Elizabeth Stein 00:00
Hi, everyone. I'm Elizabeth Stein, founder, and CEO of Purely Elizabeth. And this is Live Purely with Elizabeth, featuring candid conversations about how to thrive on your wellness journey.

This week's guest is Dr. Josh Axe back for a second episode. Dr. Axe is a leadership expert, entrepreneur, and physician. He co-founded Ancient Nutrition, draxe.com, and leaders.com, an online platform that provides the latest breaking news, leadership, business, and wealth. He's the author of several health and wellness books, including his latest book, Think This, Not That: 12 Mindshifts to Breakthrough Limiting Beliefs and Become Who You Were Born to Be. In this episode, we dive into one of my favorite topics the role of mindset in our health and well-being. Dr. Axe shares his inspiration for writing this book, dwelling on his experiences caring for his mother who beat cancer naturally, along with his struggles with limiting beliefs and his recovery journey. We talked about the importance and ways to cultivate a positive growth mindset. His strategies for overcoming limiting beliefs and the significance of self-reflection and continuous learning. Keep listening to learn all about mindset.

Dr. Josh Axe, welcome to the podcast. It's such a pleasure to have you back and huge congratulations to you on your latest book, Think This, Not That: 12 Mindshifts to Breakthrough Limiting Beliefs and Become Who You Were Born to Be. So welcome.

Dr. Josh Axe 02:42
Hey, thanks so much for having me, Elizabeth. excited to talk all things, mindset and health and wellness today. again, excited to be here.

Elizabeth Stein 02:50
I love that you've gone in this direction of mindset. As we think about health, you certainly have so many books about how eating food, diet, and mindset play such a big role in our overall health. And so I would love to hear what inspired this shift for you in creating this book.

Dr. Josh Axe 03:11
Yeah, one of the things I realized over time taking care of patients and even seeing my mom beat cancer naturally was the importance of our thoughts. When my mom was fighting cancer, I shared very frequently she was juicing vegetables, she was taking herbs like Tumeric, Reishi mushrooms, and several other things. But I believe the other half of her healing was her practicing visualization, her meditating on spiritual things and scriptures. It was her believing and knowing she was going to heal. And so for me, I wanted to write a book that really. The other thing is I always like writing things that have most impacted my life. And I think that's the same for you. Right? It's when I've had something bless me and powerfully impact me. The reason why I'm a doctor today is when my mom had cancer for the first time, I saw her losing her hair, I saw her aging so quickly as she went through chemo, and thinking to myself as a kid, I never want to see anyone have to go through that again. And also I thought to myself, there has to be a better way than this, which sent me on this path of studying natural medicine. All that being said, that led me to become a doctor. Well, what I found over the years and just in my entire life is the thing that has blessed me the most, the thing that I'm most excited about that has changed me, for the good as a person has been related to mindset, like overcoming limiting beliefs. I've had limiting beliefs in my life. When I was able to address those breakthroughs, it radically improved my life. When I was able to find my purpose, when I was able to build what I call a divine identity, when I was able to build a resilient mind and awaken my healing mindset, it all made a really big difference in my life. And so that's the thing behind the book I knew that a lot of people can heal using food. But the other half of it was healing using the power of the mind and living their best life using mindset medicine. And so that was a big part of the inspiration for the book.

Elizabeth Stein 05:14
I love that what were some of those big limiting beliefs for you? Because someone meeting you today would think, oh, you have it all together? No, you don't have any limiting beliefs. What did that look like for you in the past?

