Mikhaila Peterson on Cancel Culture, Depression, and Fighting The Woke Mob

Mikhaila Peterson
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It's what you're exposing yourself to. The amount of chemicals and the food we eat in America is insane compared to the rest of the world. My mom was extremely ill, my dad was extremely ill, and we were just starting to be like, let's try to get, like, life back up again. And then it was like, wham. Hit piece from the Sunday times.

My dad was extremely depressed, so he was already taking antidepressants at the time and was like, I think Mikayla has what I have. What does it feel like to someone who's never experienced depression being depressed? Just.

Jack Selby
Mikayla, thank you so much for coming on the iced coffee hour. We really appreciate it. We're huge fans. Thank you. Thank you for inviting me.

So, of course, we first heard about you through Jordan. Then I got interested in your story, and it is so fascinating and impressive. So you had a multitude of different ailments and diseases, and you claim that you're, like, allergic to, like, everything. Unfortunately, yeah. I'm glad that's what I'm known for.

Mikhaila Peterson
I tried to start the pod. I have a podcast, and I tried to start that and be like, okay, try and do something other than that. But it's with me still. The thing is, I'm okay with it. When you search.

Graham Stephan
Like, when I was doing research on you, it's the only thing that came up consistently. Like, you have to search for anything else other than that, because those are the most popular videos that you use. Not even a bad thing, I don't think. But it's impressive because you, like, overcame all of that stuff. Yeah.

Mikhaila Peterson
Yeah. You want to hear details? First, I would love to go into your upbringing and your story. So there's this famous story that you grew up in, like, a small house with 300 paintings in this house. Okay.

Jack Selby
And one night you were woken up because a painting of Lenin fell on your head. Yeah. So this is true. It actually woke you up. A painting in your room of Vladimir Lenin.

Mikhaila Peterson
Yeah. So my dad started buying soviet art when I was in, I think I was in grade six. Pretty tiny house paintings covered everything. There were hundreds and hundreds of paintings in there. And then when I left for university, they, like, because I didn't want any Lenin paintings in my room when I was growing up as a kid, which.

Jack Selby
I think Lenin specifically or just like. General, like russian scary ones, because there were war paintings, there were Stalin paintings, Lenin paintings. Like violent paintings. Yeah, like paintings of war. How old were you?

Mikhaila Peterson
I think when they started getting bought, I was eleven or twelve. And did you have a say? And say, like, I don't want this above my bed? Not once I left for university. So it was after I left for university, I came back and my room was filled with Lenin paintings.

Cause I've been like, no Lenin paintings in my room when I was a kid and a teenager and, yeah, I was lying in bed at night and this huge, probably seven foot by four foot painting of Lenin. Yeah. Fell on me. Were they expensive? Like, I'm curious how much they were.

So they weren't allowed to export any art in the Soviet Union when there was a wall up. So all the countries in the Soviet Union had tons of art, and the government paid people to make propaganda art too. So there was a lot of art stuck in there. And when the wall came down, a lot of these people who collected pieces of art for years put them on eBay to sell them, and they were extremely cheap. Like, we didn't have a lot of money before we started getting business opportunities.

And dad went viral. We really didn't have very much money. He was spending some money on art, but it was dirt cheap. And it was quite a bit for people who were, like, stuck in the Soviet Union times. But no, it was cheap on eBay in like, 2000, what was like six five.

Graham Stephan
And what was it about those pieces of art that made him want to collect them? I mean, he's always done work in trying to understand evil and, like, malevolence in people and how entire societies can go towards evil. So, Nazis, what happened with the Soviet Union where, like, people were going to the government, telling on their brothers and their parents and the government would get involved? And I think, one, he thought it was beautiful. Like, he's always been very into design and how things look, but I think the historical significance of how a culture can get saturated with that kind of evil has just obsessed him.

