If you allow the world to do its thing, and you work hard and you dream big, your purpose ends up aligning with your passion, or your passion ends up aligning with your purpose. Comparisons are so evil. Never compare yourself to someone else like You'll see our Caleb the CEO, and it's like you would absolutely hate to live my life, But guess what, I absolutely love it. You know what
you should be doing. You should be measuring your day in terms of happiness and putting it both in a short term and long term perspective.
Welcome to the Seas the Yay Podcast. Busy and happy are not the same thing. We too rarely question what makes the heart seeing. We work, then we rest, but rarely we play and often don't realize there's more than one way. So this is a platform to hear and explore the stories of those who found lives. They adore, the good, bad and ugly. The best and worst day
will bear all the facets of seizing your yay. I'm Sarah Davidson or Spoon Full of Sarah, a lawyer turned funentrepreneurs swapped the suits and heels to co found matcha Maiden and matcha Milkbar. CZA is a series of conversations on finding a life you love and exploring the self doubt, challenge,
joy and fulfillment along the way. It's always such a pleasure to join podcast forces, and after having an absolute blast on Trapeka's podcast a couple of weeks ago, this week we've turned the tables on CEO and co founder Caleb Marshall, leading one of Australia's fastest growing and largest health food companies with fourteen thousand five star reviews and an ever growing range of amazing products. Caleb is well
and truly seizing his ya. As we so often reiterate on the show, you could very easily assume it's been smooth sailing if you'd been observing Trepeka's impressive trajectory since
twenty sixteen. But even I was surprised by how candidly Caleb discusses the tougher chapters of his path YAY, particularly throughout his school years and then losing three and a half years of his twenties to a debilitating struggle with chronic fatigue, but the patient's self awareness and positivity he brings to reframing that experience as a positively life changing pivot is sure to reassure not just fellow chronic illness sufferers, but anyone out there waiting for their passion and purpose
to become clear. I love how much I learned from each guest and their perspectives on life, and he particularly reminds me just how important it is to stick with the wild and wacky things you love, because what makes you happy might make others desperately unhappy, and vice versa. But that is the whole point of seizing your yea. It's not meant to look like anyone else's. I hope you guys enjoy as much as I did. Caleb, Welcome to Seize the AA.
Sarah, lovely to be here, Thanks for having.
Me, Thank you for swapping sides. I dropped on your pod The Who this podcast a couple of weeks ago, and it's nice to have the tables turned.
I just realized how much nicer sees the YA sounds than whodious rough like, even when you just said it then, I don't hear that. I don't hear the title too often. It's like I felt icky about my own podcast just then. But our guests are amazing, including you. We had an amazing time. It was fantastic. So hopefully if I can replicate even fifty percent of the quality that came out of your mouth during that podcast, I'll be a happy man.
Oh that's so kind.
And unfortunately we don't have a spiral in a challenge segment in this podcast, so I don't know if it's going to live up to yours because that was so
much fun. But my icebreaker and my version of your spiral in a challenge before we kick off, is just to ask everyone what the most down tour thing is about them, to break through the sort of external identity that is created, even if you're not trying to hide parts of yourself or trying to portray a particular identity, when you're known through your business, and particularly in your case, your business is great success, I think it's often harder to see, you know, the person behind it all. So
what's something really normal about you? I mean, you just shared something with me that I think is incredibly down to it.
What was that? The studying of demographics? We had like five weird conversations, but.
It was the head.
Oh, the head of course, Yeah, I mean no, that's just a normal run of a meal thing. For me. So I've got this big cut. I've actually I just moved in my video camera a bit closer so everyone can inspect this if they're looking by a video. But I got this gouge in my forehead at the moment, and it's anything but yeah, I mean it brings the
humility back into my life for sure. So every morning I do like either cold showers or I put some cold water on my face to get going, among many other biohacks I do in the morning, which I'm more than happy to talk about. And this one was just like a case of like you want to talk about,
like overworking and just not recovering properly. This was like me putting my head to my hands with cold water, but instead of lifting my hands up from the cold water from the tap, I've just done a full head butt of my tap in my bathroom and gouged out a bit in my forehead. It looks a whole lot better today than three days ago. So yeah, my girlfriend was a bit worried at the time, but yeah, I'm alive and well.
I love it. It's just such a shit story. It's like this massive battle wound that could have this awesome backstory, Like I was I don't know, playing paintball and I did a commando role and I got my head cut on a knife or something, and it's like, nah, I just was washing my face and I just couldn't do it because yeah, I just malfunctioned as a human.
I remember in year seven at school, like you're starting high school and it was pretty early on in the first term and I got this wasp bite. Like I was playing out in the bushes and I was collecting like a ball from one of the bushes. This was at home, like over the weekend, and I got stung by a wasp right next to my eye, Like I can't even imagine what would happen if it actually stung my like my pupil or whatnot. And my god, Yeah.
Has anyone ever been stung in the pupil before?
Is it? I don't know. But I don't even want to google or google image it because that's one of those things what you what you have seen, cannot be unseen, so I won't do that. But anyway, it made my eye puff up like crazy, and I had to go to school on the Monday, and it was this exact situation again, but like I'm I'm twelve years old in year seven, Like I'm not admitting no way am I admitting, Like I just got stung by like a wasp. So I came up with some elaborate.
Story sypathetic exactly.
So I came up with some elaborate story that I got into a fight, which every teacher would have been like, oh god, this kid is like no wonder like the teachers thought I was just a bit of a dickhead from the start. If I'm making up stories that I got in some fight as a little year seven kid that like was the complete opposite of ever being able to throw a punch in his life. So it was, Yeah, it was. I just remember that. That's one of my haunted stories in the past where the truth is always
most important in life. You just come out if you're any and you bang your head and your head butt your tap in your bathroom, you say you don't make up anything.
Else totally, you just own it. I actually think back to high school a lot, and I'm like, I just used to make up so much shit, and I can't believe either people actually believed it or I just was walking around thinking everyone believed it. But actually everyone was just like she just totally made that up.
What I did before Trapeke, I was a tennis coach, so I coached a lot of kids, like coached everyone five to fifty five, but a lot in terms of you know, those younger kids and I just make up stories all the time. My favorite thing was actually the run with their stories and make their stories better and encourage them to then go and make their stories more elaborate to their friends and just see if they could pull it off. Like I had a kid who loved to talk it up in terms of like his brother
played for Wimbledon and all these kind of things. Brother didn't even play tennis, it played cricket. And I just remember like just having fun with these kids who would just like come and start turning porky's and you'd know it was a bit of a lie, but instead of calling them out on it, like let their imagination go
wild and just create some elaborate, creative story. By the time that I left tennis coaching, I think that kid had traveled to every single continent on the planet, including Antiogica, and his brother was a world champion not only in tennis, but like in Jiu jitsu and all of that. Like it, Ah, absolutely and he loved it.
