Heath Armstrong

Tony Winyard 0:00

habits and health episode eight. Welcome to the podcast where we give you ideas on habits you can integrate into your life that will improve your health, maybe even improve your life. Today's guests, Heath Armstrong, and he is the author of the suite as affirmations, and co founder of rage create and various other things as well. So we're going to be hearing from Heath very soon. If you like this episode, if you like this show, why not subscribe so you get it every week when it's released on a Tuesday. And please do leave a review for us as well that allows other people to find out more about this podcast. Hope you enjoy this week's episode. habits in health My guest today, Heath Armstrong, how are you?

Heath Armstrong 0:50

Excellent. Yeah, thank you so much for having me.

Tony Winyard 0:55

Pleasure to have you here. And you're you were just telling me you're in Nashville.

Heath Armstrong 1:00

I am in Nashville. It is not I grew up in Tennessee, Tony. So it was really complicated for me to actually make the decision to come back here last fall, actually like September October to deal with all this parental energy or whatever I left behind when I was like 17 and I left the area and on my own path and but it's been very healthy as well to return for a little bit and sort of reestablish some of those uncertainties as they're not really that bad right? It's kind of beautiful when I get to spend some good time with my parents and see my sisters and stuff a lot more so

Tony Winyard 1:35

yeah, it's well I mean, we've on this on this podcast so in the various I've had a lot of guests from different parts of the states but never had anyone from Nashville so far. It's the first time and Nashville we've got this. This reputation all around the world, isn't it obviously for music and everything. So it's Yeah, so wild. Yeah. And I've been I've been to a few places in the States but I haven't been to Nashville as yet. But one day, one day I will get there.

Heath Armstrong 2:02

I'm actually right next to so there's the main strip in Nashville is called Broadway and it's like where all the Honky Tonk stuff goes down. And it's absolute mania, man. It's like, you can walk down there, I didn't go and I walk my dog all around, you know, we're close to the Capitol or whatever. But it's just mass parades. People out there pounding drinks all day listening to music, it's like, it's hard to believe that it's actually going on but it is.

Tony Winyard 2:28

And hates you want to tell the listeners. So what is it that you do? What How do you? How do you help people?

Heath Armstrong 2:36

I create affirmation card decks and journaling systems. And I do podcasting episodes, to help guide people through basically quick mindset issues or how to break their habit of hesitation and actually sustain a life of long term happiness or as used to say, and the other Happy, Happy verse flourishing, right? Like, what's the difference? And how do you how do you navigate that I never grew up planning that I was going to start doing that or that that was going to be my path. But I think in a world where we were born in you come in through our mother's magical portal, and we're this sort of prime, magical being and then all of a sudden, the world starts stacking layers upon us on what we should be or what we should think and who we should become. And those layers come from parents, they come from tradition, they come from media networks, they come from billboards, advertisements, constant disruption via your cell phone. And we kind of lose that Prime self that that magical little creative being that we were so I realised in my particular journey of battling with deep depressions and Alcoholism and Substance abuse, and not having any idea how to get back in touch with that self that I wanted to do to be creative into. To do something purposeful that we we got to go through that dark pain, we got to really go through the shadow in the only way to the, to the lighter side of it is actually diving in deep and so I really have put a lot of time and effort into helping people realise that it's not it's not so bad. Like we don't have to. We don't have to freak out so much we can really figure things out best by stopping trying to figure things out, right, which has been a journey in itself for me and yeah, it's it's been a really beautiful transformation the past five or six years.

Tony Winyard 4:47

And what would you say can you remember what what caused that transformation? What Yeah, so when you things were getting really bad, what was the thing that kind of just flipped it and kind of brought you back?

Heath Armstrong 4:59

I had it I I had a lot of things along the journey, I was always a very empathetic child. So I, I felt like I was interacting with spirit realms a lot that other people weren't. And I didn't know what that meant. And so that led I mean, with a lot of empathetic people who feel more things, whether it's sensory or whatever, your there's not a lot of outlets for help. And so when you're getting this overwhelm of emotion, you turn to things like substances or drugs and I, I went to school and I studied like concrete construction, and I ended like, I have no passion for that at all. I ended up in this industry, I was working in a factory making $13 an hour building these receptacles that carried human faeces underground, like not seeing the light of day ever, like working early mornings, late nights in wondering how I ever got into that position. And it eventually led to some pretty bad moments of I was drinking like a leader a day of liquor, it was it was bad, but I was functioning. And I was doing okay with work, and I was progressing there, and everyone around me seemed to be doing it too. So it seemed normal. But I had this one incident that sort of initiated the big wake up in 2011. When I woke up, facedown in my garage with my pants pulled down in my face up on a wooden step leading into the door. And my nose had been bleeding on the step in my dog's like the door to my house was open in my car was running in the front yard, you're talking like a residential neighbourhood. This isn't like a college frat house or anything. This is a residential neighbourhood on like, a Sunday morning. And I remember the way my dogs were looking at me, like, What are you? They are concerned, right, and I and I didn't have kids or like anybody else living with me and a family. And it was the most miserable thing, not having any idea what had happened over the past 24 or 48 hours, and it was really hard. Wow, if I continue to do all these things that I thought were gonna make me happy, they clearly aren't that I'm probably going to die. Because I've lost all value for wanting to live. And this is what's happening. And I had this magical stranger get. It was really scary for me. Actually, two years before that in 2009, I got on a plane to go to Houston, Texas, to do a job interview in the oil industry before I got into it was like working on oil riggers or something. This guy gets on a plane. And he there's a middle seat open. You know, if you've ever been on a plane and someone gets on, or they're gonna sit in the middle seat, or whatever you're like, please don't tell this dude. Specifically, I was the type of person that would judge heart. Like, that's just how I was, you know, I grew up that way. I was taught that. Like, it's still a really hard part of our culture. Today, you see it more than ever, with all the fighting and the breaking of unity and just comp conflict and chaos everywhere right now. But I was like, please don't sit next to me. This dude's like, Can I sit in that seat brother? And I'm just like, Oh, no. And he's got this huge beard. And he's got tattoos all over his body. This like looked very different felt very different than anyone I was used to hanging out with. He had brands and like tribal brands on his body and smells so bad. Like, you know, he hadn't taken a shower a long time, which I found out he had it. But he he sits down and he starts asking me about myself, which I don't think anyone had ever done before. Like, what do you want? What makes you excited? Why What do you love these simple questions that we should all be asking ourselves every morning and asking each other and then supporting each other to be able to do he this this guy who scared me starts to ask me these questions. And he's like, oh, you're going down there to do that. Cool.