Mikhaila Peterson
So I don't know why he wanted to necessarily bring it into the house. It was like a nice calm house. I also didn't know for a really long time, I didn't know that other houses weren't exactly like that. I went over for play days and I was like, this is a nice house. But it wasn't until I went to university when I was like, oh, we had like 32 different paint colors in our house, and it was covered in soviet art.

And it wasn't until I was like 23 that I thought, oh, that was unique. I'm sure you're used to at this point, very interesting table talk and discussions and philosophical discussions. Did these thrill you as a kid, or do you think that you were kind of like, ah, whatever, I'll placate these conversations? No, they weren't boring, for sure. Dad definitely brought it down to my brother and my level when we were a kid.

So I grew up knowing the psychological significance of the biblical stories, mostly focusing on the Old Testament. And so I knew the background of these things, and he taught me about egyptian mythology and greek mythology, and I always thought that was fascinating. So, no, it wasn't boring or like, he was lecturing at me or anything. It was interesting, but it definitely, I mean, that's been my entire life. I thought those were normal discussions, but.

Jack Selby
Were you ever naturally rebellious to that? Because I know a lot of kids, like, especially when the parents are, like, trying to force some sort of thing on their kids. Not forced, but like, you know, being very outwardsly about their opinion on something. Like, kids are like, no, I don't believe that. Like, actually not really.

Mikhaila Peterson
Like, I was rebellious in other, like, horrible ways as a teenager, sneaking out, drinking, doing things like that. Rebellious. So, no, we've had disagreements about certain things over the years, but nothing major. It wasn't ideology that we argued about. It was more like, I want to go party, and I probably shouldn't, and why am I not allowed and I'm going to do it anyway type of conversations.

Graham Stephan
How inquisitive would you be on that? If he tells you no to something, would you naturally question it and wonder. Why everything was a negotiation? And if we ever had a disagreement in the family over chores or things, then it was, sit down, down at the kitchen table, and we're gonna sit here until his conversation is finished. And there were no more snakes under the rug, which was intense.

Mikhaila Peterson
So we'd be there for, like, 3 hours trying to, you know, why do I have to clean this area of the house? Or just simple things like that? Which views would you, would you say were, like, most strongly implemented into you as a kid, which belief systems like, okay, I believe in honesty. Which virtues? Probably being skeptical of authority.

I don't know if you would call that a virtue. I think it's a virtue now for sure. And maybe it's always been a virtue, but I think skepticism of authority. So I remember in grade three or four, we were told we weren't allowed to pick up snow outside because they didn't want people making snowballs and throwing them at each other. And my dad's rule was, don't listen to stupid rules.

It doesn't matter who makes the rule. Don't listen to stupid rules. You have to be prepared to deal with the consequences of not listening to those stupid rules, but you don't have to listen to them. And he put that in from a moral perspective. Like, it's not wrong of you to not listen to stupid rules, even if there are repercussions.

And then I guess the other one would be. I mean, it was hammered into me from a really young age to tell the truth. You know when you have something you wanna say and you're like, maybe I shouldn't say it, even. That's a type of lie that you shouldn't do. So it was truth, and then it was, don't listen to stupid rules.

I think those were probably the two lessons. How do you know it's a stupid rule, though? Cause I'd imagine the teachers don't think that's a stupid rule. Yeah. And I think that's what plays into, like, tell the truth.

It is hard to decipher. I think that's why America is also so split nowadays, because, like, what's a stupid rule? And the Republicans will say, well, these are stupid rules, and then liberals will have the opposite point of view. No, those are good rules. So it's tricky.

I guess he just. He just let us loose with our own morals. Like, you guys can decide what stupid rules are. But I think he classified not being able to pick up snow as a stupid rule. And as he started to gain in popularity, how did that affect the family dynamic in your life?

It was pretty awful, honestly. It was like 2016 when he first had a video that went viral. Was that the Bill C 16 video? Yeah, it was. That's the first time I spoke.

Could you explain? Okay, so I might butcher this, but you. You let me know. So basically, the canadian government was trying to implement Bill C 16, which mandated preferred speech, basically. So, like, if someone asks you to call them a certain pronoun, you have to do that, and it's punishable.