Multi talented brother.
Well, that actually leads me into our first section, your Wayta, which is tracing back through all those chapters that people don't hear about as much because obviously the more recent
successes are generally how people introduced to your life. But I think it's so important to go back and, you know, remind everyone that you were a kid in year seven, ones who didn't know what you wanted to do, and that before Trepeka, there was a whole career in tennis coaching during which I'm sure you had no idea that this was going to be in your future. So take us all the way back to the very beginning, to
young Klee, when you were a kid. Because I also find that sometimes we veer off on lots of different pathways, but often what we come back to, in terms of finding our passion or our purpose or our yay or whatever you want to call it, kind of makes sense when you look at what you used to do as a child, when you were unburdened by societal norms and concepts of success and money and climbing ladders and being impressive.
So what were you like as a kid, what was the first job you thought you wanted to do?
And yeah, take us through each chapter from there.
Yeah, I love that. I mean, I firstly want to say I've been a big admirer from you from a distance. I mean this whole purpose and passion and the importance of following it, like there's no bigger believer than myself and that and to have someone like you spreading that word like is truly amazing. We need more of that in this world. I think when you go back to like Caleb, as a kid, like I was very blessed with having like hard working parents that kind of showed
me the value of hard work. So my dad was a build I grew up like working on the building site and being around those kind of people. I played a lot of sports, so I knew the value of like training hard and hard work through sport. And I was also like, I wouldn't just I'd question everything. I wouldn't just like assume or go with the flow. Like I've always been one who's seen a lot of people with an opinion about something and then not just taking
it for face value. And I grew up with that and obviously got me into trouble as well as a kid doing that and having an opinion, which I actually don't mind. I think we need to provide environments where kids are a lot more free to express how they feel and question things and have a questioning mindset. But yeah, like young Caleb was interesting. Like I mean, I was
also especially into high school. I was bullied a lot because I was a geek, like back in two thousand and three when it was cool to hang out on the internet and do computer based staff especially. I went to an or guys school, so it was like a dog eat dog world. But I was also into sports, so I'd hang out with the sporty guys. But I was also a geek, and I was underage, and I was insecure, and I got a fair bit of bullying
that didn't make my high school years as enjoyable. And it wasn't until I kind of went into a new environment I left high school and went into say like the university years, that I was able to flourish and I was able to kind of enjoy being who I truly was, which was a guy that was into like computers, into the Internet, into all of these kind of what was seen as geeky things to do back in you know,
those early two thousands. I'm still in contact with one of the teachers from my high school who encouraged me in this path in like year seven, and I thank him. I've thanked him a number of times since leaving high school because of the impact that he made that you know, he was a bit of a quote unquote loser teacher as well, you know, kids would make fun of him, right, but he encouraged me and he sowed those seeds into me about the internet, about technology, and now I run
one of Australia's largest e commerce companies. And it was because of those early seeds that people planted in my life that encouraged me to follow my passion. And by following your passion, it turns into the opportunity to find your purpose, which is why I thanked you for the work that you're doing, because it's people like you, and it's people like my teacher in year seven that plant seeds of finding your passion that that then leads into your purpose. You mentioned as well, like what did I
want to be when I was younger? I mean, originally I wanted to be a carpenter because I was on the job site and I was seeing my dad and I love woodwork. Chippy, yeah, chippy exactly. I don't know how i'd go as a chippy these days, but I was encouraged even through high school to do the subjects that I actually genuinely enjoyed. Don't worry about your final mark in year twelve, like do things that you genuinely love. So everything that I studied in year twelve i've done since.
So accept woodworking ironically because I didn't become a chippy. I'll save that to retirement.
But you did woodworking in your I did wood.
Work woodworking in year twelve. So I made my mom a edwarding and dressing table that's her pride and joy at her house. And they pretty much just conned me into it. They're like, we're buying you the timber, make mum something nice. And I wanted to make a pool table or something for me. They're like, we ain't spending two thousand dollars on timber for you to go and make anything other than your mom addressing table. So made that very very grateful for that and my mum's appreciation
of it. So look, I did pe in year twelve and I became a Tannis coach and I love sport. I did business and I'm doing business now. Maths and English you've got to do, but you do that as a as a business person. I did German. I studied the German language, and I went and had a semester in the Berlin during university, which was like my favorite time of my life except for now. You know, I'm always thinking the current is the most amazing time. But if I look back at a time, I absolutely loved
my time in Berlin. So all of these subjects I did, and I followed my passion for it, and it led into my purpose, which I do today. The funny thing is I sat there in year eleven in high school at the career's night, and I listened to a guy that was an importer and exporter, and I'm like, oh,
that's so cool. I just loved the the global nature of it, like, well, you can bring products from overseas and sell them here, and like I'd only been overseas to Fiji, which at this time like up until the age of twenty, and I've traveled heaps now, been to every continent except Antarctica. As I mentioned, in that job.
I was going to say, you're just making shit out exactly.
You haven't been anywhere exactly, And did I mention my brothers actually played Wimbledon?
Not sure and at BJ exactly. I mean, I know that Charlie were talking about was you for sure exactly?
I'm doing something. A psychologist could reflect on that and be like, this guy's just reflecting or mirroring his childhood desires on this kid, or so who's the messed up one In the end, it's me. So yeah, it goes full circle life. But I hadn't experienced that, and like in year eleven, I hadn't experienced that global traveling and seeing the world. I just I loved it. I loved
the sound of it. And it wasn't until a year or two into starting Tripete, and we started in twenty sixteen when I was bringing products in from overseas, superfoods from around the world, and I was exporting to all these customers around the world, and I'm like, oh my god, I've achieved what I wanted to do back in year eleven. I'm an importer and exporter and I just had this.
I had this amazing feeling of satisfaction where it's like, if you allow the world to do its thing and you work hard and you dream big, your purpose ends up aligning with your passion, or you could say it the other way around, your passion ends up aligning with your purpose. And it's special.
It is special, so special, so so special. But what I love about your story and I find so interesting is that in between there was a big intervening period where you lost the opportunity really to go on any pathway and to be productive in any kind of way towards any passion or any purpose. And that that might after UNI and starting to find a forum where you did feel a bit more yourself and you did start to sow really important seeds in twenty eleven, that kind
of all really that the whole forward motion stopped. And I imagine that that would have been reflecting straight after the exchange is one of the worst periods of your life where you were diagnosed with chronic and then for three and a half years before the twenty sixteen idea for Trapeka kind of came up, you were really wiped off being able to sort of do anything on your way toa So can you talk us through that because I think that's quite a common experience for people who
have gone into the world of wellness where they've had some kind of big health crisis that's forced them to acknowledge their limits to learn about good nutrition. But most of the time it's women. I haven't heard of many men who have run headlong into a chronic fatigue wall, but particularly not that's lasted and persisted for.