Do you love it? And I'm like, What? Like, how dare you ask me that? No one would ask me that like is that that's weird. Why are you asking me that. And I just started like, all my insecurities and comforts came up and he planted the seed right there that made me constantly think about everything I was doing as if I loved it. And it sent me down this road of having to deal with my demons and my traumas. And he ended up actually telling me his story. Right after that. He was being extradited by Rwanda because he had been in prison for four months out there for fighting for gender equality. For women who are victim of the genocide and protecting children. He was actually his village was being protected by legit rosters. And he showed me pictures of these like this lizard, he chopped the head off with a machete and a black mamba and it had a lizard inside of his body. And it was in his head. It was all this stuff that I felt like I'd only seen in movies like fairy tales like this doesn't actually happen. People aren't really doing this type of things with their life. And then he showed me these these necklaces that the women the mothers had made out there and he was bringing them back to sell them so he could raise money to go back and you know, run water or feed them or whatever, to help in any way that he could be. He was the first selfless person I ever met. He put himself at risk constantly and he came from the same place as me. He came from Tennessee. He grew up in a middle class. You know White Christian type environment in a very young age, like you, at a very young age learned, you know, to not let things steal your energy into react in a better way. He learned similar things and decided his calling was to go to Africa to try to figure out how he could help things in any way that he could because he was getting all these visions about it. Well, you planted that seed. And I went through that sort of downfall of like contemplating that, and the, obviously, I would have loved to have just, like, gotten it right when he told me and made a change, but it didn't, it took me five or six more years. And so 2011 that happened. Every time I had a rock bottom moment like that, I thought about him, I saw his face. I even thought about contacting him because he had sent me a book by his father, two weeks after I met him, and it was called no more Mondays. And it was about how you can get away from working in this traditional nine to five lifestyle. And I thought that was crazy, too. I was like, no way you can actually work for yourself. And so in 2014, on February 13, I think was the day I had my final rock bottom, freak out where it was another three years after that, that incident with my car. I woke up again, in in I, I was at the last string, like there's no way I was moving forward unless I made changes. And those changes had to be drastic for me, it couldn't be continuing to stay in my job. It couldn't be having the surroundings of the people I was hanging out with that were really contributing, you know, and a lot of ways we try to be calm and just like, Oh, yeah, it's cool. We all are suffering. So let's all just go get hammered every night and do whatever it was, it was a face to face moment of, I have to remove all this stuff from my life and find this pure version of myself or I'm going to I'm not going to make it. And that was when the universe was like, Oh, you're listening now. Okay, now let's start to play with you. And these magical people started dropping into my life that basically set the seeds that would change everything for me from that point on. But to answer your question, like that's how it all got started for me.

Tony Winyard 12:05

Wow, that's, that's some story. And so how long ago was that?

Heath Armstrong 12:11

What part of it?

Tony Winyard 12:13

disseminated to boy, when you met a guy on the plane? How long ago was that?

Heath Armstrong 12:17

That was 2009. And then 2011 was when I woke up face down in my garage. And then 2014 was when I actually had this sort of the last call, like the rock bottom moment. I mean, I think anybody who is unaware that they are working a job that doesn't make them happy to make money that they think they need to buy things that they don't even need to impress people that you don't even like, right, you're kind of and then you're taking a bunch of substances or external stimulations to try to numb yourself of the reality that you're not really that interested in it. You're You're right for a rock bottom moment or a breakthrough and 2014 was that last string for me, that's when that's when I had my I mean, I woke up again, blackout and I was in a different house this time and I had a Jacuzzi tub in my room in my basement so ridiculous, because I'm the most minimal person that like I live like a meeting in the woods with nothing now because I've found so much serene value in that type of lifestyle. But yeah, I pulled myself into a tub and, and it was the first time Apple had the podcasting app, put on your phone automatically, at least on my phone. First time I noticed it at least. And I and I opened it. And I listen to this interview with as amazing. Her name is Amber Ludwig, where it was then now amber Ville Hauer but I listened to this woman's story on a podcast for the first time and the way her story started was so similar to what I had been feeling and what I've been going through and then the skill sets that she used to build out her company and then start she she does things where she helps authors, like create their books and launch them and stuff. She has a whole company. She's She's a really incredible thought leader in the self help space, even today. I don't know what it was, but it was like the universe like you should. It felt so connected, almost like an umbilical of like, I know, this woman and something is really special here. And being an extreme introvert who had never asked for help or reach out or like just being so scared of doing that or imposter syndrome. You know, I just, I got over that in the moment. And I sent her a message. She said her contacts like anyone who's listening that that is feeling like they need help, like reach out to me or whatever. And I was like, Oh, so I did. I sent her a Facebook message. And she replied, almost immediately, and I was like, oh, oh no, shoot, like this woman replied. I'm actually like, she's paying attention to me. Just like the guy in the plane hit the guy in the planes. By the way, his name's Jared and Gaza. He's incredible. He works for space for Humanity to to take humans into space, which is pretty cool. He's one of my best friends today. But Amber, she called me, she called me and said, she basically asked me about what I was going through and then shot down every bit of an excuse that I had, that I came up with, because that's what we do we all do it in a micro level on a macro level, and was like, No, that's all bullshit. And you can do any of this stuff. And here's how you can do it. Are you willing to take the action to do it? Because this is your opportunity, and it might not come again or whatever. And I was like, What? And she connected me to two people. One was, how Elrod I don't know if you're familiar with him. He's a international Selling Author of the year the Miracle Morning.