Jack Selby
By, like, a criminal offense or something like that. And he was very outspoken against this bill. And then there was an argument outside of campus or within campus between him and a bunch of other students. I was at that. You were at that.

That must have been scary for you. Yeah, a little bit. It was, because that's combative. That was, like, high, intense. It was.

Mikhaila Peterson
It was yelling. Oh, and they were blasting. What are those? Those horns? So you could.

Air horns are great. So it was stressful, and it wasn't fun at the beginning. Like, it was way more fun now. But at the beginning, it was, is dad gonna lose his job at the university, which was his main source of income? And that was a serious possibility because people were posting things on his doors, and, like, he couldn't really get to his office easily.

Some of his friends or who he thought were his friends were taken aback by what he was saying. So he lost a whole bunch of friends. So it was like, who are our friends now? And we just became aware of this political divide that we hadn't been aware of before. Things didn't really calm down until, like, 2021.

So it was stressful for, like, about five years. Being put up against so much adversity. Does it actually make you reconsider some of your opinions, or did it solidify those opinions? Because, like, okay, I see your best argument, and I think that what you're doing right now is really aggressive, and it's an emotional based argument. Okay.

Jack Selby
I am 100% firm in my beliefs. Or are you, like, well, once, you know, dad's friends start to get upset at him, and then I see, like, you know, signs on our doors, and I see all these hate comments, like, maybe I'm. Maybe I could be wrong on this. Not really. That didn't happen to me anyway.

Mikhaila Peterson
Mostly because if you, like, say, the event that we were talking about where everyone's yelling at him outside the campus, the people yelling at him, or, like, lunatics. Like, so you look at them, and you're like, who's the reasonable person in this. In this conversation? Is it the people screaming? Although dad was, like, had raised his voice at that point, too.

Everyone was yelling. But it was pretty clear to me that people who were going against him, that there was something off there. So I don't think I reconsidered any of my points because of the pushback or any of his points because of the pushback. Who is your father to you other than your dad? Was he someone you looked up to as an idol?

I definitely looked up to him growing up. Otherwise I don't think I would have gone into psychology and classics and been interested in the same kind of ideas. So I definitely looked up to him. And then now my husband and I actually are managing his social media and brand and doing like negotiations and things. So now he's also my boss somewhat.

There's a weird family dynamic, but it works out. I tried to hand off the job a bunch of times, but since we got more well known, people appear and they'll like, oh yeah, I'll help you. And then it turns out they're just after money or something. So I've tried to like, hand off his brand or hand off negotiations and things, and it's mostly just turned into people trying to screw us over, which is why we've kept it in the family. I imagine that's brought you guys all a lot closer together, like all of these controversies and like crazy experiences and people, like, hating.

Yes, it has. I'm definitely way closer with my mom. I was also so young, like when this started, I was 23 or 22. So I just gotten over the teenage years where you're already kind of like fighting with your parents and things. I'm definitely closer with my family.

I think my entire family is closer, but it's hard to tell because we're also older. I think it's solidified trust between us though, that we wouldn't have necessarily had because we've had to band together to get through some of these things. Although before we go into that, if you have a website, you know how important it is to be on the first page of Google. But not only that, even if you're on the first page of Google, the first three results get the vast majority of traffic. So if you're not there, you're missing out on a lot of growth.

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Or you could click the link in the description. Thank you so much, Ahrefs, for sponsoring this episode. And back to so, on the topic of health issues, which is like the thing that, like, we were mentioning before this podcast, like, when we search up your name, that's like all of the results because of just how extreme it. Seems, it was really bad. Yeah.

Jack Selby
What is it that you currently are eating? I'm just eating ruminant meat, which is like lamb, beef, bison. And to be clear, there's nothing else in your diet other than meat. There's salt, vodka, and occasional vodka. Yeah, that vodka just like, destroys.