Sort of three years of their life.
And I imagine that during that time you would have lost focus completely on purpose and passion, just trying to be able to get up and go, you know, go to the toilet or eat food by yourself or sit up. How you couldn't even go out for your twenty first birthday. That's a massive diversion in your way toa that probably a lot of people don't know about.
That would have felt like this is the end of my life.
So talk to us about that period before now coming into the purpose that you have and how you got through it as well.
Yeah, well, okay, this could be a three hour conversation, but we'll condense it. Yeah. I went through hell and back a number of times for three and a half years. It was beyond painful. So chronic fatigues come a long way in the last ten years. This is twenty eleven, but in twenty eleven, chronic fatigue, I mean, it's an exclusionary illness, and it's a doctor's way of politely saying, I've got no idea what's wrong with you, and we hate CAYLB. We don't give you much hope of getting better.
I had chronic inflammation throughout my whole body every single day. I liken it to feeling like you've been hit by you know, when you have the flu really bad and you feel like you've been hit by the by a bus. I felt that all day, every day for three and a half years, just constant, constant, constant pain, flu like symptoms all the time. I couldn't run fifty meters without
feeling dizzy. Memory ReCore obviously wasn't their depressive thoughts, suicidal thoughts at times, and the big one a lack of so you know, you're when the medical establishment don't even know what's wrong with you and don't know how to diagnose you, and you put all your trust in them, then it doesn't lead to being able to generate any hope. And you know, the cliff notes on what I found out was the reason behind it. I actually went on
my own path of self discovery. I found an area of medicine called functional medicine or integrative medicine, which actually treats the body as a whole. And I've got some real heroes almost you could say, in the functional medicine space. That also leads into like the biohacking space, which is people who are like into longevity and want to get the most out of their life through dietary and nutritional
and lifestyle choices. Those guys led me onto the path of like realizing that there was hope, there was a way I could get healthy, and also showed me what it was that was the catalyst. So it was five years of antibiodic use for my skin, using antibiotics long term that destroyed my digestive track, caused dispios which is far more bad bacteria than good bacteria that it's not working in symbiosis. And when you do that, then you crash your immune system. They say somewhere between sixty to
eighty percent. Most say around seventy percent of your immune system is associated with your gut and the microbiome that's
within your gut, and I destroyed that completely. And then what was worse was when I started to feel really sick and I had flu like symptoms because my immune system was trashed, and I went to a range of GPS and unfortunately their understanding in twenty eleven of this kind of abuse of antibiotics and also the symptoms that come from it, they didn't know what the issue was back then as well, a whole decade ago, so a long time, and so they prescribed me further antibiotics for
my flu like symptoms, and so it made me even worse. So I went through absolute pain without a lot of hope, and I was flat broke riding around on a pushbike. I remember one of the worst occasions was writing down to Cohal's on my pushbike, absolutely flat broke with thirty bucks in my bank account. You know, it nearly makes me cry even today, like needing to buy enough groceries. It was the equivalent of probably fifty bucks worth, knowing
I only had thirty dollars. Absolutely chronically sick anxiety through the roof. So I had chronic anxiety, chronic social anxiety, which is all just your typical symptoms of having, you know, gut related issues. Obviously not all anxieties associated with that, but there's a lot of people that have a connection
between gut related issues and mental health. So you know, doctor Daniel Amen is an amazing and quite famous psychiatrist in the US that talks a lot about this, has some New York Times best selling books, So that applies to you. I definitely recommend you check for the listeners
doctor Daniel Amen. And so I just had this horrible social anxiety, horrible anxiety, horrible sickness, horrible physical symptoms, riding around on a pushbike while absolutely exhausted and flat broke, and I hit rock bottom, and I hit rock bottom for a long time, but there was something inside of me that still was like, you know what, like I can overcome, and I know I can overcome because there's people in the past that have overcome things far greater
than this. And my brother in law had these self development books that he had on his shelf at that time, and that was given to him by his dad, and one of them was Tony Robbins, and there was a lot of other ones as well on that bookshelf. And so the only thing I could go do at the time was go and read self development books and read biographies of people that had overcome things far greater than
what I was going through. And that was a really pivotal, pivotal time, because it's during your darkest times, in your most painful times, that it either crushes you or it strengthened you in the furnace. And although I couldn't see it at the time, it was strengthening me in the furnace to be able to do what I do today, which is handle extreme pressure and weight on a fast
growing business. I was so grateful and I still am today that we have access to people, you know, the Tony Robbins of the world, David Schwartz who wrote like the Magic of Thinking Big, and books along those lines that like transform the way you think, like I had access to it. Like you go to some places in the world at the moment, like North Korea, for example, and they don't give you access to anything other than the propaganda that the nation state gives to its people.
And just the little blessing that I was able to read about people overcoming things far greater than what I was going through, and then also to have books on strategies to overcome Like Unlimited Power by Tony Robbins, written back in the eighties, is one of the most incredible books ever. The Magic of Thinking Big is one of the most incredible books ever. Like they're timeless books that reshaped how I thought, where everything around me was so dark and nothing seemed like there was going to be
a positive out of it. And you know, I also had my spiritual faith at the time as well, which was which was so important. Having all of those come together shape me and then it led me onto a path of self discovery. And through that I found stuff on the internet. I found doctors in functional medicine that had been treating people with conditions that were incurable, right, and it led me then down on the path of like lifestyle changes as well as changes to my diet.
In twenty fourteen, I read a book called I'm Not Crazy, I'm just a little unwell by former Sky News anchor Lee Hatcher. Yeah, and he noticed that when he ate an apple or something, he started to feel a little bit better. It sounds so basic, but he said keeping his blood sugar levels up helped him. And I'm like, hmm, interesting, Okay, nutrition's got something to do with helping him. So I started eating some apples and I was like, keep him
my blood sugar level up. I'm like, oh, that's interesting, okay. And then and then I delved into this nutrition side of things. And remember I've got no background on this. Like I was the guy that would have a large you know, I'd love a large quarter pounded meal from McDonald's, right. I was like, that was the type of guy.
You can't even remember that you've come.
And so I found these holistic functional medicine practitioners and they said, get off all inflammatory foods, get off gluten, wheat, dairy, sugars, and eat whole foods. And I was like, okay. And I was seeing a dietitian at the time as well, and I don't want to say bad things about her, but her understanding of this wasn't where where it needed to be in order for me to find healing. And she just had me on a typical dietitians kind of program that was the typical one in twenty fourteen, and
it still had your whole grains. And your whole grains are important, and don't get me wrong, they're very important for people. But a sick person has to tinker with their diet in order to find underlying inflammatory foods that are causing the symptoms to exasperate themselves. And so I got off gluten. I started feeling better already. I'm like, wow, okay, I don't feel like absolute shit every single day, but I still feel a bit rough. And I told this
to the dietitian. She's like, oh, that's great, Okay, keep on doing that. I'm like, you know, this functional medicine practitioner actually said to get off dairy as well. And she's like, oh, you know, you can, but probably won't do anything. And I got that exact response actually from GPS as well in twenty and eleven, twenty twelve. And I don't say this to rip on GPS or anyone like GPS are incredible. I have a GP in my family. He's an amazing guy what he does every single day.
