Men Over 35: Still Doing These 7 Things? Big Mistake!

Men Over 35: Still Doing These 7 Things? Big Mistake!

D Brent Dowlen: [00:00:00] If you're over 35, there are things that you're doing right now that are making your life harder than it needs to be. Things that drain energy, kill your confidence, and hold you back from the life you actually want. The worst part, most people never realize it until it's far too late, but not you.

Because today I'm sharing seven things you need to stop doing after 35 so that you can level up instead. See, when I was younger, I thought that once I hit my mid thirties, it was all downhill, slide until 40, and that was death, right? 40 was the end, but I knew once I hit 35, it was just all downhill. I'd already heard about, you know, my testosterone levels would drop and oh hell no.

Basically I've hit the apex of my life at that point, life was over. Once I hit that slide game over, I was as far as I was ever gonna go. Doors would close. It was the beginning of the end, and I would just fade away and younger people would come along and I would just [00:01:00] drift into, I know really stupid ideas of youth, right?

But when I actually hit 35 and started towards 40, I found out I was just getting started. I went on to set records of my life in the weight room, uh, in my activity, in my income levels. I took control of my financial story. I started a couple businesses. I closed a couple businesses, and I started doing things I hadn't even imagined yet.

I'm just getting started. What I realized as I made that transition was there was some serious garbage I needed to get out of my life to live my best life though, and getting rid of these seven R eight things will absolutely help you too. Take my friend Dave, for example. He's made huge leaps forward in the last year.

In his life as he's transitioned out of trying to please everyone and some of those other issues we're gonna talk about into the man he is today. So do yourself a [00:02:00] favor. Pause for one minute. Just just one. And I want you to think about the big goal that you're trying to achieve in your life. I mean, the really big, that, that goal that just like moves you, right?

What is that one really big goal that you're just drooling thinking about getting there? Get a clear image in your mind. Guys, I want you to really like visualize this, like do that sports crap. Okay. Got it. Can you see it in your head? Number one, stop wearing stress, like a badge of honor. Being busy is not a flex.

You don't have to be exhausted to prove that you're working hard. Learn to drop this mental state because somewhere along the way, we all got it in our heads. That being busy somehow equaled powerful, important are a value, and that's a bunch of crap. Stress is literally a killer. June is Men's Mental Health Month, and [00:03:00] one of our biggest issues as men is chronic stress.

Well, chronic stress has been linked directly to heart disease, anxiety, depression, and accelerated aging. That sounds horrible personally. Anxiety and depression are two of the most common mental health issues that men face today. And self-harm is the top killer of men under the age of 50 due to this epidemic at this point.

So instead of overloading yourself to prove that you're productive, focus on efficiency. Gonna have to air quotes here, guys. Work smarter, not harder. Right? Yeah, I get it. It's cliche, but it's true. Solid planning, better time management. More importantly, better energy management. Are important tools to take control and not less stress steal from your life because otherwise stress will absolutely steal the best moments of your life and the best years of your life.[00:04:00] 

Now, that's just the start of the list because men's mental health is the super priority to me personally and to us here at the Fallible Man. But I've got seven more things you need to stop doing right now, especially after 35 for your past there. But even if you're coming up to 35, the sooner you drop these seven other things, the better your life is gonna be now, if you wanna live your best life, we're gonna jump to my sponsor, then we'll be right back with the other seven issues You absolutely need to drop outta your life right now.

Gent. We are truly a MyPillow household. This is my MyPillow Travel Roll and Go Pillow, MyPillow 2.0, travel Roll, and Go with Case. I have one of these for every member of my family. Uh, we all have different covers so we can keep for our pillows, but I also sleep on a MyPillow 2.0. I have MyPillow Giza Dream Sheets.

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You heard me, 49 98. You can't normally get King sheets for 49 98. Much less high quality king sheets. And guys, these are the best sheets I've ever had. I love them. I sleep on them every night. I have multiple pairs, but by shopping in my pillow using promo code Thrive, you help keep me on the air and making these shows, because MyPillow sends us a part of that, everything, they don't mark up their prices.