Mikhaila Peterson
They're like, oh, it's a health diet. But there's also vodka. But we're talking like, no vegetables, breads. Absolutely not. No sauces, no, nothing.

Nothing. Salt. Okay, so to explain these drastic measures, what was your experience that made you determine, okay, I just need to eat meat. Yeah. Cause we discussed earlier that you were suffering from a lot of, like, chronic illnesses like Lyme disease, arthritis, celiac disease, leaky gut.

I think the worst one was I was extremely depressed. So I was on antidepressants from the age of twelve till I kind of figured out that diet could alleviate those symptoms when I was 23. How do you know you're depressed at twelve? I got angry at somebody for not following the rules of a game we were playing. I was twelve.

Right. They thought it was a stupid rule. It was. I was like, you're not following the rules. This isn't fair.

But I remember going inside, slamming the door, going into my room, slamming the door, and sitting on my bed and being like, I can't control my anger. I was aware enough to be like, I don't think this level of anger is appropriate for someone who's breaking the rules of a ballgame. So that was one thing, but it wasn't actually. Like, I didn't really clue into it because I was diagnosed with juvenile rheumatoid arthritis. They give really chronically ill kids a psychiatrist usually, to try, and I don't know if that even helps.

Like, good luck. You need someone to talk to. Like, your life is not great. And the psychiatrist gave me the beck scale. And a Beck scale gives you questions like, do you have subtle thoughts.

Do you ever feel it would be better off if you weren't around sad questions like that? And then you rate it on a scale, so it's pretty objective. But my parents had sent me to them. Art had encouraged me to go because my dad was extremely depressed, too. So he was already taking antidepressants at the time and was like, I think Michaela has what I have because we've got this severe depression that's run through my family, like my great grandpa, my grandpa, my dad.

And then it hit me. That's what we thought at the time anyway. And so I was diagnosed by a psychiatrist when I was twelve. What does it feel like to someone who's never experienced depression? You know when you go into a really, like a dark alley or a scary neighborhood, and it feels like someone might jump you and you're like, kind of on high alert, and you're like, looking around, just hyper stimulated and aware, it's that feeling all the time.

Or it's the feeling like your dog that you've had since you were a kid is dying. It's like this deep, grieving pain almost. It was easier to identify what depression felt like when it finally lifted. And what changed for me was my thought patterns changed. So instead of being like, something bad is gonna happen, all the problems in my life turned into opportunities.

So, like, here's a challenge. And it wasn't like, my life is going to be over because I have this challenge. It was, oh, I can beat this challenge. And then there'll be new opportunities. But being depressed just, well, it just destroys your life.

So I had arthritis, and the arthritis was the worst arthritis my kid rheumatologist had seen in 25 years of treating kids with arthritis. I had my hip and ankle replaced when I was 17. It was catastrophic. And the amount of, like, pain I had from the arthritis wasn't even comparable to what the depression felt like. What does it feel like to have arthritis?

It's like what an older, what you would imagine an old person would feel like. It's like all your joints are stiff and painful. And then for the hip and ankle, like the cartilage, literally, my body ate the cartilage away. So it was just bone on bone. And at that point, it's excruciating.

Jack Selby
Do you think depression can be solved for anybody? Yeah, I do. I think it depends what's causing it. Part of what I tell people if they have chronic illness is you need to figure out how to fix it. It's fixable.

Mikhaila Peterson
Like people aren't born to have some sort of problem. Now, say that there are genetic abnormalities that could be different. I don't believe the genetic abnormalities for depression. And I do think that if you have any type of chronic illness, you need to go and search out for the answers. And the mainstream medical system doesn't cover chronic illness very well.

So if you have any type of chronic illness, like autoimmune, any type of, like, psychiatric or long term problem, you'll go to the doctor and they'll say, here's a drug. It'll help, but it won't cure you. There's no cure. Right. So if you have arthritis, they'll say, they'll put you on immune suppressants.

It might help. There's a host of side effects, but it won't cure you and your diet. Diagnosed with multiple joint replacements in the future and an early death if you have autoimmune disorders. And the medications don't prevent that. So, like, none of it works.