Dr. Josh Axe 05:26
So when I was the first big one was when I was in my freshman year of high school, I had a teacher ask me to stay after class. And by the way, I was not a very good student. And when I stayed after class, she said, “Josh, what do you want to do after high school?” And I said, “I want to be a doctor.” And she laughed out loud. And she said, “Josh, listen, with your GPA, you'd never get into med school. My daughter had a 3.8 GPA and barely got into Ohio State med school. Listen, you got an F on this paper, which is why I asked you to stay after. You're getting a D minus in my class. You'll be lucky to graduate.” And that was it. I walked out. And the thing that I took away was, again, being very young and naive is that, oh, well, I can't be a doctor. I don't have the grades to do it. And the other thing I started thinking at that time was, I'm not smart. And then it was solidified in me when two weeks later, my mom brought me in to see a medical doctor, who then diagnosed me with ADHD. And then he was talking about me, I still remember the day. I wasn't in the room, and he said things like your son has a learning disorder. He has ADHD, he's always going to have trouble learning and in school, and here's a medication for it. Ritalin was the prescription I got. My mom didn't put me on that medication. But I remember walking out of there and thinking, well, gosh, not only am I not smart, I'm medically not smart. I'm always gonna have trouble learning. So from then on through high school, I tried even less and I barely survived. The only reason I did end up graduating with a C minus GPA, barely graduated. And I just made it because I knew my dad would just be so mad. And I didn't always graduate high school, like that was my motivating factor, my wife, for even graduating. And then I did want to go to college. And I applied to a lot of schools, got denied by all of them. But one school, the one school I wanted to go to, sent me a letter back, it was the University of Kentucky. And in summary, here's what it said, “You're not in. But if you come and take summer school class, and if you average above a 3.0, we'll let you in.” It was the first year of them ever doing this. And I thought, Well, okay, I'm gonna go and I'm going to try because I don't want to be the kid that stays at home and doesn't go to college. And like, I'm going to go and try. And so I went to the first class I had to take English 101. And I went, first big assignment was a paper. And I went, and I tried, I turned in the paper, and a few days later, the teacher's name was Miss Williams. She says, “Josh, can you stay after class?” And honestly Elizabeth, my first reaction was, oh, no, like, this is deja vu, I probably just did not do a very good job. And she asked me, she says, “Josh, what is your major?” And I said, “Why? I haven't chosen a major yet.” And she said, “Well, I want to let you know, I think you should consider being an English major, or a journalism major because you got the highest grade in the class. And I can tell you're a gifted writer, great job.” And I walked out of there. And I've never had a teacher say anything like that to me. And I remember walking out and thinking, wow, I can do this. Then throughout undergrad, I averaged above 3.0, later on went to Johns Hopkins University, graduated there with a 3.9 GPA, and eventually, again became a doctor, wrote some books, and started a company Ancient Nutrition that's doing well. All that being said, if I had held on to that one single limiting belief, none of that would have happened, you and I wouldn't be having this conversation, none of that would have happened. There are a lot of people who have had somebody say something to them, could have been a parent, a teacher, a coach, or a friend, and they still are holding on to something untrue about them. A lot of people believe that I'm not, they're not worthy. A lot of people believe that they're not smart, or they're not beautiful. Sometimes it's limiting beliefs about ourselves, sometimes it's about others. Sometimes it's about the world like a scarcity mentality. It could be about God, it can be about a lot of things. But if you have the wrong belief about something, it will stifle your growth in life, it can ruin your relationships, and it can keep you from ever living out your dreams. And so one of the first things I get into in my book is, here's exactly how you start to overcome limiting beliefs and how I did it. And I want to bring people through just a quick example of something that can help and one is, most of our beliefs are memories that we are replaying in our subconscious. And so for instance, I had that replaying in my mind. I wasn't thinking about that teacher necessarily, but I was thinking, well, I'm not smart. So I can't do this over and over and over again. So it's called the ABCDE method. A, go and activate and think you can pray you could just meditate on this, but what are those limiting beliefs? What are those things that you believe that are not benefiting you? What do you know that is keeping you from doing the things you truly want to do in life? So for myself, for instance, activating memory, okay, I don't believe I'm smart. When did that first happen with Mrs. Noble, that was the first real-time it started to happen or the first big memory? And then B is belief. What exactly do I believe about myself? Well, I'm just not smart enough. I don't have that thing that certain other people have that are naturally gifted with this high IQ or something like that. That's what I believe. C is consequences. If I continue to believe this lie. Where's that going to lead me in my life? If I continue to believe that I'm not smart, and I'm not capable, well, then I'm not even going to try. And I'm going to end up staying in a small town in Ohio and never leaving and just be like, That's the consequence, or working as I did in the summer's construction. Like, did I want to do that the rest of my life when I wasn't called to do that? I knew I wasn't. So what are the consequences of you believing this lie? That D is disputed. Here's why this is not true. Well, it's not that I on occasion, got good grades in high school, I got an A a few times. So is it really the fact that I'm not smart? Or is it that I'm not trying or, or something else? So dispute. Why that's a lie? And it's not true in an E exchange, exchange the life for the truth? What is the truth what should you believe that will lead you to being the best place? And here's the other thing. Even if you don't fully believe it, decide what you should believe that will lead you to the best place in your life. Even once Mrs. Williams told me that it wasn't 100% I believed that was smart and capable, and that I could become a doctor immediately. It was like a 50%. It was like, boom, okay, somebody said it to me, now that I'm 50% more believe it, I need to keep working on why it's true. And believing and knowing I'm capable, I can become a doctor, can help people. And if you want to kind of simplify the method, take the thought captive that is incorrect, that limiting belief, and just exchange it. One of the things I call it in the book is I call it a memory or a mindset transplant. If you have a diseased organ in your body, like a diseased liver, or heart, eventually it kills your whole body, if you leave it in there. Versus if you go and get a new heart or a new organ. So a lot of us are having these toxic disease beliefs that are corrupting and destroying our entire lives. And if you can replace that one belief, they can do radical things. So that was, for me, probably that first limiting belief that when I broke through it, my entire life changed.