Tony Winyard 15:49

5am stuff.

Heath Armstrong 15:50

Yeah, yeah. And he was, you know, this was, he was he just had the one book out, then the Miracle Morning book, but his story is insane. Like, you know, he, he got in a car wreck. And almost, he was pronounced dead for six minutes, and then came back and had all these visions and put to bring this morning routine to the world and remind people how important it was. And I implemented that, which is we talk about habits and stuff. And we get into that, like, that was the first fundamental change to my routine. And then she introduced me to a guy who was a podcaster. And he was like, Hey, what do you want to do in the world? And I was like, Well, I would love to travel and explore different cultures and things because I had these memories of Jared and Africa. And I was like, that would be cool, and had no idea how to do it, or how to get money, or how to support myself, or how to pay off all the debt that I had from going to school. And I mean, just all these big questions that a lot of us have, how, how do you do it? And he's like, well, you have to find the people that are doing that an ESCO. Like, everything was made so simple. It's like, Oh, damn, you're right. And so he helped me set up the first podcast I ever did, which is back in 2014, it was called the artsy the artsy now show, and I just started contacting people that I was intrigued by that were doing amazing creative things and asking them how they were doing it. And that that was really what set me on the path of studying people's habits and being able to put all the habits that I was learning that kind of overlapped into a system and, and then start using them myself, which would eventually lead me to making the transition where I did, I did get away from my job and pay off my debt and create businesses and sell everything that I owned, and move into that sort of wild exploration of the unknown, which would lead me all over the all over the world, you know, 20 or so countries in the past four or five years and climbing volcanoes and working with actually full circle. I'm coming back in 2017 with duffel bags full of jewellery made by women in Africa to support a school that I'm working with. So it's like, Did I just did I just fulfil this prophecy of Jared by becoming that? You know, I don't know. It's such a it's such a weird thing when a vision becomes reality, right? So yeah,

Tony Winyard 18:05

it's kind of before we started recording, and you mentioned to me about about the hero's journey. And, and I was wondering, okay, so how is the hero's journey going to fit in your story, and as you're telling your story, I could just see all the components of the hero's journey is, it's fascinating.

Heath Armstrong 18:21

Yeah, it Luckily, for me, you can go ahead if you want, but I was gonna come, I was flown with this. I had a lot of help with from the universe, Tony, like, I can't explain, because I think a lot of people are like, Oh, the woowoo side of things, or the magical side of things isn't real or visionary reality isn't real. And, and I'm extremely adamant about how you have to show up and take action to make your visions and your reality meet each other. But I have also had in incredible amounts of universal synchronistic things happen in my life that sort of show me a sign of like, Oh, I'm on the right path. And they're not always, it's like, it's not it's not an option of Oh, that's true. But it could be looked at this way as a coincidence. Like, no, this is so specific that you can't, you can't look at it any other way. I mean, for instance, just really quick. Last year, I was struggling with some physical health stuff I needed to. I felt like I needed to do something to get a lot of the energy from the world out and like physical purge or whatever. And my best one of my best friends love her to death. Her name is Olivia. And she's a shaman. And she, I mean, her path has been just to heal, like work with healing people and she works within prison system. She works with leaders of countries to help them with their energy work and things like that. And she was like, yeah, you should come to this. This Mayan retreat that we're having around Mount Shasta. It'll be 11 days to work with this Mayan org. Oracle. Eric. He's a wisdom keeper from the bloodline and like Just this amazing man who is completely enthralled with working with nature and synchronistic with nature, and she told me the price, like the deposit and stuff, and I was like, we're gonna stay in teepees, we're gonna do sweat lodges, we're gonna learn actually how to go through the traditional Mayan practice. And it's all work. It's not play. It's like, you go there, it's demanding. It's hard. You're like, you know, picking weeds all day, legitimately on your hands and knees. And she was like, I guess if I am supposed to be there, the universe will help me out somehow and give me a sign because it was coming up really quick. She's like, Yeah, I think so the deposit $750. And I was struggling financially, because I was on the brink of like, potentially filing bankruptcy for one company. I'd started and starting another one. And I didn't know what direction to go. And I was like, Okay, well, why don't you just help me sort of send out some thoughts to the universe and, and maybe it'll work out. Two hours later, my mom sends me a text message that's like, Hey, you just got this check. I don't know what it is. It's from the state of Oregon. And it was a refund from like, some personal tax thing from two years ago, and is for the exact amount of $750. And I sent her the picture. And she was just like, well see, like, I'll see you there in a couple weeks. And I was just like, yeah, yeah, I guess you will like, and one of the the other medicine men that work there, his name is Raven. And as I was driving to the grocery store, right after I got that text message, there was this giant pole, on the side of the road and spray painted down. It was Raven, like the name and big black letters. And I was just like, Whoa, this is also weird. So I'm not saying that that's going to happen for everyone. But if you work on opening up what you are paying attention to with your senses, it totally is possible that you will start noticing things that you didn't notice before.

Tony Winyard 21:50

You mentioned about 510 minutes ago about when she introduce you to two people one of which was how L Word. Yeah, and you talked about you know, sort of morning miracle and everything and, and he helped you with kind of habits and routine. So what what kind of changes did you start making once you became aware of what he was doing?