So go out and look in a different direction. And what I tell people to do is at least start with diet. Cause, like, that's changed. My. My mom.

My mom's on the diet. My dad's on the diet. I'm on the diet. Because we all have different, weird autoimmune things going on, but that's usually where I tell people start. So, no, I think.

I think depression is curable. Even if it's some sort of PTSD depression, I think there are things you can do about it, and it's just hopeless. If you think I'm stuck with this forever, this is just me. I don't believe that. And what made you think that you should try out diet rather than all of these other remedies when you're suffering from all of these ailments?

So I was diagnosed in grade two, and I didn't delve into diet, really, until I was 23. So it was mostly because I was like, well, the mainstream medical route isn't working. I've had a hip and ankle replacement. When I was 17, I was like, I'm screwed. And when I was 23, I was like, I was actually.

I had dropped out of university because I was too sick, and I had chronic fatigue at that point, too. And I was like, I can't make it to my final exams. That's it. I went into makeup school, much to my dad's chagrin. He was like, you're not going to be intellectually stimulated there.

And I was like, you don't know me, dad. So I went into makeup school for a semester, and my wrist was so sore because you stand all day and you do someone's makeup. And I was like, I can't even use my wrist. What am I doing in makeup? It's me becoming a surgeon or something.

This is ridiculous. And at that point, I went to my doctor, and I was like, I think my wrist, because it really hurt. And I was like, I think it's headed in the same direction as my hip and ankle. And he was like, oh, joint replacements are really rare at your age. I was like, I've had two.

Like, they don't seem that rare. And that's when I decided to go into biomedical science at a different university and just figure out what was wrong with me. I did my entire family's genetics through 23 andme to see if there was any type of pattern which showed genetics for celiac disease. And so I cut out gluten, and my health improved a little, like, the tiniest bit, enough that I was like, okay, maybe I'll go on an elimination diet. And I was encouraged by my mom, who kept dragging me to, like, over the years, I was brought to, I don't know how many, like, witch doctors and naturopaths, just, like, anything being, like, here.

And that head initially backfired because you go to a naturopath, they sell you, like, $200 of supplements. None of the supplements do anything. And I was like, these, you know, quacks are just taking advantage of sick people to push supplements on them, and that's terrible to take advantage of sick people. So I was really averse to that. But she did drag me to a naturopath when I was 23 who suggested an elimination diet.

And I kind of looked at it and said, this doesn't make any sense, and came up with my own just to give it a shot. And that diet helped a whole bunch of my symptoms in, like, a month. It was crazy. But before we get into that, I'm sure you know as well as us that there is really only one foolproof way of becoming a millionaire by the end of your life, and that is investing. I completely agree with that.

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Jack Selby
And thank you guys so much for checking it out. And back to the episode. Was it just like a natural allergy to a bunch of different foods or do you think this diet would work for anybody? I call it the lion diet. I named that a number of years ago.

Mikhaila Peterson
Not sure how I feel about it, but that's what it's called. And it seems like people with severe chronic illness, if they limit their food to just beef, even if it's for like six weeks, and then reintroduce other foods, then they can monitor flare ups and it seems to work. And I know how that like crazy that sounds, but there's more evidence and a bunch of is coming out of Harvard now for ketogenic diets, treating cancer or treating autoimmunity or treating psychiatric diseases. That's a big one. There's a doctor named Chris Palmer that is is saying, hey, medications don't really work.

Like psychiatric illnesses are a metabolic disease, and you can treat that with a ketogenic diet. Technically, the diet I'm on is a ketogenic diet. It's just plant free. It seems counterintuitive to everything that I've learned about nutrition, you know, growing up, like through the public school system and everything. And I'm not a nutritionist, obviously.

Jack Selby
It seems questionable. Do you think that this exact diet, this lion diet where you're just eating straight beef and salt, could work on everybody? Or do different people respond differently to varying foods? From what I've seen, it works overwhelmingly well for people with autoimmune or psychiatric illnesses or obesity problems. I don't know about the other illnesses, so, no, I do think it works for that.

