17:00] getting a li little bit in my neck and I'm not as good at situps and my time and my mile has gone down just a hair and I'm not sleeping good that well. So they start building the net for you.

Yeah. And you can go, don't have to ask that. Don't have to ask that. Don't have to ask that. Don't have to ask that. And so you go through 10 of your 20 checklist. In the first two minutes, and then you can just get to what your actual expertise is. And so this kind of, you know, when I work with the guys in this program with the NSW guys, I'm like, some of this isn't like, you don't have to become a domain expert.

You don't have to read this book or do my class, and then now you don't need coaches. What you can do though is have monitoring systems that allow you to communicate better with subject matter experts that you work with. So if you go to a PT or you go to your coach and you go, oh, hey, when I do shoulder presses, it feels like this.

And then you say, well, I know this because I do shoulder press presses and I [01:18:00] look for full knockout of my elbow in alignment with my head every single time. And you're like, oh, that's a very standard. And I do it once a week no matter what, just as a tester for my shoulder health. And I notice. Last time I saw you, I could press overhead, no problem.

But my head's starting to get stuck and my elbows aren't locking out as well. So now I know like, Ooh, I need to go get some help. And it's prepay. So like, oh, I'm losing some function. I've, I've exhausted the resources. I have time to ask somebody else. And we do that decently well in most other domains.

Like if you own a home, you might know, like some basic plumbing, you might know how to screw a, a board and basic, some little bit of carpentry. You own a home for a while, you kind of start picking up little, uh, you know how to change the cord in your lawnmower, but then you go, Ooh, uh, this is getting past my knowledge.

I'm gonna take this to an expert. And then [01:19:00] you go. But if you have opened up the top of a lawnmower before. You take it into like the lawnmower repair, you can be like, Hey, listen, I took the top off last time I changed the cord. It started right up, but now it's doing this thing. It gives them another layer of information so they're not starting from zero.

Danny: Yeah. I feel like it's, you're describing it as collaborative, right? It's like, I can't just, you can't just come to me and I do this for you. Right? Like, you have to have ownership in this. Like, we have to do this together. I think that's the, I think that's the way, uh, that, that if, if people have the, you know, the desire and the, uh, the, the financial ability to, you know, invest in their, in their health in a way to, you know, that they want get really long-term, you know, positive out, uh, outcomes.

Um, that's it. And if they don't, then a book doesn't cost them that much, you know? And you can hire Well,

Rob: yeah, that was a goal that I had with the book because I definitely do realize that. There are people who have [01:20:00] financial limitations with access, right? And so all the experiments in the book, there are technology options, but there are also even no tech, like taking your resting pulse with your fingers and a watch as like a heart, you know, as a, a resting heart rate measure.

So it doesn't have to be really sophisticated. Can it be? Sure? But everything in the book was written so that people with financial limitations wouldn't be automatically excluded from self-care. Um, and so if you're a practitioner and you work with somebody who might not be able to constantly work with a provider, then a book like this can be helpful because you can go, Hey, listen, why don't you try these two experiments?

And then in a month you can come back and then we'll talk about or whatever, in six weeks, come back and we'll talk about the outcomes. And then [01:21:00] that can give additional information and context to the practitioner so they can get more done in the time that they have. Yeah, right. So, yeah,

Danny: no, that's fantastic.

Uh, where can people get a copy of this book, Rob? Where, where, where can we send 'em to, to grab, grab it and start applying either to themself or to their, uh, their, their practice?

Rob: You can go to the check engine light book.com.

Danny: Nice. V check engine light. I like the name. Dude, I feel like we made a lot of car references when we were, uh, when we were teaching, uh, a lot.

It just seems to like make sense to people.

Rob: Yeah, it's easy. We drive a car every day, right? So you get in the thing and there's a light on, and we've all had the moment of like. You're like, oh, shoot, shit. Yeah. Yeah.

Danny: Well, this was awesome man. Thank you so much for your time. It's fun to catch up. It's always fun to just, you know, hear your thought process.

I think you do a really good job of, uh, of, of the people that I know that can like, sort of like, take complex topics and then sort of, you know, synthesize it into, uh, analogies that [01:22:00] make sense and, and into frameworks that make sense. You do a great job of it and I'm, I'm very excited to get through the rest of the book and hopefully everyone listening to this, uh, is as well.

And, and you learn some great stuff. You can help the people that you're working with, uh, you know, achieve the goals they have and have a better framework to do so. So Rob, thanks so much for your time man. I really appreciate it. My pleasure. Thanks for having me. Alright, see ya.