Heath Armstrong 22:13

What's really beautiful about his system is It's so fast, it's so quick. It's it's you can make it as long as you want, which nowadays, my morning routine actually does go into the hours. Because it's it's something that I've added components to over time. But what it forced me to do is when you start waking up and I you know, the sun is this gigantic ball of energy and consciousness. And what I've learned a lot from spiritual teachers and sort of my journey in itself is if, if you're awake, when that sun starts coming up, you are absorbing this magical energy that not only will explode your creativity and your ideas, but it sets you into the the foundation that you want for your day, you're up, and you're doing these things, and like you're training your brain and your body to do that. And therefore you're opening yourself up to a much more opportunity throughout the day. A lot of his system, I had never meditated before I thought meditating was hilarious. I thought it was it's crazy now because it's like the you know, the main component of my life in every way possible. And I'm saying that because for people who who doubt, like you can change, you can really discover things that you were judging before, that might actually end up being the most important thing to you in your life. But so I started meditating. And I started journaling. And I started doing like the five minutes of exercise, whether I was running a couple miles through the neighbourhood, or whatever, and practising with affirmations, which was the seed for my writing career, because I do create affirmation card decks now. And these decks, you know, there's 1000s of them around the world, and people are constantly tagging me and thanking me and saying that they were able to make, you know, get through blockages themselves and create incredible projects that are so far beyond anything I've ever created. You know, just that was a domino effect of a seed of how creativity flowing into me, and then me doing my own thing with it. And then it flowing out into the world and other people sort of feeling that effect and then creating their own things. We're all very collective. But no fundamental basis, it was very simple it was, I can't stay up and drink anymore, because I have to get up early. And this is a more important commitment. And therefore, if I do drink, and I don't get up early, it throws me off of my commitment of what I want to become and my long term vision. And I've really understood in what's up one of the main things I help people with in a specific way is how to set your your core Montreux, your values of who you want to become. And then align your long term visions and your 100 day visions and your daily actions and all of the foundational habits, all in one line with each other. So that they're not You know, alignment and intention being all over the board, it's like, if the things that you're doing with your habits are in support of your daily actions, which are in support of the things on your vision board, which are in support of this person that you want to become long term, then you're going to make progress in that direction. And I think his system was just, let's create a sacred space, let's breathe a little bit, let's move our body. And let's take a little bit of time to think about who we are and what we want to become, and how we're going to do that those simple things are just the foundation of everything still to this day, and I think it's, you can do that on a personal level, then you can also do that on a business level or in a creative level, but you can't, I don't think you can be truly happy or flourishing or successful. Without being personally, you know, in there, you know, like you have to, you have to be able to say, oh, all this chaos is happening. And I'm not going to give my energy to that. That's what makes you happy. Right? It's sitting around a fire looking at people in the eyes and saying, I love you, and I'm enjoying this fire. Not Oh, I really wish we could sit here longer because I got to go to work tomorrow. And I'm just really worried about it. It's like, how often can you be in the moment and realise like, Oh, that's a beautiful tree. I wonder. I wonder how long this tree has been here. I wonder who planted this tree? Did it? Did it fall from this other tree over here? This a little bit bigger? What is the lineage of this? And how many people walked by this tree a day? And how many people notice that it's here? It's like, so yeah, that that morning foundation? Everything?

Tony Winyard 26:31

Boy, is it? I mean, obviously, the last 12 months has been very different for most people around the world. So so maybe not so much the last 12 months, but the last 24 months? What kinds of things have you been doing?

Heath Armstrong 26:45

I've been going really heavily inward with the development of, of myself, in the last 24 months has come really heavily from the contemplation of death, really. I did go through some pretty intense ceremonies with indigenous cultures and try and the Mayan thing really changed a lot for me. But what it did was it sent me into a really hardcore analysis, or I guess a leading analysis is such a weird word, a leading into soul, like Who are we? And what's the purpose of being here. And that led me into doing a lot more things with nature. And I was able to learn so much about fire, water, air Earth, and how all of these elements actually, we're completely dependent on them. But we actually are then right where it's, they're all a part of us. And so how can we pay attention to that? And so I spent a lot of time last year. And because the wildfires are so bad on the west, where I was living, I mean, it was intense, like it was these elements are right in front of your face. I was spending time in bodies of water, meditating. And then I would get out of the bodies of water. And I would, and I would let that wind hit my skin and be like, oh, like this is now I feel this wind on my skin because my skin's wet from the water. They're working together in unison How do I warm myself up now? Like, oh, you build a fire, you sit by this fire, you build yourself up? And then Okay, how do you replenish yourself? Well, you're sitting on the earth. And it just starts to you start to realise that there's really nothing to freak out about, right? You're You're cradled you are part of something extraordinary. And we've almost as humans, forgotten that we're part of the earth. And a lot of my health transition and the things that I've been doing and even helping people out with this past year have been around earthing, like how do you spend more time on earth? How do you take your shoes off and go run through the forests, you know, rip your clothes off, run through the forest, climb an apple tree in the rainstorm and swing down into the puddles of mud like to say, a glorious elixir of Earth and stop, stop worrying and stop. Stop trying so hard to figure things out. Because it's been, it's been sentimental, it's like death is really your best friend. It's the only constant reminder of, of how important each moment is. And I think that when we learned that death can be our teacher, it can be our our friend, it can be our Guru, it can be our wisdom, then we're able to understand that each one of these moments that we have is really important. And we should be telling people that we love them instead of fighting with them. And we should be having conversations that are meaningful in creating things and doing things that make our hair stand up and excite us. So that's been a lot of my journey the past two years, from a spiritual side, but on the physical sort of productive side of things I've been, I've been pretty pulled back from writing and creativity, but way more intentful when I'm doing it, and so I was able to create another affirmation deck and I actually worked with an amazing woman to build a journaling system. I'm for diabetics, to guide them through creating habits in their life and setting their vision to to alleviate stress, which would then lower your blood glucose levels, which was a really cool project because I'm not diabetic, and she is and she had a company where she coaches diabetics. She, she has a coming out party, like a diabetic, actually. And she presented it to me because she had used my happiness journaling system and was like, I really want to make a version of this for for diabetics. And so that was a cool project too. And then I've just been having deep conversations, Tony, and like asking questions and spending a lot of time in medicine spaces and, and playing sound bowls and stuff like that, because I've found that it's the most alleviating thing for stress or anxiety, which I really rarely ever have anymore. Honestly.