Mikhaila Peterson
I don't think the average person needs to be as restrictive as me. Like, I was really, really sick. I've seen a lot of people who have arthritis that go on a ketogenic diet or go on a paleo diet and cut out processed foods and cut out dairy and cut out some inflammatory foods, and they see their symptoms lower. But if people have, like, three different autoimmune disorders and can't get out of bed and they've been treated through the medical system and it's not working, then this is what I generally suggest people try. I wonder how much of that is purely because you're not eating a lot of the crap that's out there.

That's what I thought. I mean, people say that, but what I started on. So in 2017, the elimination diet I did wasn't just meat. Like, it took a while to get that because I was also unaware that you could survive only on meat because nobody knew that. So I did, like, lots of greens, certain fruit.

I was eating, like, apples and pears and things, meat in general, fish. And it was more like, I cut out all the soy, dairy, any processed foods, grains. I cut out eggs, too, because I know a lot of people have egg allergies, nuts. Like, I cut out everything you could be allergic to and just kept, like. Like I said, greens and certain vegetables, fruit and meat.

And that almost got rid of all my symptoms. I got off of all my medication on that diet. So I wasn't just on a meat diet. I was on, like, more of a paleo diet. And that worked.

As soon as I got pregnant, my arthritis came back, even though I didn't change what I was eating. And I was like, okay, what is this about? And then I also moved into a house that I know that had black mold in the basement. And I think that flared. My autoimmune symptoms at that point, I couldn't get them under control again, and I was like, there's no way I'm going back on medication.

I'm just going to keep removing foods until it goes away, because it went away, and it was gone for, like, a year and a half. And then I got pregnant and came back, and I was like, it's got to be diet related. So then I just slowly cut down, I cut out all the food, fruit, which was awful, and then I just slowly cut down the vegetables, and it. And then I came across a Joe Rogan episode with Sean Baker. And he was like, yeah, I only eat steak.

And I was like, okay, so people can only eat steak. Steak. That's great. I'll do that for a while. So I switched to doing that for a while.

And then every time I tried to reintroduce something, I'd have these inflammatory reactions, which was like, depression mostly. That was the worst symptom, but also, like, arthritis and my skin breaking out. But it was mostly the depression that was awful. And so I just stopped reintroducing things. So I'm really curious.

Graham Stephan
Do you think there's a chance that it's a bit of a placebo effect? No. And why do you say that? I had my hip and ankle replaced from arthritis. There's nothing that can placebo that kind of arthritis away.

Mikhaila Peterson
I do get that question. Yeah, it's a fair question. I've always been, if there's a placebo. Effect that's that strong, I'm all for it. I think what's happening is the environment we live in now compared to how we lived 150 years ago is full of different exposures to different things where, like, molds.

The food we eat is crazy right now. Like, the amount of chemicals in the food we eat in America is insane compared to the rest of the world. The cancer warnings everywhere you go, it's like, oh, this is known to cause cancer in this. We're eating at, like, a restaurant. Yeah, yeah, exactly.

People's bodies are completely overwhelmed, which is why it's like, one in five people have an autoimmune disorder. I can't remember what the psychiatric illness numbers are, and they've skyrocketed since COVID People are getting sicker and, like, fatter and more miserable. And I think it's environmental. It's what you're eating. It's what you're exposing yourself to, because it wasn't here, you know, 150 years ago like this.

Graham Stephan
So this is something I've tried recently. So January 1, I wanted to lose a little weight, and I wanted to get in better shape, so I tried the. I think the proper term is, like, the caveman diet. You're just supposed to eat, like, whole foods. Nothing fried, nothing processed, no alcohol.

And I did that. And the first week, I remember how difficult it was to find foods that were not processed, like, just purely natural foods. It was really difficult. And so I had to go out of my way to find these foods and then consciously eat them. And then every restaurant I go to, I'd look at the foods and I'd be like, I can't eat this.