We do get a cut of [00:06:00] everything and it helps us keep making shows and it helps MyPillow keep making great American products. It's a employee-owned company. Guys, I can totally get behind it. I love their stuff and we're proud to have them. So let's get back to our show. The Driven To Thrive broadcast purpose, growth, and lasting impact for men, helping men go from living to thriving.

Purpose-filled intentional lives. Welcome to the Driven Thrive broadcast purpose, growth, and lasting impact for men. I'm your host, Brent dLAN, and we help men go from living to thriving purpose-filled intentional lives. Now, at the start of the show, we went right into dealing with stress because stress is a killer, guys, and really, men's mental health is a super priority for us here at the Fallible Man Podcast, or sorry, the Driven to Thrive broadcast.

It's the Fallible Man is my company. Um. I wanted to jump right into that, but these next seven are absolutely crucial to start getting outta your life. And if you're still dealing with these at 35, [00:07:00] you are holding yourself back now. Number two is to stop saying yes to things you secretly hate. We say yes out of guilt obligation, and because we don't wanna disappoint someone.

Learning to say no is a superpower, guys. It is a super hack to gaining your life back. Just say no thanks, unless it's just a hell yeah. Hell yeah. Then why are you disrespecting yourself by saying yes? I recently found out that billionaire, Richard Branson, one of the richest men in the world, set two to three big goals every single year.

He never says yes to anything in that year that does not move him closer to one of those two to three goals. That is his whole focus for the year, and if it's not a direct. Mover towards it. It's not even a possibility. Even seemingly good things like fundraisers and stuff like that, the man won't make appearances if it doesn't go along with his goals for the year.

Now [00:08:00] he runs over 200 businesses and has a crazy amount of money, and everybody always wants something for him. From him. So you're probably thinking, yeah, well Brent is Richard Branson. Yeah. He's gotta tell people no. But Richard Branson is just a person who respects his own time or goals. You don't have to have.

A bazillion dollars to protect your time or to be worthy of protecting your time, you should absolutely protect it and it's one of those things that you'll never get more of is your time. I totally blew the way I was gonna say that. 'cause you don't have to be a billionaire to protect your time. It's one of the things you'll never get more of is time.

Your time and your energy are incredibly valuable because it is the only limit there is. Money can always be made, things can always be had. And if you have enough money, you can buy back some of the time you're spending, but you don't get any of the time you lost ever again. So [00:09:00] respect yourself and really you're respecting others by saying no to things you hate.

They may not see it that way at first, but honestly, you're respecting yourself and others by saying no. Now, along those lines of not wanting to disappoint somebody, 'cause that's one of the reasons we say yes. Is three. Stop trying to please everybody. If you're 35 and you're still trying to make everybody happy, you're gonna lose battle guys.

Not possible. My buddy Dave had this bad for years. He was always the super nice guy and he is, he's one of the nicest guys I've ever known. He's always trying to make everyone happy and make sure he was caring for other people. It was the way that he was taught you're supposed to be is you're supposed to be cognizant of other people and help other people and do things where, to the point where people walked all over him and took advantage of him.

What he didn't see was the stress it was causing in his life and actually hurting his health by trying to please everyone. And he was [00:10:00] miserable at missing his own life because he felt like he always had to say yes. Like in marketing, you can't sell to everyone. If you wanna sell your product, because aiming at everyone means you hit no one.

You have to get more specific about your target audience, right? You can't give to everybody. This shows for men, right? Women are welcome to listen to it, but they're not my target audience. I'm here for you guys. The same is true about people pleasing. It's not only not humanly possible to please everybody.

It's frustrating to try and it will actually just tear you down and ruin your life. The worst part is you're crushing yourself in the process, but the only person you have to really please is you. That doesn't sound right. I. Most guys just don't know that we want to say yes. We want to be the good guy, the nice guy, and we feel [00:11:00] like saying no, makes us a bad guy.