Tony Winyard 30:52

Just come back to the you mentioned just now about the happiness journal and the diabetic journal, you want to tell us a bit more about that and how that came about?

Heath Armstrong 31:00

Yeah, so the happiness journal was I made in 2017, after I met Amber, and then I met how and then I met Paul and I started podcasting and introduced like interviewing people and just asking questions, a lot of things started to unfold. And I met people in an opportunities exploded, and I tried a lot of things, I failed a lot of projects that I thought could work, I didn't know what was going to end up working. But the one thing that that really started, I unders started to understand was I did create a business, I did a bunch of, you know, crazy numbers and sales and things like that, that ultimately led to me not not increasing my happiness at all, right? When you get more money, like, did it and then I wasn't in alignment with it. So it was all falling apart. And I had to go through that as well. Like, wow, I created this thing that that was incredible. I was doing like six figure months. And then I, I don't want to contribute to this, like what it's doing within the world. It's not my highest self. And now I have to go through that. The other side of it was, I'm looking at all these habits, and I'm putting them into my life. And I want to be able to help other people do this. But I was still scared. I did not realise that when you start to help other people so much. That's the real only true form of abundance. And when you talk about happiness to this day, if anyone asked me a question like, what's the number one thing that will increase your happiness, help people go out and help people without expectation? Help people without expecting anything in return, like paint, because you love painting, not because you want someone to buy it. In, it's just, I put all of those habits in a journaling system. And my dog I was I had all these six different journals I was carrying around one was like I was tracking, I was getting gifts every day and tracking a journal to like to log how it made me feel. Anyone who wants to learn more about that. There's an amazing book called 29 gifts by Cammy. Walker, she had an autoimmune disease that affected her very painfully and nothing was helping her happiness or to feel good. And she went through this really incredible transformation of gift giving. And it's all about her story. And it's really good, but I was doing what she was doing, essentially. And it was incredible. And my dog that was just one of the journaling systems, I was keeping my dog peed all over these journals one day for no reason in the house. And it was weird, because my coach had been telling me you need to put these into one journaling system for others to use, and I was being resistant to it. And I went down there to meditate. And it was just like all this dog pee all over my journals. And it was awful. And I was like, Well, I guess that's a sign from the universe that I need to put all these into one journaling system. And so I did. And I created an actual AMPM sort of system that people could use. And it was called the sweet ass journal to develop your happiness muscle in 100 days. And then that went out into the world. And I expected maybe like three or four people maybe to get it that were in my family. But it actually took off and did decently well for someone who had never written anything or put anything out. And, you know, I ended up selling 1000s of those. And then people started coming back and giving me feedback and like telling me about their transformations. And it was just like, Whoa, this is real abundance, like this is real magic. And that that rolled into the diabetic journal system. Two years after that, which had a rough, a little bit more of a rough launch, because we tried to launch it right in March of 2020, which, as we all know, was a tough, tough time to do anything but still nonetheless, it's it's it's a cool project.

Tony Winyard 34:36

So the happiness journal you what actually how does it How does it help people? What can you be more specific about what was in the happiness journal?

Heath Armstrong 34:44

Yeah, so there's it walks you through, creating a vision of who you want to become and essentially setting your three visions over a 100 day period. I've actually built this out into a much more in depth system that I'm getting ready to launch for free soon. But this this journaling system in particular, you set your your short term visions essentially over 100 day period. And the reason that I use 100 days is because I saw a lot of overlap with people that I really respected that were using 100 day periods to track goals, bringing something to life, because you can track each day by 1%. So it really translates to, you could create a spreadsheet and have these habits that you're working on at the top, and you have 100 days to going down the column. And every day you wake up and you look at these habits, you're like, Okay, I'm going to do this, today, I'm going to I'm going to take this step forward. And if one of those habits is actually doing two things that day to move towards your vision, and you're tracking it over 100 days, it can be very effective, because you're constantly thinking about it. So you set your vision, and then it's an am and pm format, where you wake up in the morning. And if you implement something like your morning routine, like how Elrod teaches in the Miracle Morning, you go through different exercises, which is a weird word. So I kind of like to call them like freedom actions, or whatever. But you start with gratitude and sort of thinking about things that make you smile, which brings back that sort of warm, fuzzy feeling of like, actually, there is a lot around me, that's, that's good, because we talked about earlier how pessimism is a is a really big thing that people can get sucked into. And from the gratitude practice, then you go into extra stuff around idea generation. And that's really just to keep your mind juicing in different areas, it's not necessarily to have an expectation of it's going to produce some idea that's going to change your life, it's more about your thinking, your thinking your keeping yet that that mind working and that muscle building. And then it walks you through a programme of eliminating distractions, physically and mentally. Because minimalism in a physical form changed everything for me when I got rid of 1761 items that I owned in my transformation. And there's two very simple ways that anyone can go through a physical transformation of minimalism. And one of them is just the fun way that I did it was I started on day one, and you go from day one to day 30. And on day one, you get rid of one thing that is not contributing absolute value to your life, and who you want to become. And on day two, you get rid of two more things. And the goal is to get over that hump of resistance of the first five days of you the attachments you have to your things. Because really, we are attached to them, but they own us, right, like we spend our time cleaning them, updating them, paying money for them. It's like, all of this stuff that we do goes to our stuff like they, they own us, we don't own them. And you get through that hump, and it just starts to feel so clean. And so decluttered. And you get this like fire going of like, Oh, this is this is nice, because when you remove all that stuff, you create space for things that actually matter to you. And you can get your life down to a point of only interacting with, it's not just material things, right? It's people that are around you, and things that you're paying attention to books that you're reading, only interacting with things that are in alignment, and helping you become this higher version of yourself that you want. So you go through this, this minimalism game, you go all the way through day 30, I actually ended up going today 56 or 57, because I had so much stuff. And I would take a picture of everything that I was getting rid of, so that I could like log it. And then after that, it's it's a gift giving. So that's based off of Cammy Walker's thing, it's just what can I What can I do today? What kind of gift Can I give today? or How can I be of service today and you're journaling about it doesn't mean that you have to go buy a cake for someone, you know, you could you could legitimately just smile at someone on the street who looks upset, because that can change their day, it can change everything. It's an exchange. And that in itself, that gift giving part, if you do nothing else, like I said before, if you if you try to be of service in one way every single day and you journal about it, it's going to change your life positively no doubt, it's going to make you think differently. And it's going to allow you to create space to become a better person and that person that you want to be to be in alignment with.