Elizabeth Stein 12:58
That's amazing. When I hear that it makes me think for me, personally, a limiting belief was that I was, for example, a terrible runner, I was slow at running the mile, I then met my boyfriend who told me like, you can run a marathon. And you can do this. And so in my instance, and I went on to do it, in my instance, and in your instance, someone came into your life, who really helped to give you that confidence. So do you find a commonality? And really being able to shift that limiting belief of how much that outside factor helps play a piece of it, versus doing that internal shifting for yourself?

Dr. Josh Axe 13:40
Well, I think you want to stack things in your favor, and you want to ideally, get both of those. But let me tell you three ways that I do this. One is, that I do it myself, I do it internally. And I started to prove to myself, This is why I'm capable. This is why I'm smart. This is why I am effective. And so one, I do it internally, myself. Two, I change my inner circle. It's just it's going to happen if you get around people that are more positive, more encouraging, more uplifting, they're going to speak that into your life. And so one thing I've told people to do, and I did this myself is write down the five people you spend the most time with. Now rank them on a scale. Give each of them a score of one to 10 on how strong they are that iron sharpens iron. That means they challenge you to be better and they encourage you so they're challenging you so if you're not living up to your potential like, hey, get up you are made for more than this. And encouraging they're cheering you on. Okay, on a scale of 1 to 10, how are those five people you spend the most time with? What are they to you? You might be like, well, I got one 10. But then I got a five, a three, a two, and a one. Okay, well then write down five people, the five people you should spend the most time with. Maybe they are in your inner circle now or maybe they're outside, or maybe you've just met them one time, write down those people, and pursue relationships with those people. And what you'll find is they'll naturally do that for you. And by the way, it's okay to ask people and be vulnerable with them and say, listen, I want to say I'm struggling with something. And if you could speak to my life about this, I want you to be honest, it would be very helpful to me, and in letting them know that. But the second point is you do want to surround yourself and change your inner circle. I was interviewing Dave Ramsey recently, he was on my podcast. And he said something, and it was really an amazing study. So we did a study. And we found that your net worth is the average of the 10 people you spend the most time with. This is true on everything. So if you want to make more money, you're hanging out with more wealthy people. One of the things Tony Robbins said, he wanted to become a billionaire one day or will be worth $100 million. And, and somebody said to him, “Well, Tony, who are you hanging out with?” He said, “That's the thing. I'm hanging out with millionaires.” He said, “Tony, that's your problem, you need to hang out with billionaires.” So that's an example of wealth. But it's true with health, there is a study at Duke University that found if you want to be healthy. And I think this is the way it was framed, and I covered this in the book. But if you want to be healthy, the most important thing you can do, it wasn't attend house seminars or read books or this, it is hang out with discipline people. If you hang out with disciplined people, that's the biggest thing you can do to get healthy yourself. The point there is, is that if you want to grow spiritually, hang out with people who have great faith in their lives, right? And so it rubs off on us. And so if you want to break through limiting beliefs, one, emphasize it yourself, two hang around those sorts those types of people. And then the third one reminds me of an I'm a, I love JRR Tolkien. I love the movie, Lord of the Rings, and he has a quote, and I think it's so beautiful and brilliant. He says, the praise of the Praiseworthy, is above all rewards. And so it's when someone is praiseworthy. So it's the person you admire most or the most incredible person. If they compliment you or praise you, it's above all reward, the most impactful thing. So this is why if a parent, a teacher, or coach a pastor, or someone you really respect says something to you encouragingly, it is transformational for us. Well, my third point with that is, God is the most praiseworthy of all. And if you go to the Bible, or whatever spiritual faith that you follow, and you go and read about what God says about you, for instance, I made the image of God, I'm his prized possession, he knows me that very number in my head, those sorts of things, and you meditate on that, that's also important. God has a plan and purpose for your life. So I know I'm getting spiritual from it. But my point here is that those are the three ways that I've done it. I've done it internally myself, I've done it via consciously proactively pursuing to be around to speak into my life and me into their life. And I'm doing it via reading the Bible and having those scriptures penetrate me and realizing what God says about me. And I think if you're able to do that from all of those angles, it's helpful. Here's another thing I found, you want to allow people to do it to you. But if you pursue it and start doing it for other people, it's you reap what you sow, you'll start getting it in return. And I would challenge everybody to do that. I do this, I have a men's group that I lead. We've had some amazing speakers, we read books on a regular basis, the best of the best books, and we share what we take away. But one of the things I've done every year is I will go to each man in the group, I put my arm on their shoulder, and I'll look them in the eyes and say someone like Dave, you are so gifted at this. And you're gifted here, here, here. I can see you doing this in the future, I cast a vision for what I believe that God's calling them to do in their life. I've done this, this is my sixth or seventh year of it. And I did a survey of the group of like over the past five years, all of you that have been in here, what's the most impactful thing we've read or thing we've done? All of them said, Oh, it was when you went put your hand on my shoulder and said to me, this is what I'm capable of.” Elizabeth, I think there are a lot of people who have maybe never had anyone do that for them. A lot of people who maybe it's been maybe it's once a year when we really need that more often. You can literally transform someone's life if you go and do that. I think it's really powerful.