And without GPS we'd be screwed as a society. Without dietitians, we'd be stuffed as a society. So I don't say this.
I say this too for people who are chronically sick, who are in my position to say there are all sorts of different opinions out there, and just as all doctors don't agree with each other, not all dietitians agree with each other, and not everyone knows the solution for you, And there is something powerful on finding out the solution through a range of different experts and seeing like I
didn't make this up myself. I went to a functional medicine practitioner right to get this information, and I wasn't getting the answers elsewhere. So don't ever give up. Always look for new experts and their opinions, and keep on keeping on right. It's so important, and be brave enough to make decisions over your own health. If I didn't make a decision to get off dairy, then my life wouldn't have changed around. So let me tell you the
whole story, because it's not just that. So I got off dairy, and I got off sugars and I ate whole foods and my life changed around in two to three weeks. If you could imagine feeling like you've been hit by bus every single day to literally feeling like a normal human again like you did five years earlier, it was the most incredible two weeks of my life, so impactful that it changed the course of my life, and I decided to start a health food business around it.
Now here's the important point, really important. I did not cure myself by doing that, doing an elimination diet. All that does is take away the trigger foods that are
causing you your symptoms to flare up. Right, So there was a whole bunch of then over the next few years where I had to had to actually cure, through the help of functional medicine practitioners, cure what was actually causing the issue and reheal my gut to a state where I can have gluten, I can have wheat today, and I can even have a bit of dairy if I want to. And so a lot of people think like, oh, an elimination diet or changing nutritions going to suddenly heal you.
And in a lot of cases it can allow the body to heal itself, but there's generally a long process in a journey of healing. If you have been sick for a long time, you know there's functional dietitians out there, There's plenty of people that are interested in this area and line of thought that someone who is chronically sick, I would I'd recommend they go and talk to them.
I agree with that so much. I think we've talked about the fact that we have such strong parallels in our business journeys. Having been through a period where I had chronic fatigue as well, not for three and a half years, but actually probably in total for three and a half years, with different flares of having taken like two terms of school and then a couple of years later, not being out of work for a couple of months, and like mine was sort of more in acute, small abouts,
but persistent over a decade. And I think one of the things is that you don't necessarily need those extreme measures for your whole life. It's not a forever diagnosis, you know, you just need to create an environment for your body in that chapter, which is the same as your pathway to ya. It's like you need certain career circumstances in your life at different chapters, depending on what
you need at that time. And chronic fatigue specifically is such a misunderstood like you can't even really diagnose it in western medicine. And so I was the same as you. I had to try all sorts of different things. I never would have tried because that's the thing that gave me results. But I think it's so important that you
pointed out you weren't necessarily healing yourself. And one of the things that I think has probably made us or added to our experience as business people that being so sick taught us is patience, Like nothing happens overnight, and if you have ever learned how some things will slow you down and force you to slow down, like you know, I normally have a whole section called NATA on self doubt and compare and then burnout and getting off the
conveyor belt. But I mean you had taken off it for three years, and so you had to separate your identity from productivity. You had to learn how flipping frustrating it is to have an intelligent mind, good resources, great practitioners, and still know that it's going to take you five to ten years to recover. But that's that's part of it, exactly. That's every day is like it's baby steps. Nothing is a quick fix. But each day you add and you
chip away and you feel better. So true, Well, I'm sure we still have days where we push the balance too far and probably have a you know, have to be more careful than the average person. But it's a process and that's okay.
And look, the big thing that I've learned as well is matching input with output. So now I recover just as hard as I work. You know, I work hours that would scare the vast majority of people on this planet. But I love it, right, I'm built for it, and I have this self awareness to know this is my passion because that's my passion and my purpose. Like it doesn't put the same well, maybe it puts a lot of strain on me, but I make sure that I recover and I look after myself and my input back
into my body. Like I sleep for as long as I need to sleep every day. I eat really healthy, and I believe in balance as well. That's great. I also know the repercussions of having balance as well. If I have a big night and I still have them right, you know, with friends or whatever it might be. I make sure I'm breathing right, I make sure I'm meditating. I make sure that I'm taking some time away from my work to do other passions like play tennis and
stay fited and exercise. And so a lot of people kind of fall into the trap of pushing themselves too much, which produces a lot of output, but they don't work just as hard as on themselves in terms of the input what they're doing to feed themselves, in terms of their their body, they're so their mind their spirit to keep them strong.
Yeah. Absolutely, And I often get people who are in the sort of your version of the three and a half years, like in the throes of that really tough time where they still can't get up and they still can't independently do the things they want to do, and a losing hope. And it's actually I think your story is such a reassuring example that you can get through it. You can go from being a person who can't get out of bed to living a very, very full life.
You don't have to live a halfway life. You don't have to be sick forever. You do have to take care of yourself. But I'm almost glad that that crash came early in my life so I could learn the lessons that I had to learn that now allow me to have a fuller life than I probably would have been able to do if I'd crashed it thirty or forty or when I have kids, Like inevitably, we all have to learn where our limits are, and we just
had to learn them really early. But I think that's equipped does really well to be able to navigate busy, full lives now.
It's such a great perspective. I love that and it's so true. In twenty eleven, I was twenty and I could only work six hours, so I got sick. At the back half of twenty eleven, I could only work six hours a week. That's all I could do, and the rest of the time I was reading self development books and crying. Right, that was my life, and it builds resilience. Tough times suck, They suck massively, But for those going through tough times at the moment, like there
is a path for you, be kind to yourself, be patient. Yeah, see if there's ways that you can work on yourself to become an even better human being in other areas of your life, so that when your body decides to rejuvenate and get your back on the right path, and you're just going to be an absolute winner, you know, like everyone's a winner, but a winner in the sense like you've used your downtime in a way that has been kind to yourself in multiple, multiple ways.
Absolutely, and there is a whole section on downtime and your identity outside of your work. But before we move on to that one, do tell us about your light at the end of the tunnel tripeka going from you know, you and a mate at a kitchen table in February twenty sixteen to now being served in fifty countries with like five thousand five star reviews, which those starts have probably changed enormously by now.
Yeah, we're up to over seventeen thousand five star reviews, So it's whoah been fun?