So and then the other main thing on the am side is you you pick two things every single day that you are going to accomplish to move towards that vision that you said at the beginning of the journaling system. And so I did that before I had the journals with a note card. Like I watched this old incredible Earl Nightingale video called the Strangest Secret it's for free on YouTube, I suggest everyone watch it. And I, I was taking a note card every single day and I was writing my vision on one side and I would flip it over. And I would write two things I was going to do that day to move towards that vision. And that principle is put into the journaling system. Because it's a reminder, just like anything else, vision boards, all this stuff that we've been talking about all this stuff that you always talk about you. You're constantly reminding yourself of who you want to become and therefore when you're not thinking about it, you're subconsciously going to be able to make decisions in life. With that action, and then on the pm side of things, you're celebrating the stuff that you did for the day, one of the main things that I noticed people were doing that was actually really helping them that I was sceptical of, but then I started doing it was like, Oh, this is cool, is writing down everything that you do throughout the day. Everything I mean brushing your teeth, putting your shoes on, at the end of the day, sit down and write down everything that you remember doing throughout the day, because you do so much more than you could possibly imagine. And you have so much more time than you think. And that that space isn't even big enough to get everything down, I noticed that I was like, I need like two pages for this every single day. So the celebration thing is really cool. And then there's a preparation for the next morning, which is something how teaches, it's what are the two things I'm going to do tomorrow to work towards my vision, right and in knowing that before you go to sleep, alleviates a lot of stress when you wake up and you're like, Where's my coffee, I don't know what I'm doing today, what's important, you already know, like, you've already taught your brain, Okay, I'm gonna wake up and this is the thing I'm going to accomplish today. And it doesn't have you know, if you can only do one thing, great. But just do something, do anything. Because if you're taking that baby step, it takes you a long way. And then there's a reflection section where essentially, you're sort of reflecting on your journey and how far you've come. And I think that's, that's always really important. And it's just a more extended version of the celebrating in itself. And so the system walks you through 100 days, essentially, of doing these things, and you're sort of tracking how it changes your life. And, and people really pertain to different sections I've found in the study of happiness. In particular, I've done a lot more like scientific study with it, since I put that journaling system out. And certain things appeal to other people in different ways. Right. But the one thing that across the board has been a very consistent thing and studies of feedback has been the gift giving and the taking the taking action, obviously, but the gift giving as well.

Tony Winyard 41:56

What about how do you handle a situation when people feel that they're not able to join it on a consistent basis, they for whatever reason, they feel that they can't they don't remember to do it daily, or whatever the case may be?

Heath Armstrong 42:11

Yeah, that's, that's me, right? That's a lot of us. I, the journaling system that I made is actually built as a kind of a mosaic where you can draw or colour or write one big word or write a lot of small words, it's meant specifically to not feel like a journaling system. For that reason, I don't want it to look like a workbook or whatever. I have a little tracker at the bottom of it that says you are at you know, if you're on day three, it says you were 3% done with developing this happiness muscle over 100 days. But it's not a daily journal. So you don't do you don't have to do it every single day in a row. It's great people have done it, they've told me that they did it. But like I couldn't do that. Because there are days when you get thrown off. And then if you get thrown off, you don't want to feel like you're behind now. Because when you start feeling like you're behind, then you don't go back into it. And then you just abandon the whole thing. So I think with anything that you do, if you have a 100 day period, and you show up one day, and you do something towards your vision out of that 100 day period, it's better than showing up zero days, right. So if you show up 30 days, out of 100 days, you're still at a 30% success. But you have 70 more days throughout that near future to be able to work through that. If anyone feels like you can't journal every day, and you can't do that type of thing. It's all about breaking your habit of hesitation. Everyone is on a different scale of what type of time we have how much time we have you have kids you have jobs, you might have multiple jobs. It's it's Can you can you find 10 minutes a day to breathe and think about who you are and what you're doing with your intent. And it could come in the form of journaling, it could come in the form of exercise running outside, you know, going on a jog, it could come in the form of reading something inspirational in a book or having a really good conversation with someone, it doesn't always have to be the same thing. As long as you're you're reminding yourself of who you are in in, you're doing things that are in alignment with that. So overwhelm is a gremlin that tries to stop you from being creative. And it's resistance and resistance is the death of creativity in the depth of ourselves. And the more we can work on breaking our habit of hesitating, the more we can overcome resistance and I think breaking your habit of hesitating comes from training. Like you have to wake up and say, okay, no matter what excuses is here, I'm going to write one word in this journal today. Or I'm going to put my shoes on I'm going to go on that walk. First thing no matter what, like don't think about it, you get five seconds to count down and you do it. And the better you get at that the better you can get at overcoming any obstacle that comes your way. And that's the most simple thing I could give advice around that about I think