We feel like we have to please everybody around us. Guess what? You don't. You have to please you. And if you're in a relationship that you committed to working through, like with a spouse or with your kids as a parent, then you have to work through what, what is best for you and them together. You might even have to please your boss some to keep your job.

I understand that. I don't. I don't think so. After that though, screw 'em. Don't assign people value in your life unless they're mutually bringing value into yours. Now, while we're dropping people, being a people pleaser, let's take it a step further, and number four is at 35, you've gotta stop obsessing over what other people think.

I was blessed with this capability from the time I was very young. I've always just been able to be like, I don't care, [00:12:00] but I tend to be an outlier in this. We live in a world of Instagram and TikTok and social media platforms. People were already way too concerned about other people's opinions before social media because yes, I'm old enough to remember before social media.

We now have young people doing self-harm because they didn't get enough likes on social media. Guys, if you can't see that, that is crushing your life. Feeling like you need to get likes, that you need to worry about people you've never met before and never will what they think. But let's take a step closer.

You don't have to worry about what the people around you think unless you are committed to a connection with them in some way. So I'm gonna tell you don't like this episode. I don't need your likes. I'm sure it helps with the algorithm or something like that, but just out [00:13:00] of pure spite and out of making this point, guys, I don't need you to like this episode and I promise nothing bad is gonna happen to me if you don't.

So don't worry about liking this episode. Like I said, I'm sure it helps with some algorithm, but for the availability of this point, I don't actually care. I only ever throw that stuff out there if you guys follow the show. I hate throwing that crap out there anyway, so don't like this show. Now, as a personal trainer, this was one of my biggest headaches in the gym with my clients.

This, this worry they had about what other people think. One of the things I could tell them with absolute certainly is no one cares. Absolutely no one in that gym who was doing anything of value for themselves cares what you're doing. Other than you might get a good Jim bro who sees you doing something that's gonna hurt you and he might stop you and good on that guy.

Please do that and be nice. When he does, he's trying to help you. But clients get concerned about [00:14:00] people seeing them or judging them. Nobody cares. Well, that's just a microcosm of a much bigger world. Nobody cares, guys. You're connected to some people you've chosen to be connected to, and hopefully they have a good opinion of you.

Who cares what anybody else thinks because it's not gonna help you and it only hurts you if you choose to let it shake off this obsession with what other people think. And I promise you, it will free you like nothing else ever has. The only people who are ever gonna try and knock you down a peg or scrutinize what you do.

Are the people who are jealous or envious of you. That's the simple truth. No one further along with you in anything will ever look down on you for making an attempt. So stop worrying about what everybody else is saying because the few people who are negative, jealous, or envious, guys, you got something they want, whether you see it or not.

But while we're thinking about those lovely gym rats who are near and dear to my heart, [00:15:00] 'cause I am a gym rat, stop ignoring your health. You can get away with a lot of crap under the age of 25, and especially with men, it tends to go in five year increments. From 20 to 25, you're almost bulletproof. From 25 to 35, that starts to decline.

After 35, you are battling an uphill battle. The problem is most of us lived our lives, like our bodies in amusement park in our younger years because we felt indestructible. Well, all that comes back on you. It's always much easier to maintain than to build, and a lot of people don't take their health serious or our sugar addictions, not to mention any other substances that might come along.

Weight's harder to lose than to keep off muscle's, harder to gain than to build when you're younger. If you're 35 to 40, get on this horse now. Find exercise and movement that you enjoy and get working. Guys, my friend Dave over at Common Man, [00:16:00] OCR. Is trying to encourage people who started taking care of their health later in life as he goes through his own journey.

It's great if you don't follow Common Man, OCR. He's been on the show several times over the years, but hats off to him because he is on his own journey and he wants to encourage people along with him. He found something he's passionate about, he found something he loves to do, and it keeps him moving. It keeps him in the gym, it keeps him eating right.

He's making tremendous strides forward and so can you. Pick bicycling, pick the weight room, pick obstacle course events like my friend Dave did, or whatever makes you happy. Go play tennis. I don't understand it, but go ahead. Go play tennis. Go play basketball. My daughter likes basketball. I have friends who play basketball.