I can't eat this. And it was like 80% of the menu you can't even touch. So then I'm eating, like, fish, vegetables, steaks, chicken, stuff like this. In the first month, I think I was down, like, five pounds. Yeah.

Which is just from doing that. Like, I'm not doing any extra exercise. It's purely just from eating well. And so I stuck with it. And so even now, like, I try to stick with it, but it is difficult.

Mikhaila Peterson
So in 2017, I basically did that, and it got rid of almost all my symptoms, like my chronic fatigue. I was taking Adderall for chronic fatigue because I was sleeping 18 hours a day and I was exhausted most of the time. I got off of Adderall, I got off of the antidepressant, I got off of the immune suppressant, I got off of the antihistamines I was taking every day. I was taking an antibiotic, uh, for this rash that just wouldn't go away. I got off of everything on that kind of diet.

And, yeah, I went from, like, being able to eat out with my friends to being like, I guess I'll just come join you, but I'm not going to eat anything unless you're going to cook at home. It's hard. Luckily, in, like, places like Austin and La, it's becoming more popular to not cook with seed oils and to have gluten free items. And it's growing in popularity. Compared to 2016, there was nothing.

It was miserable. So I get it. I get the pain, but if you order just steak, I mean, that opens a lot of restaurants up. What are the downsides, though, to such a diet? Like, are you worried about cholesterol, saturated fats?

When you have an autoimmune disorder and it goes away, you don't really care what the repercussions are. Like, people are like, well, you were worried you're going to die earlier. It's like, not really because I was dying, and now I'm not. So I don't really care what anything says, but because there are people following me. I've done research into, like, cholesterol and saturated fats and all these concerns.

All of the studies done on red meat were epidemiological studies that don't actually conclusively prove anything unhealthy about red meat. So if you actually look at the science, Max Lugaver is actually really good. He kind of talks, like, about a diet, like you're doing. If you're just eating meat, your cholesterol does go up. But cholesterol, the research done around cholesterol causing heart disease, and that is iffy.

At best, too, if you look into it. So there's a doctor named Ken Berry that delves into that. I'm not the best person to talk to about the scientific evidence of only eating meat. I mostly tell people, hey, I was, like, dying with, like, four different things and on all these medications, and now I'm healthy. I've been doing this diet for, like, six and a half years.

Yeah. Do you do it for six weeks and see how you feel? And then when's the last time you cheated on the diet? I don't cheat, like, ever. So I've never cheated on the diet.

I've tried to reintroduce foods very carefully. The first time was in 2020, so that was three years into the diet, and I literally didn't cheat until then. I did try to reintroduce early on because I was like, I'm only going to do this for six weeks, and then I'm going to try, like, olives or something. And the reactions were so bad that I just stopped. In 2020, I tried to start eating fruit again, like, berries, like, things people should be able to eat.

And it wasn't terrible, but I got sicker over a period of, like, two or three weeks, so I cut those out again. And then recently I had a baby. I had a baby four months ago. I had a meat aversion the entire pregnancy, which can happen if you're pregnant, where, like, meat makes you. It doesn't taste good and kind of makes you nauseous.

Jack Selby
It's like the opposite of a craving. Yeah, it's horrible. And I was like, there's no way this is gonna happen to me. Cause all I eat is meat, and I had it the entire pregnancy, and it was horrible. I know it's funny, but it's not.

Graham Stephan
Like, so I heard that's your body telling you that you need certain nutrients, and that's what, like, that's what the cravings are for. Like, if people are craving ice cream, it's like your body's craving whatever that is for the child. I don't think so, because people get cravings like ice cream, and you don't need ice cream for the baby. And most pregnant women gain, like, massive amounts of weight during pregnancy, which isn't healthy either, because then you give birth to babies that way too much in the nineties. They used to say, if you have cravings, eat that.

Mikhaila Peterson
That's what your body needs. But they don't say that anymore. They're like, eat a healthy diet. They don't say, eat only meat. That would just horrify most doctors.