Elizabeth Stein 19:42
Yeah, that's so powerful. It's such an important lesson and as people think about who they're surrounding themselves with make sure they have this person in their lives who can lift them up help either get away from their limiting beliefs and help them reach their potential. So as we think about potential, the other real big item that I loved in your book is the concept of a growth mindset. And that's one that certainly really resonates for me. It's an area that as a company, actually, this year, we're super focused on really getting everybody, every one of our employees to be thinking through this growth versus fixed mindset, being 1% better every day. So I'd love for you to start on what that means. Let's kind of start with the basics of it and see it really playing into this mindset shift.

Dr. Josh Axe 20:39
Yeah, I'm gonna kind of go with an overlapping concept and then specifically clarify the fixed versus growth now fixed versus growth. Stanford psychologist, Carol Dweck has done such an amazing job in her research on this in terms of what that is, and I'll define it here first. Basically, when you look at a fixed mindset, the fixed mindset is all about wanting people to see me in a certain light, it's sort of keeping up the outward appearance. So your biggest goal and focus is for people on the outside to see how great you are. The growth mindset is about, well, I don't care about my grade. Necessarily, I want to win the game. But the biggest thing is, is that I grow and get better improved day after day after day, I'm committed to growing and being my best. And that mindset says, well, I'm going to do the harder puzzle because even though I may not do it as well, it's going to help me grow more. Even though I might not look as good, I'm going to be getting better. And I think this also really lives in alignment with something I call the accomplishing mindset versus the becoming mindset. We have these events in life, the one I mentioned I had earlier with the teachers, those were absolutely shifted my life. And I had another memory for me, a person in my life that absolutely changed my mindset, my trajectory. It was my grandfather. And so going back my grandfather was an amazing man who lived to be 96 years old. He was a World War two veteran in the Navy. When he was in his 40s, he was a blue-collar worker who worked on fixing telephone pole lines that were broken. Anyway, he got to his 40s he just realized he was like, This is not what I want to do the rest of my life. I don't want to be just outside fixing telephone pole lines. This wasn't his passion purpose. And he really wanted to bring people together, he loved fostering community. So he and my grandmother took their entire life savings and bought a pond and some land, 50 acres in Lima, Ohio. And they invested it all and bought that land. Well, they turned it into a swimming park and a campground. And for 52 years, my grandfather ran this campground. And he would just bless people, love people, took care of them. They held family reunions there and retreats for kids. And it was just amazing. As a kid growing up, it was a magical experience. At my grandfather's funeral, we were at the point at the funeral where the pastor said, “Does anyone have any final words about Howard?” Howard was my grandfather. And immediately the person next to me, he was a man of the first person, there's hundreds of people there. And this man just in tears, just cried out he goes, “Howard was my best friend”, and then just started sobbing. And I'm a little bit ashamed to say this. My initial reaction was not empathy or compassion. It was a little bit judging. It was, well, you're not my grandfather's best friend, because that's my uncle Allen and Don, and whatever. So I was just thinking like, but then I caught myself and I realized something. There were probably half the people in the room, or at least a third, whose grandfather was their best friend. And I knew this man. And I realized that like, he was definitely your best friend. Yeah, I see that. And I started thinking about where I was in my career. This is early on in practice, and I was trying to achieve and accomplish. It was like, writing a best-selling book and helping this number of people and build a certain social following and a number of things, accolades, grow the top natural health website, like I had all of these achievements. But one of the things I realized was my grandfather never thought about any of that. And I started to redefine success a little bit, thinking about what is success actually. And I started realizing success is not what I accomplished. It's who I become. We mentioned earlier triathlons. Well, I was the biggest Lance Armstrong fan. To me as a triathlete in college, and the person with my mom with cancer who's raising all this money, like to me, I'm like, oh, t I love Lance. And I felt fairly betrayed when he got caught for doping. The thing I think that bothered me the most is when essentially he denied God and also said my mentality is when it all costs. And to win at all costs, that's the accomplishing mindset. Not to say we shouldn't try and accomplish things. But if that's the number one in your hierarchy of what's most important in life, well, you'll sacrifice your character, your family, and other people for just an achievement. Steve Jobs at the end of his life, was another person I admired. He told his biographer, he said, I want my family to know, and my kids didn't know why I wasn't there for them. He was building an apple and he had something he felt bad about later on in his life, he basically sacrificed his family, for his company. And all that being said, he reminds me of this verse, and it's, what good is gaining the world, but losing your soul? At my grandfather's funeral, I was really conflicted and started realizing, that I needed to start focusing more on who I was becoming and growing as a person, rather than focusing on my accomplishments. Because again, if you have a choice, between your number one priority is accomplishment versus the person you are, you're going to bend the ethics and morality. You're going to ask, you're going to put your family second, not first. You're not going to do the right thing. Versus if becoming is number one, you want to be a person of integrity and character and speak life into people and love others and be the encourager, well, then accomplishing is going to be the secondary, not the primary. So bringing this back to the growth mind, all that being said, I really started focusing on not just having a to-do list every day, but having a to-be list. I'm going to be super generous, I'm going to be loving, I'm going to sacrifice myself for the benefit of others. And that made my life so much better. It's like that's something everyone can accomplish just being kind or loving or courageous. So when it comes to the growth mindset, I think that it's very much in alignment with that. For instance, let's say you're trying to build a social media following obviously, Elizabeth, you've done such a good job of being able to build a podcast following and a social following, and people buying your products, you've achieved those things. But if you do it solely because you want to build a $100 million company, or because you want to have 100,000, Instagram followers, or YouTube followers, if that's the primary, one, I don't think you'll be as successful, but also you won't be as impactful. If you instead say, you know what, I want to help save lives, through regenerative agriculture, I want to help kids live free of ADHD and get off medications. And I know when they eat a food that's lower glycemic, and using these natural ingredients, you're the solution to these cereal companies that are putting out frosted this and lucky that and food colorings, and so much sugar and all the things that are causing autism rates to get worse and ADHD and all the other things. My point there is, because you are about becoming first, you are having a positive impact in the world, if your goal is only a number, and not about people. That's really the difference between a growth and a fixed mindset. And fixed mindset is an accomplishing mindset. And I want to look good to everyone else. A growth mindset is about I want to grow myself, grow others, and have a positive impact.