Oh my god? Well, yeah, talk us through everything from twenty sixteen to now, because I also think we skate over I mean, there are so many highlights, but we skate over that bit where people go from I have never had a business, I know nothing about business and I've never worked in this industry to like, bang, I've got a business. The next day, Like what were those
first initial steps? I think it was one hundred and twenty thousand initial self funded investment and then it has grown to what it is today.
So took us through that.
So to really know what was involved, you got to go back to two thousand and eight, Like I remember finishing high school and I was seventeen. I was too young to go party with my friends, and no one wanted to invite me out anyway, because I was the geek, and I was on the internet, like I was on internet forums, Like I knew of bitcoin when bitcoin was less than a dollar and I bought piercoin instead, and I bought a hundred of them. You know, that's how
like long I've been. No, that's how long I've been around in the Internet's base for so I was doing like random stuff like trying to be an affiliate marketer after high school, trying to sell stuff on eBay, learning, learning, learning, making no money, like. I then learned some skills and did it for other businesses in twenty eleven, twenty twenty ten and the start of twenty eleven, just before I got sick and made a little bit of money on that.
It like nothing for a full time income. But I was like spending so much time, like hours and hours and hours instead of on like the PlayStation doing something because I love business. And that's where it goes back to, like that was my passion. I'm a weirdo. I'd love to spend my free time learning about what was blogging back then in affiliate marketing instead of like playing a PlayStation, right,
And so I put thousands of hours into this. And then in twenty thirteen, twenty fourteen, and around twenty fourteen, and I started to like get a little bit better before I made the big impact in my life of changing my diet. So I was able to do a little bit more work, and I was doing some on my marketing for the tennis industry I was in. So I had a website that had over two hundred video drills on it for coaches around the world, and they'd
pay me a membership to do it. And I spent an ungodly amount of hours on that project and the equivalent of five bucks an hour probably if you worked out how much I made in the time. And it taught me so much in terms of what I do today. So when I decided in twenty fourteen with my business partner Blake, who's amazing, and like everything that looks beautiful at Trepeka is because of Blake, Like he's an absolute branding mastermind, is incredible. I do all the boring stuff
behind the scenes. He was my housemate and we were like he had his own health issues as well, and we'd go down to the health food store and we'd realize, this is in twenty fourteen when we just made this breakthrough in like realizing like nutrition is key. We'd go down to the health food store and we'd realize the only people going into a health food store are old
people and hippies. And it's like this needs to be made like ches, this needs to be like relatable to young people, Like why is that a young person on social media can talk about so comfortably getting hammered on a sad today night, which there's a time and place for like I'm a young guy, but they can't feel comfortable about talking about that. They're into health and wellness
and these are the brands that represent them. And like in twenty twenty one, people are listening and being like, yes they can, Like in twenty fourteen, that just wasn't the case. Like Trepeka was the pioneers of that in Australia when we launched in twenty sixteen. We made health foods cool and there was no one else doing it
now like you go. We went through a trade show recently in our space in the in the health food space, and it's like all these other companies like doing what we pioneered, which is awesome because like our biggest competitors are Coca Cola, you know, and soft drinks. It's not the guy selling protein and superfoods. It's like that's our teammates. It's how I look at it, Like we're in the
business and making people healthy. Oh that's amazing, And so Blake and I were like, Okay, let's make this cool. And so we're like, well, I've been hustling online for a long time, Like I know online marketing and I know so and Blake knows branding, and we actually both know each other's strengths as well. We don't know product development. So we spent two years from twenty fourteen, well from
August twenty fourteen to February twenty sixteen we launched. We spent two years finding the best suppliers in the world, the best product quality, the best product formulators, and then building our website. Like it's not an overnight process. And that was coming from two guys that actually knew business and new online marking, so it's not an overnight thing.
And then yeah, we eventually launched in twenty sixteen. We put sixty thousand dollars in each, so one hundred and twenty K, and I had three hundred dollars in my bank account for the next couple of years as we grew Trepeka killing air exactly. Like people don't see that, like they see the big numbers, they don't see the fact that from twenty fourteen, when I started first putting
money into the into because I could work more. So when I say we put sixty k in and it wasn't we put sixty k in in twenty fourteen, I got healthy. I then put money in twenty fourteen, twenty fifteen, and then twenty fifteen twenty sixteen financial year, I made ninety odd thousand dollars. It got taxed, and I put literally everything that I had left over in the business. That's how I was able to put sixty k in like it wasn't I had sixty K available to me
in twenty fourteen. I did everything. Luckily, Blake had some savings, So I was always a little bit annoyed because like, I'm literally like living off two hundred bucks and I know you got some savings. He's a bit older than me and was more successful than me at that time.
But the funny thing is once twenty sixteen hit, like around that period, he still had to put more money and he got into the same position as me where we literally we had no money, and then we had no money for twenty seventeen and twenty eighteen because all the profit we made we put back into the business to grow. And so you're talking like I was sick before that, and then before that I was at university.
So it wasn't until twenty eighteen that I actually had money in my bank account, and it wasn't even anything special, but it was the first time at the age of twenty seven that I had money in my bank account. Twenty seven I'd risked everything. So the moral of the story is like there's no easy path. That was me working and Blake working sixteen hour days, having two businesses so that we could support ourselves while Trepeka made no money up until the age of twenty seven, flat broke,
absolutely flat broke. So and I mean I was driving around like I don't like materialism. I think materialism is a massive trap. But one thing I went and bought, which I was a goal of mine because it was special to my heart, was I bought a car that I really wanted, and I bought that because in twenty eleven I rode around on a pushbike with thirty bucks in my wallet. Like I said, in twenty sixteen, I
rode around in a Holden Commodore nineteen ninety nine. While starting Trepeka, I then upgraded to a Ford Falcon, a green, horrible looking Ford Falcon in my dream car. In twenty seventeen, I upgraded. I paid three thousand or four thousand dollars for a Ford Falcon, which was ugly as anything. It was not giving me any hope of getting a girlfriend. And it burnt down in the middle of Paramatta four weeks after I launched Trepeka. And I looked at Blake on that day and I said, it's okay, it's okay.
Trapeka is going to be huge, And we convinced ourselves off nothing but an absolute lie to ourselves that it's okay. My car just burnt down in the middle of Paramatter. And it burnt down because the previous owners decided to do some DIY electrics under the seat, which I didn't know about. Lucky you were okay, Yeah, Well, that's a
funny story. As well, because my best mate was with me at the time and he had coconut water with him and I'm like, put the coconut water on the on the sparks and it's like he valued the coconut water more than my car and he's like, no, it won't work. And by the time we argued over it, my heart my seat was on fire. And then I'm like, crap, all my tennis is in the back, so I had to take all my tennis are out and then core
triple O for the first time in my life. And so I've always had this running story with my best mate that he values He pretty much valued his two dollars coconut water over my precious Ford Falcon car.