Whatever you gotta do, get moving and take care of your health. If you are already 35 and not started on this row somewhere. You're in for a really sad awakening in a few years it will catch up really fast. And guys, it just makes it harder and harder if you wait, jump [00:17:00] on your health now. We'll say the food conversation for its own episode because guys, it really is that important and it's almost as important as number six.

Stop hanging out with toxic people. Gentlemen, we're particularly bad about this one. As men, we often have those high school buddies that never moved on to the next thing. You know the guy I'm talking about. Bro. Bro, hopefully it's not you 'cause you're listening to this show, so you're trying to move forward.

But we all have that guy in our life, that friend, we know him. You know exactly who I'm talking about. He came right to mind when I said it. Well, everyone has heard the quote, you know, the sum of five people who you spend the most time with. I don't think it's the exact quote. I read it once, and that's not exactly how the original writer put it, but who cares?

Because that's what has become, and it still, you know, expresses the sentiment well, but it's pretty, pretty sadly accurate. The [00:18:00] crowd you hang out with is a decent predictor of your future. If you hang out with negative people, you will tend to have a more negative outlook. If you spend time with nosy, busy bodies, you'll likely have the same tendencies and it's hard to stay out of.

If you hang out with positive people, on the other hand, you will see life through a happier lens. It affects your perception who you're around. It affects your attitude and your perception. And what you perceive in your mind is what really makes your reality, whether it's real or not. And some of the most toxic people in your life are the hardest to walk away from.

But gentlemen, if they don't add positivity to your life, if you don't add positivity to each other's lives. If you don't make each other better, it's time to create some distance and limit your availability to those people. Surround yourself with people who want to see you win, who want to help you get there, who you want to help them win as well with people that are having [00:19:00] conversations in the same positive direction to where you want to go and are already half step ahead of you while you're talking to them.

And we're talking about the people who are going where you want to go. While you're talking to them. Number seven is stop playing small. After you get rid of those people who are toxic in your life, stop playing small. Recently I had a conversation with Yusef Marshall, AKA, they, they called me Mr. You, uh, the, they called me Mr.

You podcast. He has got several different shows and he shared a profound thought. The richest place in the world is the graveyard books, poems, inventions, stories, idea. They rest there because they weren't ever walked out. They weren't ever lived out in your twenties. You're living large in one way. Then you're trying to grind out the good life and make money and build the lifetime you want.

Well, but [00:20:00] by the time you're 35, most people have settled and that's air quotes. For all of you listening, they've settled for what they think is gonna be their life forever. It's usually not even a pale imitation of what their dreams were. Guys dream big. Okay? If you've gotten to 35 and heading towards 40, you've put in a lot of work.

You've learned a lot of things. You've done a lot of prep, you've thought you've dreamed, so start reaching for those dreams and stop playing small. The world knows nothing and everything. It's amazing. Nothing is new. Everything is new. It's all how you frame it. That doesn't mean that you shouldn't contribute.

In fact, the world needs you to be the man you've always wanted to be. The world needs you to realize those dreams and chase them because we need to see the man you were born to become. That's part of the reason we do this show is one of the foundational elements of this show. The world [00:21:00] needs you growing up, a preacher's kid, I had some real close personal time with a lot of people.

At the end of their lives, no one ever regretted taking chances or dreaming big. They did regret things they didn't do or try like taking chances or making big plays. No one went, man, I wish I had played it safer. Guys, stop dreaming small. Stop playing small and grow into the man that you were meant to become from day one.

None of that's worth a damn. If you don't shake off this bs, which is number eight, believing it's too late. If you are 35 or 40 or 45, stop believing it's too late. It's not. It is not too late for you to become the man you always dreamed of being. It's one of the biggest lies ever told, and I'm not sure. I think it, it's a lie of youth.[00:22:00] 

If you ever heard anybody argue this before then you probably heard examples of the fact that Warren Buffet didn't become wealthy until after he was 50. Morgan Freeman was in his fifties or sixties when he started acting. John Wayne was just a lot hand on the back lot, and a director saw him went, yeah, that's the guy I want, right?