Elizabeth Stein 28:19
Yeah, that's great. So as you think about that, for someone who really needs this mindset shift, and maybe they're having some limiting beliefs, they're being held back, not living their best life, and to really enter into this growth and becoming mindset where they're able to achieve and go after this thing where they have been held back and don't believe that they can do X, Y, and Z, how can you help? Because again, it's all about those small things in our life that can you start to do to really foster more of that growth mindset.

Dr. Josh Axe 29:06
Yeah, one of the things I recommend people do, and this is something Aristotle taught the famed philosopher, but really start with the end in mind. Think about the end of your life. There was an interview, I watched recently, and it was so good. It was the founder of Kinkos, I think. And they asked him, they said, “Hey, what is your greatest accomplishment?” And his answer was not that I built a billion-dollar company. It was that all my kids still wanted to come home and spend the holidays and spend time with us regularly. It's so beautiful. And so I think you need to redefine success and even think about your eulogy, and the end of your life. And what is success for you at that point? And so for me, I think it's a lot more about that thing. It's like, okay, I have kids and I've really raised some incredible human beings I'm having deep relationships with and they want to come home and they're great people. I'm still really connecting with my wife and we’re doing trips together, and still loving each other deeply, I'm mentoring other people, I've had a lot of people, I've helped them excel in their lives, that's more of like thinking about, okay, this is what I want my life to look like in the end. So I think that's where you need to start. And then in order for that to happen, what needs to be true about you? And so if I want to raise great kids, I know I need to challenge them to be their best in a form of discipline. I need to just love them with total compassion, look them in the eyes and tell them they're great, and be their biggest cheerleader, I need to help them grow in their skills and talents. So like my daughter, like, I can tell, she's a good swimmer. So I'm like, okay, we're gonna help you be the best swimmer you can be or be the best at our or whatever it is that she's good at, and then help her continue to grow in her character. So I know if I'm going to be a great dad, a great husband, and a great leader, I need to work on leadership, I need to work on compassion, generosity, and wisdom. So I might write down seven qualities, I'm going to work on these on a regular basis, I'm gonna read books on these, listen to podcasts on these, I want to be healthy. So I'm going to do that. So I can be there for them when I'm in my 90s. So I think that the biggest part of it is redefining success. What does it look like in the end? Who is the person you need to be to do that, and then just start creating habits that help you become that type of person? Another thing that helps you become that type of person is hanging around with those types of people. We talked about this earlier already. But that still is just one of the absolute biggest things that people need to do if they're going to have that growth mindset becoming mindset because that really rubs off on us. One of the things I did as part of this book, Think This Not is I created something called virtue cards. I created 22 cards of the most important things that you need to grow in, and it has quotes and scriptures and questions and things like that. I did this to transfer myself, by the way. So I was at a John Maxwell seminar. I got the idea from him. So I want to credit him here. And he has written a book called Today Matters. And it was my favorite book of his. And in the book, he said, you can transform yourself in 30 days if you just focus on a card with the saying. So I created these cards, like for instance, encouragement. And there are certain questions and thoughts and famous quotes from people. And I looked at this card, and I kept it in my pocket every day when laminated it and I look at it every day and at breakfast, lunch, and dinner. I was looking at it, I'd read it and think about it. Then I had a challenge for me it was anytime I had a conversation with anybody. I was going to encourage them in some way, just say something nice. And at first Elizabeth, I was not an encourager, I was a little bit more gruff. I started doing it, and I literally changed in 30 days, I became a naturally encouraging person. Then I did it with generosity, I said, I'm just going to give more, I'm going to pay for the tab, I'm going to start tipping this much, I'm going to just give more to charities, things like that. And I became more generous. So one of the things people can do if they go and buy the book on Amazon is Think This Not That, when you buy it from Amazon, you'll get like a little six-digit code of your confirmation code that you ordered. If you go then to my website, joshaxe.com. And just plug that in and you're gonna get these virtual cards for free. The workbook is free. I did a mindset masterclass. It's worth $500, all of these bonuses, all these interviews. But if people get the book here soon, and go and just plug in that code, they'll get all those for free. But I wanted to mention that because it's such a great tool that I've used to just help myself grow and become.