So yeah, but as a health nut, you should really appreciate that that was his health and well being above all else, which we fully support. We did, don't we do.
There you go, Aaron, and I went to your match of milk Bar in Sint Kilda and loved it. I had to take away match up. That was just before COVID hit last year, so oh my god. I was that last bit of freedom I felt was hanging out at your milk bar getting a takeaway Matcher, which was delicious.
Oh, I love it. I also just love that you have been a pioneer in this space beautifully branded completely change the way we perceive health food and supplements and naturally boosting our health and wellbeing. But I love that you are really open about the fact that and I try to be as well that like, actually, it's don't
make money. Like at the start, people think they look at you because the business growth it looks like it's expanding all the time, but that takes all of your cash and they wouldn't understand when we go out and I'd be like, oh, I've got to you know, I'm not going to have that extra whatever it is. Like I'd be, you know, checking if my avocado was seven dollars on the side and be like, oh no, I
can buy my own ather card. And they just wouldn't get it because until you've done it and managed your own cash flow, it's like there is not a dollar spare, Like, not two dollars to rub together, not even fifty cent pieces to rub together, because everything goes into the growth. But that comes again back to that idea of like you have to be patient through the bits where it doesn't feel as good as it does now to get to the bit where it does now. And that's again
the bit people forget. I think they just do see from the outside. Of course, it can look like an overdight success, because if something isn't in your consciousness and then suddenly it is and it's doing really well and it's big and beautiful, it's natural to assume that. But I think that's why I love these conversations, because you
do get to see behind the scenes. You were like flat, broke, car burnt, like still couldn't you know, afford your groceries, still had no idea what was going on, and like it's been a journey to get here. You know, who wants to I mean living it up?
Who wants to be an entrepreneur? And then a true entrepreneur's crazy because we just brought out like this is our most proud product. I'm holding up our vitamins that we just brought out, and it's like, as soon as we got money, we're like, well, let's bring out vitamins because we don't care about patch flow.
You know, let's pie more stuff exactly.
Not only that, let's bring out like the highest quality of vitamins we can possibly think of and which ain't cheap. Let's do that as.
Well, say what a bargain.
I'm sure they're really cheap.
Yeah, I mean only only was multiple, multiple hundreds of thousands of dollars to bring out that project. Yeah, but like that's the fun, you know, Like we have a mission statement here and it's because like of the health issues we Bake and I went through, and it's like we are on a mission to help millions of people in their health. And that's always our norse style, our guiding star. It's not I want to make a kazillion dollars.
It's like you help enough people and you'd be a blessing to enough people, and that will naturally come and then you'll probably be crazy and you'll make money and then invest it in a whole bunch of new products as well. Like the cycle will just continue. But if we're true to our mission, like we saw a gap in the in the vitamin market and we're like, you know what, like this these vitamins are going to really
be able to impact people. We know we can bring something out here that will truly be special for our customer base and our future customer base. It's going to cost us a lot of money, it's going to take cash flow away from the business, but hey, let's do it because it's part of our mission. So it's part of the fun of being an entrepreneur.
Absolutely, And that comes back to something you said at the beginning as well, even just back to subject choices in year twelve. I think so many of us like reverse engineer what we think is going to get marked up or what's going to be fancy or look successful or whatever. But if you just choose the things you're good at and choose the things that you love, oh
my god, sorry, that's pull in the background. If you choose things that you love and that you're good at, you'll probably do better than by choosing and forcing yourself into something that isn't your strength and isn't your passion, but just because you think you should. When you go with what you're good at, and when you go with what suits you and what suits your skills and your weaknesses and all those kinds of things, things turn out better anyway.
So true, it's much easier to avoid things like burnout when you're doing something that you genuinely enjoy. Have you ever heard of someone like getting burnout from eating too many ice creams? You know, it's such a stupid example, but it's like, or have you have you have you ever heard of someone getting burnout from, like if they're
into sport, watching too many sports matches. It's like, no one ever struggles being like sitting on the couch, and like, have you ever heard of someone getting burnout or watching Netflix?
I probably have.
If anyone's done it, it's probably me, like a real hard like real intent, all.
Right, you just forget to drink and go go.
Yeah, basically, I really like I just a type achieve it everything.
So I'm like, I'm going to be the best ever Netflix.
Watcher ever plus.
So good. I'm going to watch this series before anyone else. Yeah, but like I suppose, Look, it's very hard to overdo it when you're passionate, as long here's the caveat, here's a caveat, as long as you're still focusing on your input. So what are you doing? Are you meditating? Are you sleeping enough? You're drinking a lot of like enough water, You're having enough healthy salts. Are you taking time away from your passion? Are you eating healthy every single day,
are you allowing ten percent wiggle room? And then perhaps when you do have a bit of balance and have a bit of wiggle room with not eating the best foods for you, are you then allocating time post that in order to recover, Like a great time to have balance is Saturday night or Friday night. Like, I don't go wild on a Tuesday night because I have responsibilities the next day.
Right, you're missing out mate, tuesdays exactly, Like you can recover on like a Saturday morning, a Sunday morning, Right, So you can be strategic around your balance.
You can be strategic around your inputs totally. And I hope people understand what I mean by input.
Yeah, well that leads really nicely to the last section your playta, which is about the input the ways that you put back into your energy, into your nourishment, into your life. But it's strictly limited to the things that aren't productive or that aren't teaching you something. Because my downtime used to be totally consumed in self development because of the role that it's played in getting me healthy again and because of the way that it's positively changed
my life. But I characterize that as downtime when actually it's still on time. And then I didn't make any time for actual downtime where I was just doing things for pure joy. And I think even if you do love what you do, and even if it doesn't burn you out, you don't want to get to the end of your life and think I just worked and then I died, Like there was no joy, There was no leisure,
there was no play or adventure. So what are the things that you do that might seem like a waste of time but that just bring you joy.
Yeah, I mean, it's so so important to have that in your life. So important to have distractions in your life as well, you actually perform better and do more work. And you can have micro distractions as well during the day. So like one thing I do every single day is I go for a walk, right, even occasionally go for two walks, like that downtime just being in.
Like yeah, I know, radically calm down.
I'm a wild man. I'm a wild man. And just having that like present moment is so important. Right. I play a lot of tennis last night, Like I had a huge day and then I went and played tennis. And because I actually had that downtime, I was able to then go and work well into the night. And I was able to do that because of the break that I was able to have. I love nature. I spend a lot of time in nature on the weekends.