And he just said, yes. When the opportunity came along, Colonel Sanders was in his sixties before he started KFC. History is full of proof that a lot of great things happen long after people thought they were done. I don't know where we came up with the idea of 35 and 40 being the end of the line. I know I went through that phase, but I promise you at 45 I feel like I'm just getting going.

The world is still opening up to me and I'm still charging forward hard guys, and I encourage you, you have to dump. These seven or eight issues if you want to live life to the [00:23:00] fullest. Sally, one of the things that stops a lot of men from ever reaching their dreams and Sally at 35 all the way to 40, is this misconception that is too late.

We have in our heads and it's like, oh, I might as well be dust. You're not. You're not dead. It's not over. You're just getting started and there is still so much to go at 40 years old now, gentlemen, this is a roadmap for shedding the weight that's been holding you back since your mid thirties. Moving on to 40, wherever you're at in that row.

Don't wear stress like a badge of honor. Protect your mind. Protect your body. Stress is not a flex. And running yourself into the ground, stressing yourself out will just kill you. Quick. Quit saying the yes to the things you hate. Guard your time like the asset. It actually is. Protect it more than anything else.

Stop trying to please everybody 'cause you can't pour from an empty cup. [00:24:00] And I hate that cliche, but it is true. And more importantly, the world's full of irritating people. You can't please 'em all. It's just fact. Let go of obsessing over what other people think. No one's actually watching. As closely as you wanna believe in my notes, I said that as closely as you imagined, but it's not.

It's as closely as you wanna believe. Everybody wants to believe they're important and everybody's watching them. They're not. Don't worry about it. They're all worried about their own crap. Get serious about your health. It's so much easier to maintain than to rebuild toxic people loose from your life.

Your circles write your stories, so choose co-authors that are gonna lift you up. Stop playing small because your dreams deserve to be lived, not buried and above all. Stop believing is too late. The best chapters are often written way after 35 guys. I honestly would not go back into my twenties for the life I live now because I love life in my forties.

Pick one of these [00:25:00] things right now, just one. Okay, and commit to quitting it today. I. Think back to the beginning of the show. I asked you to think about that one really big goal. If you could shed all this baggage that is keeping you from getting that goal, how much easier will it be to get there? How much more time will you have?

How much more lightness in your life? 'cause you don't have the negative people and you're not trying to make everybody happy. How much easier will it be to get to that goal? Start by just picking one. The guys dump all eight of these. Pick the one, then the next, and commit to quitting it today. Small changes compound into colossal wins.

Now, if you found value from the episode, head over to driven thrive.com. Leave us a quick review. Your feedback helps other men discover the path from merely living to truly thriving. And don't forget to subscribe on Apple Podcast, Spotify, or wherever you tune into the show. Rumble [00:26:00] YouTube. We're everywhere.

Whatever. Huge. Thanks again to our sponsors, MyPillow. Remember to visit mypillow.com. Use code Thrive for up to 80% off your free ship, off your order, and free shipping over $75 because rest matters as much as your grind. You can't grind on an empty tank, guys, and you absolutely will need that rest to keep going, if you enjoy this episode, be sure to check out episode The Invisible Robot Blocks.

Uncover the sneakier barrier, sabotaging your success. I can't ever do this YouTube thing and point to the right side. So it will be somewhere over here if you're watching on video or down in the show notes if you're on the podcast platforms. That way you can just go right from this episode to that episode, and we'll see you guys next week when we dive into men's mental health and the uncommon ways of dealing with stress and anxiety as a man that will help free up your life.

Until next time, be better tomorrow because of what you do today. We'll see you on the next one. The Driven to Thrive [00:27:00] broadcast purpose, growth, and lasting impact for men, helping men go from living to thriving. Purpose-filled intentional lives. Affiliate disclaimer, my Pillow like any other Source cycles, promos because of the extended lifecycle of a podcast.

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