Elizabeth Stein 33:32
Well, I think it sounds like such a great tool. And that was going to be my next question. As far as how many people listening to this might say, I'm not someone who has a growth mindset, that's not me and really identify not as that type of person. But the reality is that we can change. And that is completely possible, our thoughts can completely change how we approach things. So if you can talk a little bit about that, to give people that hope that you're not stuck in where you are.

Dr. Josh Axe 34:04
I'm so glad you brought this up. Because It's a limiting belief that a lot of people have that they don't know they have. And this is common to most people. When we think about ourselves and we think about ourselves 10 years in the future. And this is part of the idea of who we can become. We don't think of ourselves being any different 10 years. But if I think about myself 10 years ago, I'm pretty different. Like yourself, you're really different. When you came on my podcast, and you shared about like, you mentioned about being a runner or triathlete or starting, I mean think about this. 20 years ago, would you have thought you were going to start it one of the most successful food companies in the past 20 years. In the natural industry, one of the top 10 or 20 in the entire industry. If I had thought about myself 20 years ago or as I mentioned, I never would have. So the reality is I am way different. And even when we think of ourselves in the past, you might not think of yourself how different you are, if you've ever been a parent, you are different now than you are years ago. I mean, kids change you. So all that being said, you want to be thinking about who you want to become in the future and start acting like that person right now. Now sometimes it's hard for us to envision ourselves in the future. So the other way to do this is to think about the people you admire most in a certain area of life, and act like they would act and try and believe what they would believe. A few examples of this. One, this is a bad idea. I tried financial day trading for a little bit and just lost money. I realized this was a terrible idea. Me trying to Josh Axe to figure out how to do finances. And so I realized, I just need to listen to Warren Buffett and Ray Dalio and Dave Ramsey, and Kathy would and do like they do, think like the 1%. So I need to do like what so the question is, what would Ray Dalio do in this situation? Or if you're on an airplane, and you've got a crying baby next to you you might think to yourself, okay, gosh, this is a little annoying, or something like that. If you're in that mode, but if you're in the mindset of, I'm trying to become the best version of myself in 10 years, the actual best way to do it's not thinking about yourself in 10 years, it's thinking, what would Mother Teresa do, if there were a crying baby next to her in this exact situation? Well, would she pray for the mom when she asked the mom next to her, Hey, how can I help you? Is there anything I can do to make it easier for you? Could I get a snack? when they're getting up, can I lift when they need help? Thinking Ahead, when they need to get that suitcase down from the overhead rack? Like, could you be that person to do that for them? So that's how I try and do that really think about that when I was in high school, and again, I've shared this a little bit and I know this is not everybody on your podcast. So again, give me a little bit of grace here. But I wore this bracelet when I was in junior high and it said WWJD (What would Jesus do?). And it really is that sort of thought mentality. Now you could do that without being a Christian just knowing what did.? He was self-sacrificial, he gave his life for others. Now, you can do this with a lot of people, though. Let’s say you really admire I don't know someone else you find to be a virtuous person. Like, here's a random one. Russell Brand is really committed to telling the truth. Okay. And I think I've really admired a lot about him from that standpoint. And so when would Russell Brand do if you were doing a podcast, I'm not saying you want to be your authentic you. But at the same time, think about the people you admire most, are in the top 1% in that area of life, and then think about what would they do and then act like them in terms of just in terms of that action or that positive character quality.

Elizabeth Stein 37:54
Love that. So, after reading the 12 mindset shifts, what's the number one thing that you want people to take away?