I really like going for hikes and walks. But you know, if I'm going to be honest as well, like a lot of my downtime I am I'm borderline crazy, like and I have the self awareness to know that, Like a lot of my downtime is work, is work related stuff, but like I don't advise it. I simply don't advise it. Like like what you're saying, Like, it's only if you have an incredible amount of self awareness to know that, Okay, this thing that is actually downtime for me but is
actually work still is truly downtime. So for instance, I'll give you some examples, like I love I love listening to podcasts where I finish a podcast and I'm like, I just had a perspective change or I learned something new about whether it's business, whether it's about leadership, whether it's about personal development, whether it's like I was listening to podcast Jordan Peterson had last night with a lady that had escaped North Korea, and it just like and
here I am. My day is so hard. I've got so much weight and pressure on me. And then I hear someone talk about what they went through, and perspective shift straight away, like I've got nothing but gratitude to be thankful for. So like that stuff nourishes my soul. Like I'm not a big fan of social media, but I spend enough time on it where I can scroll,
but I can also learn at the same time. You know, I follow people who know how to do social media, and as I scroll through my timeline, I see my mate who's doing god knows what and posting pictures of it. And then I've got the next person who's incredibly intelligent, smart and showing me how I could do social media better. Right, And so suddenly I've got some efficiencies there as well.
And I can't really sugarcoat things too much in terms of my life, like I tell it how it is, like I need to be able to do all of this stuff in order to do what I do. But I'm so adamant that ninety nine point eight percent of people out there would hate to do what I do and shouldn't And that's such an important lesson in life, Like comparisons are so evil, Like never compare yourself to someone else. Like you'll see oh Caleb the CEO, Oh Caleb,
He's this growing, massive business. And it's like I tell it to my friends that ask these questions all the time. It's like, you would absolutely hate to live my life. You would absolutely hate to live my life. But guess what, I absolutely love it. And you know what, if I was a world class opera singer, I would absolutely hate that.
But that world class opera singer who loves the pressure, loves the discipline and the refinement of skill, and loves spending thousands and thousands and thousands of hours in order to be the best in the world, she or he absolutely loves it. And they have the self awareness to
know that they absolutely love it. So for me, I know that I absolutely love having downtime that is work time, Oh my god, And I absolutely, I absolutely think it is the worst thing that anyone could do unless they have except me, unless they have complete self awareness over knowing themselves. And I have the self awareness as well to know that I'm also not Superman and I need to still have downtime, Like I go and like, as
I said, love nature, love tennis. I also love like I watch the Paramatta Eels every weekend, which is a horrible thing to do because they're one of the shittiest teams on the planet and haven't won a premiership since I have been.
Born underdog though underdog, right, it.
Just creates more pain in my life. But it's an outlet, right, and that's all part of the fun. So like, I know during my day and I'm very grateful for it. As like a boss, I choose my own times and I have my own self responsibility, so I can say, Okay, I've done this work. I can now go for a walk. I can I've done this work. I can now listen to a podcast. So I've done this work, and I can now do this or that in order to get my mind my body back to where it needs to be in order to carry more weight.
I just I feel like you've just summarized the entire concept of this podcast, asked in that last paragraph, Like, it is so true that exactly what you love, the perfect circumstances and life set up for you, is literally going to be what people around you despise or would make them so unhappy. That is the nature of humanity.
That what you find. And this is why I get so fascinated talking to people because things that literally make me want to throw up in my mouth a bit are things that other people are like, I am so obsessed.
With that, and that is the fascinating thing.
That's the message that I don't think we get as often that what is weird and wacky about you that you love about life, it's not meant to look like what anyone else loves or hates about life. And your job, your one job, is just to weighe through all the noise of comparison and what everyone else is doing and choosing to do in their life. Your best data point of feedback is whether you feel good or bad after
you do something. And for some reason, don't we spend a whole portion of our life, like too much of our lives ignoring that and not like we have all the data and then we go, oh, you know what, I'm just going to ignore that and I'm just going to do what he's doing over there because that looks good. And then you're like, why am I unhappy because you didn't just go with your weird and wacky thing.
That you love.
That is so good. I had a conversation recently with a very close friend of mine and he's not where he necessarily wants to be in life at the moment, although he doesn't know where he wants to be. So I said, you know what you should be doing. You should be measuring your day in terms of happiness and putting it both in a short term and long term perspective. I broke down his day and he actually has a
pretty amazing day. He texted me earlier as well, and it's his day off and it's like, firstly, it's a Wednesday and he's got a day off, which is ridiculous, so amazing.
Winning celebrate that, mate.
Yeah, And I'm like, okay, tell me what you're doing at nine am on most days? Are you happy? Then? Okay, tell me what you're doing at twelve on most days. Then tell me what you're doing at five pm or after you finish work. Are you happy then? And then tell me what you're doing at nine pm and are you happy then? And then measure that in terms of is this a short term happiness? That is going to
be a law of diminishing returns? Where okay, you can get happiness from it, but eventually you'll get to an age where you won't have your shit together and you won't be happy because of the decisions you've made ten years ago. Or will this actually be something that you can add to your day that you're not doing a lot of And even if it is law of diminishing returns,
it's okay. But then because you're not doing a lot of it, but it's bringing you that short term happiness, But then are you also fitting into your day something that's actually going to bring you long term happiness. So I'll give you an example, like nine am, he's up and he's walking his dogs, right, or it could be eight am or seven am, and it's like, how amazing is that? You know, you're out in nature, you're spending time with man's best friend, and you in the present
moment perfect that's not a law of diminishing returns. Then twelve o'clock he goes off to study and he's studying something that isn't easy for him in terms of enjoyment at the moment, but it's a long term fulfilling practice and he's doing something that short term isn't happiness, but long term is happiness. So he's ticking off that box. He does that, and then he gets home at five, He then, you know, might watch Netflix or cook something really nice, or play on the PlayStation or whatever it
might be. And Okay, that's a short term law of diminishing returns. But he cycles that and he's not doing the same thing each day, so he's getting something new and it's okay because it's short term pleasure and you've done some long term pleasure before that, so that's great. So like you might spend a couple hours like pissing around some time, and that's really important and it's a distraction,
that's a worthy distraction. And then I'm like, okay, well what do you do between seven pm and nine pm? Can you then spend that time after that time of happiness, of short term happiness then going back to long term fulfillment, long term happiness in your day where you're doing something
that isn't structured study. It's actually study that you want to do, which is even more enjoyable short term, but it's also growing you as a person, so that if you do enough of it in twelve months time, you've actually put yourself in a position where you've got new skills and new personal characteristics and a new outlook on life.
Oh my gosh, amazing advice. And I also forgot to say, I love what you said before about micro distractions. I've never heard it put like that, but I think it's not just plata.
It is about the.
Distraction value, like pulling your brain out of what you do, even if it's towards something else that you do, but just out of the thing you've been doing all day, to distract your brain so that it comes back fresh. Like I love that. It's such so much wisdom in this episode. Thank you so much for sharing. I've got two more questions. One is three parts, so I actually have a formal question the three interesting things about you that don't normally come up in conversation. Three A, I
feel like I want three personal ones. But three A, which I've forgot to ask earlier, is what does Tropeka mean? And how did you choose that name?