Tony Winyard 44:48

I'm wondering what brings you flow What do you get completely lost in time just flies by and you don't even realise

Heath Armstrong 44:55

climbing mountains like legitimate, going out in nature and walking through the woods. I think we absorb a lot of energy from this world, you know, there's emfs everywhere that are coming into our body. And if you do take your shoes off and you do stand outside, you're absorbing more electrons than you could possibly get by eating blueberries all day, these electrons add, they act like antioxidants, I should say, you could get more electrons acting as antioxidants, then you could get antioxidants from eating blueberries all day. And what antioxidants do in your body is they are able to balance free radicals. Free radicals are the cells that are out of balance that are really, they're really attacking and causing havoc and creating inflammation and electrons are magical, because they can lend a charge to a free radical imbalance that without damaging itself. And so if you have this unlimited supply of these coming directly from nature, but we're spending 95% of our life with our rubber shoes on sitting in, you know, this high rise that I'm in, and not being connected to earth at all, it's no wonder why we have so much inflammation and why our minds aren't working and why we're depressed and why we're not creative and, and why we're, you know, our neurological systems aren't working correctly. So for me, it's not only the fascination of walking in nature and seeing like life like this is this is all happening on its own without humans helping it like nature is happening regardless, we are a part of it, but we forget that it's also Wow, this is the most meditative thing I can be doing is noticing this and walking, I get lost in it. This actually inputs all of my creativity, it connects me to my muse, I get the best ideas when I'm in nature. I come back from doing something like climbing a mountain or backpacking in the woods or whatever in and I'm just like in this serene state of calmness, like oh, that's always there. Like we can always go back there and do it. It's just so much of us haven't done it. So that's what I've been getting lost in and writing as well. Obviously creating things that this this new vision system that I've been working on is really exciting that I've been getting really getting real lost into for sure.

Tony Winyard 47:15

Do you read much?

Heath Armstrong 47:17

Yeah, a lot.

Tony Winyard 47:18

Hold that kind of stuff to read.

Heath Armstrong 47:21

Mostly nonfiction. Although I do read some fiction, but it's I like really dark fiction for some reason. I love Cormac McCarthy books and I, I've been just really in the philosophical realm mostly in the last couple years. A lot of a lot of mechanics, a lot of Alan Watts ROM das, I really enjoy boot koski to for his writing techniques, but he's also quite quite a maniac. But there's, there's a lot of really good stuff. I I'm the type of person that has 20 books open at a time. And I'm not like, sometimes they take me years to get through. But at some of them I'll finish in like a week or a couple of days if I get really into one and I don't pull myself away from it. So

Tony Winyard 48:07

if you would, can you think of a book that's really captivated you in some way in the last few months? years? Something that you'd recommend me to listen? Or to read?

Heath Armstrong 48:18

Yeah. Yeah. So I was in Indonesia, and I was with this amazing, wonderous dude, his name is Justin fairman. He actually runs. It's called flow consciousness Institute, where he teaches people a lot of different amazing, like, effective creative people how to flow better with life. And he has this magazine. And it's I think it's called flow consciousness magazine and might have a different name. I think that's it, though. And so he gets all of these people sending him these books that what they want them to feature in the magazine. And he was telling me when I was in Indonesia with him, we were talking about books and reading. And he was like, we were asking the question about, like, what has been the most impactful book, and at the time, I was telling him, it was mainly Steven pressfield stuff for me, like, turning pro by Steven pressfield was one of the biggest catalysts for me to like, stop, stop dicking around and start actually taking action and like being even more effective than I thought I was already being. And he was like, Yeah, well, I get all these books, and they just sit in the corner of my place. There's just stacks and stacks of them. He's like, every day, I just kept like, looking over at these books. And this one just kept standing out to me. And so he's like, then I read it. And, and it's like, it's just, I don't even know how to explain the story of it. Other than it is the hero's journey, essentially, but I just feel like you need to read this book. And I was like, oh, okay, cool. And so he he gave me this, this book, and it's called the immortal self and it's by Gary Vee, injure him. modra and This book is about a journey of a guy who was, you know, in the United States who started getting all these weird universal signs that he needed to go to the Himalayas. And like, everyone thought he was crazy. And it's a true story. And he would have dreams. And he would see commercials and all these signs. And he was like, What is this thing? Why, like, I need to go out here and do this. And he went on this exploration, and I won't get into the extreme details about it. But he goes out there. And he's, you know, he finds this monk in a cave. And like, it just goes, it goes from there into this unbelievable life transformation. And now, Ravindra is a, he is a wisdom keeper of the Marta masters, which are a spiritual group of masters that are said to have lived in the Himalayas somewhere that aren't accessible unless you can get there via spirit realm with help. He teaches about this in orc Island, I think is where he lives now in Washington. But the story is like, unbelievable, and you're reading it, and you're like, it's so detailed in magical that it can't be made up, you know, you're just like, this is this is channelling from somewhere. And this is an experience, this guy was actually having whether he was in a trance laying in his bed, or he was actually in the Himalayas, which is what he, he claims. It was happening regardless, either in that spiritual realm or the physical realm, or both simultaneously. So I read this book. And it's, it's incredibly impactful. But I was also like, wow, these universal signs that I keep picking up, because I have a lot of those things happen to me. And then I follow them. And then it leads me to this person who changes my life, you know, and it happens over and over to me. And that's part of flow, right? Well, I met my acupuncturist. She's just magical, because this woman had actually, she rode her bike across the country, and then like ended up in, in Nepal, and she wasn't planning on being an acupuncturist. But she also had an interaction with someone out there that led her on to helping set up acupuncture clinics in Nepal. And now she, she brought back all these sound bowls like handmade Tibetan sound bowls, and she set up and like, she's just this wondrous healing woman. And I was doing a session with her. And I started to tell her about this book, because she said to me, you're not seeing with both your eyes, you need to have your other eye open. And I was like, Oh, I'm starting to do that. Because I'm seeing the signs that I have this book, and I start to just get into the very beginning of that book. And she goes, she interrupts me. And she's like, Oh, that sounds a lot like my friend. And she tells me this whole story about her friend, who is not arvinder han modra. And the story was almost exactly the same as what was in the book, just like a little, you know, obviously, some details different, but it was mind blowing to me, because I'm like, how did that all come? Full Circle? And I was like, Well, I don't know what to tell you now, because you just described the book. She was like, really? She's like, that's my friend. He He's really like, cool, dude, you should you should meet him sometime. I was like, but it's not Ravindra, the guy who wrote the book, like, no. So that book is really really special if anyone is interested in a good read.