Dr. Josh Axe 38:07
Well, can I tell one more story? Because here's the big thing, and a lot of people don't know this. When I set off on writing this book, the hardest thing in my life happened to me or the worst thing I've ever experienced in my life up to this date. And I was dying because a lot of people don't realize this and I just started sharing this. So years ago, I injured my back weightlifting, I herniated a desk and bulged a desk and I dealt with pain. I went and got stem cell therapies where they take your own bone marrow, concentrate the stem cells and blood, and reinject the area. When I did it, I got almost all the way, like 70% better. But then I still had a little bit of a nagging issue. I wouldn't get it done one more time. Well, afterwards, something just was not right. I got worse and worse and worse. Three months later, I woke up and I couldn't walk. I had so much pain. Had to call an ambulance they brought me to the hospital took an MRI report came back. I had a spinal infection. The infection was in my disk and got in my bone causing osteomyelitis and then was outside of the bone in an abscess by the spinal cord. I was in Puerto Rico at the time. I had to be flown medically to Florida. And I had a doctor infectious disease specialist sit down with me. He said, “Josh, here's your prognosis. The best case scenario is you're gonna have pain the rest of your life. And you're going to be the first person to know when bad weather comes through.” These were is exact words. And then he said the worst case scenario is you're going to be permanently disabled. And this is life-threatening. For the next 48 hours, there are emotions I'd never experienced before, Elizabeth ,despair and hopelessness. It was incredibly hard and I started going down this rabbit hole of like, oh gosh, what if I never walk again? Then I just realized this is not serving me. So what I had to do was realize what is best going to serve me, and what is best going to serve my family. And that is believing and knowing I'll walk and I really started praying and believing God was going to heal me. So I went in after meeting with a doctor, and they wanted me to be on antibiotics, likely even three months. I was able to follow conventionally. I did antibiotic IV, I didn't take any medications in high school, and I'm in my 40s. So it'd been 20-some years. And I went, got an IV antibiotic, but I wanted to reduce the damage on my body there too, and help myself heal. Because conventional medicine isn't about optimizing healing. It's about keeping you from dying. So I said, I want to get my best. And so I also got in a hyperbaric chamber for two hours every day,. I only ate meat and vegetables. I got vitamin IVs, and ozone as an IV every single day. And did this for 30 days. The first week, I felt nothing. I felt worse. To the point, that I literally couldn't walk, I couldn't even roll over in bed hardly. It was so bad. The only thing I could do was crawl a little bit. And so eventually, it started getting a little bit better. But this was after a month of not walking, and then it actually took me another nine months to walk. So I didn't walk for 10 months. This time last year, I wasn't walking yet. So I haven't shared this much.

Elizabeth Stein 41:23
You had already written the book?

Dr. Josh Axe 41:27
I wrote the book this entire time. That's how I wrote this book while I was in bed, the whole thing. So all that being said, after doing all this, I'm now healed. I had this vision, I officiated my sister in law's wedding in June, that was the first time I really walked on my own without a walker. And now I'm able to carry my little girl and back lifting weights work, I'm already better than the best, the doctor said I would be, I'm probably about 75%-80% back now. And by the end of this year, I think I'll be at 100%. And so I share that all the say, the biggest thing I learned while reading this book was… a lot of things. One is just family. Having them here to support me, the people we have around us to support us and encourage us and help us be our best. It's so important. My number one lesson in life is you become and your success is directly determined by the people you surround yourself with. It's incredibly important. And the things after that are the people you allow to influence you, the books you read, the podcasts you listen to, the things the people you listen to, and allow speak in your life. It's the most important thing. I didn't do anything negative that whole time. I only watched funny movies, or listen to positive podcasts or people in my life. I had a limiting belief. For a day or two, I thought I might not walk again, if I know the principles and laws are on neuroplasticity, and if I would have believed I wouldn't walk again, I don't know that I would be. Because my brain would not be sending healing messages to repair and restore my body versus believing in knowing I would, I now am. And so it's really important for everybody here. Listen, you might be one limiting belief away from an absolute breakthrough. Or you may have a limiting belief keeping you and you'll never break. If you don't correct it, you're gonna stay stuck in the same place. And you're like people go to their doctor all the time. Here's an example telling them, hey, you have to be on this pill the rest of your life, or you can't reverse this disease. When 99% of the time, you can and you need to believe you can. The biggest lesson is to focus on becoming, surround yourself with the right people, and address those limiting beliefs. And in the book, I go through so much more. We just scratched the surface exactly how to do that. It's the best book I've ever written. I've written seven books that are published and several that aren’t. I think it's my 10th book. And it's the best one. I really wrote it because I think it's gonna help transform a lot of lives. I'm so grateful for you having me on and let me share this. A lot of people don't know that.