All right, I will go Tripeka first, So great question. Firstly, you're pronouncing it right, and like it's standard to say it wrong, everyone says it wrong. To start with, it.
Took me a long term. I was like tropiacre trophy acre. I used to say in my brain.
Yeah, so it's a combination of tropical and peak performance with an A on the end, so trop for tropical and peak performance. So yeah, we wanted to highlight the vibes of you know, we're from Sydney, Australia, our packaging is vibrant, we're at the I love the world famous Bondai Beach here in Sydney. We wanted those vibes coming through in the tropical vibes of of what we do and the imagery we present. And then obviously everything's about
peak performance. So a lot of people are like, no, the the most important currency of life isn't money, it's time, which is pretty close to one hundred percent. But if you've got plenty of time and no energy, I would prefer to live to eighty with energy then live to ninety with no energy, right, So I'd actually say energy trumps that. So our whole mission in life is and
that's why I'm into biohacking. I've got a personal instagram that talks a lot about these biohacks and whatnot, which is just lifestyle choices and nutritional choices to get the most out of life and give you the most energy. That peak performance is so important because that's how you really enjoy life. You can't follow your passion and purpose. Like I couldn't follow any passions or purpose when I was chronically sick, right, all I could do was just kind of sit around and read so and cry. So
energy is so so important. I'm a big believer in it. And so that's why we did that. And then we're like in twenty sixteen, we're like, well, dudes aren't into health foods, which sucked, so like, well, at least women
actually do, yeahs ruining. At least women like are intelligent around this stuff, you know, Like I'm like guys, So we're like, okay, we'll just sell it to women because they're the ones that actually care about looking after their health and health foods rather than just taking some bro science you know, protein powderful of all sorts of crap and some pre workout that's going to make you feel like you've just taken off to the moon and then
crashed all in one. And so so that's why we added an alien because it was a little bit feminine as well. Tropica Oh is that Highty A was there.
Oh that's cute.
Yeah, but now guys have caught up and we've just started selling to two guys at least in the fact that we've got a dedicated space on our website for it. So I don't know. It might need to be trying to.
Drop the.
Nice yeah or.
Tropicaspekus yeah nice.
All right, three quirky things about you, but personal life you like you only your girlfriend would know, like weird sleeping habits or party tricks or like weird middle names, like stuff that just doesn't normally come up in interviews.
Okay, I clearly don't meditate for long enough before bed because I have full on, like conversations, arguments, adventures during sleep that my girlfriend puts up.
With great good ones.
So there's that party tricks. I can spit like a snake. I taught myself to do that at the age of twelve. Quite an achievement. My parents are really proud.
You should have some sort of certificate for that or something.
No, exactly, a diploma, a diploma and snake spirit.
So wait, how do you what is it?
So I'm going to look like an idiot because I've talked a lot, so I don't have a lot of sliver in my mouth. I'm just drinking decend.
But you don't have to show me, okay, Yeah, see if you can do it.
So so you put your you push your tongue out your you bend it back and by bending it back and then pushing the bottom of your tongue almost it activates the saliva glands underneath your tongue and it comes out spitting like a snake. So yeah, that's.
Oh my god, you're just making up ship again.
If you can't show.
Me, okay, you want me to do it? Oh god, I look, if you can, you're going to You're going to screenshot this and just put it as your Instagram post, aren't you.
I'm videoing right now this come out.
I see if I can do it, I don't think I'll be able to do it because I don't have enough sliva.
Sure, sure, do you see it?
A little bit came out, not a lot. It's on my pants.
That was amazing. Yeah, I love you were really dedicated.
I like it. It works, trust me.
I mean, it's not the classiest thing that you would want to whip out as a party trick, but I like it. It's you know, it's you Nique. Of all things.
I have a very high threshold for embarrassment, so I definitely whip it out at parties. I was doing it literally at a party two weeks ago, and I was really annoyed on a Tuesday right exactly. My friends willed to accept me for I am. Yeah.
I feel like my life has been so much better since I just came out of the weirdo closet, as like, not trying to pretend I was cool, just fully embracing the nerdy, weirdo, crazy person that I am.
It's been really liberating and wonderful.
Imagine us at a party then, oh my.
God, can you even We'd just be drinking spirillinau in the corner. Just wouldn't be a good time for anyone else, and.
You'd be spitting it all over.
But it just wouldn't be very.
Nice a party, just green spirillina venom coming out.
Man on a Tuesday night. What a great time?
Very last question. Favorite quote, Well, I've.
Got a bunch up on my wardrobe at home. Probably the most simple is pro noya. So it's the opposite of paranoia. So paranoia is the feeling of the world is out to get you. Pro Noya is the feeling that the world, God, the universe, whatever you want to call it, is out to bless you and there's nothing I can do to stop it. So I'm a big
believer in pro noya. I'm a big believer in just like quotes like things that I actually took these quotes from, like Tony Robbin's original, the original book I read Unlimited Power. It's like things don't have meaning. We assign meaning to everything, like reality doesn't exist, like we create reality. The other one I love. I think it was Muhammad Ali that first said this. It's like people wear themselves out before they even get to the mountain with the little pebble
that's in their shoe. So I just have a phrase that I say to myself every day, like don't let the little pebble in my shoe wear me out. Like a job of a CEO is to put out fires. So like something's going wrong in the business every day, at least in a micro or macro level, and my job is to deal with that. And so you've constantly got pebbles in your shoes, and so that SAPs energy away from you. So your ability to not let the little pebble wear you out before you even get to
the mountain. The big hurdles in life or in business. Is a great way to ensure you don't get burnout.
What a beautiful way to end. Thank you so much for sharing your wonderful story. It is so inspiring and so amazing everything you've done with Trapeka and continue to do. I'm so excited about the new range. Congratulations and I'll make sure to include links to everything in the show notes.
Amazing. Thank you so much, Sarah. I had so much fun.
We didn't end up getting as much time to talk about the actual products as I thought we would, but I'll quickly just add that I use them every day and have since way before I met Caleb. You've probably actually heard me talk about them on the podcast before. They are just as beautiful and a high quality as he describes. I've popped a link in the show notes
for anyone who's interested to try them. You don't get fourteen thousand and five star reviews for nothing more importantly for our chat today, though, I think Caleb has such a good head on his shoulders, and I loved the reminder about just sticking with your own happiness or unhappiness as your main data points for making decisions in your life, as well as the need for micro distractions and time
away from your work, and just so much more. If you enjoyed or took anything away yourselves, please do share tagging at Tripeka or Caleb at c A La Sha l L to thank him for sharing his time so generously. I hope you guys are all having a great week and are seizing your yea