Tony Winyard 53:06

And is that is that widely available in that book?

Heath Armstrong 53:09

Yeah, I believe it's on. I know, it's on Amazon in the US. But it's a I think it was carried by. Sounds true publishing, maybe? It should be you should be able to find this for sure. Okay, well,

Tony Winyard 53:24

I'll put I'll put it, I'll put it in the show notes. If I if I can find links to.

Heath Armstrong 53:28

Yeah, if we can find

Tony Winyard 53:30

that. Cool. Okay. And if people want to find out more about you and connect with you, where would they go to?

Heath Armstrong 53:38

Yeah, if anyone ever has really wants to reach out and has questions or anything, I'm open, total open book, you can direct message me directly on Instagram, at Heath fist pumps. And as far as my work Heath Armstrong comm will get you pretty much to anything that you could want. rage. create.com is where we make the affirmation decks and things like that. Both of those sites, our new sites are coming up very soon for both of them. So I'm excited for that. But and then I'm just yeah, never stopped peaking podcast, and I'm working on a new one called 62nd power affirmations, which are just like quick little two to three minute. I know. It's funny because it's titled 60 seconds. That's the affirmation part. There are little meditations that I'm doing. That'll be out soon that I think really help people with breathing and mindset. That's been a good fun project recently.

Tony Winyard 54:31

And the sort of podcasts you mentioned, what what kind of 40 do you interview people? Is it just you sort of telling stories? What was the podcast about?

Heath Armstrong 54:39

Yeah, it's a mixture of solo episodes. There's there's a lot of storytelling. There is a lot of interviewing as well or like deeper conscious type conversations, but it's really just another method of motivation for creative minds. I dive deeply into subjects around spirituality. A lot The stuff we talked about today vision to reality, even get into plant medicine, and psychedelics a little bit, although I am 100% certain that the most psychedelic thing you could ever do is complete sobriety. And so no one should actually, I don't, I'm not an advocate to say that anyone should go out and go find, you know, I asked in the middle of a Mexican jungle and have some life changing experience, then, although I've been there, and I've done those types of things, I also really understand that you can get there by a lot of different aspects and that that mainly, the quickest and most impactful way I think, is through just deep adaptation and sobriety. But yeah, lots of different topics, lots of fun stuff. And it's, it's kind of it's kind of mania, honestly, it's it's about personal optimization and human health as well. So yeah.

Tony Winyard 55:52

And just before we finish eighth and I believe you've got a quotation that equally like

Heath Armstrong 55:59

I do, I have one that I've been loving lately and it's john O'Donoghue. And it's really around embodying your work, right? And what you're doing with your life. This can come on a very, very miniscule scale of what you're doing with yourself or other people, but it's made that made the sacredness of your work, bring healing, light and renewal, to those who work with you and those who see and receive your work. And I just love that I also love when the going gets weird, the weird turn pro by Hunter S. Thompson, but it's another energy right?

Tony Winyard 56:33

And the john Donahue one, what is it? Why does that resonate with you?

Heath Armstrong 56:38

I think it's a reminder of, of being just bringing sacredness to everything and ceremony and you don't pray for rain, right? You pray rain, something taught, Eric always says, You remove this space that you think this thing is divine, or you think that that nature is, is this heavenly thing, or you think that this other person is better than you. And it's not like we're all just, we're all the same. We're all kind of just different projections of each other at different times, fading in and out. And it reminds me to not allow any of that, that yuck to get into the things that I'm doing and to remember that it's all very sacred. And it's not just for you, but it's for bringing light and healing and renewal to everyone else as well. And therefore, when I sit down to write something, you know, I'm in alignment with who I want to be. And that's, that's somebody who's helping other people and I don't go off and other tangents that are complaining or talking about what's wrong with the world or pointing out all the bad stuff. It's just a reminder to always, always be self centred, or to always be centred in the beauty of the self and how things start internally not to be not to be self centred. It's like a selfish way.

Tony Winyard 57:51

Oh, hey, it's an hour and she's flown by. So thank you very much for your time, and I really appreciate you coming on the episode.

Heath Armstrong 58:00

I really appreciate it too. And it was a lot of fun. So thank you so much.

Tony Winyard 58:07

Next week, episode nine with Dr. Gabriela Fundaro. She has a PhD in human nutrition in foods and exercise. She's qualified in exercise sport, in health education, a health coach, her list of qualifications, we'd be here for the next couple of hours just reading them all!. It's it's a really interesting episode. She's got some great information, talking about body image and nutrition and health and we go deep into similar areas. So that's Dr. Gabriela Fundaro. Have you enjoyed this week's episode with Heath Armstrong if you know anyone who would get some value from some of the information that is shared? Please, do share the episode with them. Maybe send a screenshot of the image to them with the link or whatever. Please do subscribe, leave a review and hope you have a great week.

Transcribed by https://otter.ai