Elizabeth Stein 44:04
It’s an incredible story. Well, as we're closing out, before we jump into some rapid fire qDr. Josh Axe a, I do just want to touch on this. You talked about neuroplasticity, and I think hearing that science piece is really important for people to hear that it's not just a concept of yes, we can change but what's really happening.

Dr. Josh Axe 44:21
A few things, and I'm gonna jump back to it. using placebo and nocebo as an example of this. So the best example of this is the placebo or nocebo effect. The placebo effect, during World War One, there was a physician who was taking care of all the men who had horrific injuries, loss of limbs and legs, and he went in and ran out of morphine. He started giving patients just anything, and really nothing. And he found that the patients who are getting sugar pills, some of them, over a third of them were having the exact same pain relieving results as if they were taking morphine. And there was an Another example of a case study called the nocebo, the negative effect, where if a patient believes something negative is going to happen, it will happen for him. So there was a man who was diagnosed with liver cancer. They told him he had three months to live and he died three months later. Well, when they went to the autopsy, they found he only had a benign tumor on his liver that could have been removed, and he could have lived another 30 to 40 years. So the reality is what we believe greatly impacts us. But basically your body creates new neural pathways, your body will start blocking off other pathways, your body will send growth factors, stem cells, and healing factors to regenerate and heal the area because your brain is telling it to. And so that's very condensed version. But that's in part what neuroplasticity is.

Elizabeth Stein 45:44
Amazing. All right, well, we're gonna close it out with some rapid fire qDr. Josh Axe a. Three things that you're currently loving.

Dr. Josh Axe 45:58
Number one, my family. I've got a baby girl who's just a few months old. That's just such a gift and a blessing. But yeah, being a play to play with my daughters. The second thing I love is just being outside. I didn't walk for a year. I'm walking. I love walks. And it's so healing. The studies on it for longevity are pretty amazing. And so just going on walks in nature, I'm loving that right now. Another thing I'm loving is I’m loving growing. I’m loving just continually to focus on what I love. And for me, it's helping people grow and have breakthroughs and body mind spirit. I'm loving doing my podcast. My podcast, it's the Dr. Josh Axe show is growing a lot right now. I think it's because I'm teaching stuff I've never taught and health and nutrition and mindset. And so I'm loving doing that right now.

Elizabeth Stein 46:53
Favorite words to live by?

Dr. Josh Axe 46:56
As a man thinketh in his heart, so is he.

Elizabeth Stein 47:01
A favorite book for growth?

Dr. Josh Axe 47:06
I have so many that this is a very hard question. I would say some of the best I've ever read, there's a book I love. This is a faith based book. It's called And David Perceived He Was King. It's a book all about identity. I think that's an incredibly powerful book. Jordan Peterson's 12 Rules for Life. I know he's a controversial figure. But despite his politics, I think those 12 rules are very good. And then John Maxwell's Today Matters is another really good one.

Elizabeth Stein 47:37
And lastly, what is your number one non-negotiable to thrive on your wellness journey?

Dr. Josh Axe 47:42
For me, it's doing a spiritual triathlon in the morning. I wake up every morning and I do a gratitude walk. I just say everything I'm grateful for. The second thing is I come in and I read either a personal growth book or my Bible or some sort of spiritual growth book. And then I'll pray and meditate. And I'll do that for 30 minutes in the morning. And if I do that, my entire day is different. It's win the morning win the day. And so, that's my nonnegotiable.

Elizabeth Stein 48:11
Love it. Well, Dr. Josh Axe, thank you so much for being here. Thank you for bringing this book into the world. I absolutely loved it. I know everyone else will, too. Where can everybody find you and the book?

Dr. Josh Axe 48:22
Yeah, you can find my podcast. It's the Dr. Josh Axe show. It's on YouTube. It's on iTunes. It's on all those platforms. But check it out. I got some really great episodes. And if you'd even search on it, let's say you want to heal your thyroid or learn more about mindset, whatever it is, you can search that in YouTube or iTunes and I've often done episodes on it. @drjoshaxe on social. And then last is check out the book, Think This Not That you can find it on Amazon. And remember, don't forget this. If you go and you get your coat on Amazon or any bookstore, and you plugged it in at joshaxe.com You'll get all those free bonuses there as well. So Elizabeth, thanks so much for coming out for having me on. And thanks so much for your awesome products. I mentioned this when you were on my podcast, my wife was eating some Purely Elizabeth this morning. So thanks so much for your awesome products.

Elizabeth Stein 49:12
Love it. Thank you so much. Thanks so much for joining me on Live Purely with Elizabeth. I hope you feel inspired to thrive on your wellness journey. If you enjoyed today's episode, don't forget to rate, subscribe, and review. You can follow us on Instagram @purely_elizabeth to catch up on all the latest. See you next Wednesday on the podcast.