Like, horrify. Um, I didn't have a obstetrician. I had a midwife, and she was chill. Why do you think the diet is so controversial? Because I was doing research.

Graham Stephan
I saw a Harvard study that said people in the study who ate the most red meat tended to die younger and die more often from cardiovascular disease and cancer. Others seemed to think there's no problem with it at all. So why is it such a controversial thing? Well, there were a bunch of studies that came out, like, decades ago showing that red meat was bad and saturated fat was bad. And like I said, those were all epidemiological studies where they look at, like, large groups of people and they kind of hand out pieces of paper you can fill out saying what your diet is.

Mikhaila Peterson
And most people who eat red meat eat them with other things. A lot of it's processed. So, yeah, like, yeah, I eat red meat three times a day. I'm going to McDonald's and I'm having burgers and fries and a milkshake. And then they go, okay, it's the burger.

It's like, it's not the burger, it's the bun and the fries and the milkshake. So most of the studies on meat are done from that. And then they've also recently decided saturated fat isn't a problem. But that's new research in the last five years. But then how much are you going to trust the new research?

Jack Selby
It seems like the research is always changing and the research that everyone understood to be fact 20 years ago, everyone's like, well, I actually don't really know about that. There was also influence from different food corporations in America, if you want to get conspiratorial. So there was like, the seed oils, they were like, stop eating butter. It's not good for you. You should eat canola oil.

Mikhaila Peterson
And that was all not true. That was to sell canola oil. Or there was sugar. Sugar was like a weight loss drug in the fifties. Sugar's not a weight loss drug.

Yeah, like, eat sugar, it'll satisfy your sweet tooth. There are ads from the fifties that. Show sugar from the milk was similar. Yeah, the whole milk industry, cigarettes, even. They'Re like cigarettes, you know, for diet suppression and stuff.

Graham Stephan
In the fifties. Part of the reason I don't delve into the, like, the science is because, one, I don't really care because of how I feel, and two, because most scientific studies, period, have some sort of agenda behind them and you can't trust them. Yeah. Or they're just not. They're done sloppily, like the epidemiological studies on meat.

How many problems in life do you think are diet related? It depends. If you're depressed, like, most of your problems, then are probably diet related, because if you're depressed, then that changes your outlook on life, and it can impact your work and your relationships. Like, being. Being severely depressed and having a relationship is very difficult because you misinterpret what the other person is saying.

Mikhaila Peterson
You're, like, a little bit paranoid. You're hurt really easily. You're volatile. Like, that impacts your relationships massively. So I say anybody suffering from any type of chronic illness should try and figure it out themselves and look into diet and at minimum, remove the processed foods and do something like you're doing, because that's usually enough to be like, oh, I lost weight.

Like, when I did that, I was probably more restrictive than you, but it was pretty much like whole foods. I went down three pants sizes in a month, but I only lost five pounds. And so a lot of my, like, I was bloated, and I didn't even notice that went down. And I was just like, diet can have that kind of impact because I had always thought that exercise makes you lose weight. So I was at the gym all the time trying to get abs, and then I went on a diet, and, like, I had abs.

I was like, oh, I thought it didn't matter what you ate, as long as you didn't eat too much. But that wasn't the case for me. That's like what people used to say. They're still kind of saying it now. It is interesting.

Jack Selby
I feel like whenever you go to the doctors with a certain problem, like, the last thing that's ever discussed is diet. Yeah. Intuitively, not a nutritionist. Intuitively, it makes the most sense. It's like the oil that you're putting in your car, essentially.

It's like you want to put in the good stuff to make sure it runs efficiently. Doctors don't get very much nutrition, like nutrition education in med school. And what they are taught is taught from the government, basically, which is like the food pyramid, which has been created by these companies that were trying to push seed oils and, like, wheat. That's what I was taught, is the whole food pyramid. That's what I was taught, too.

Mikhaila Peterson
I mean, I had breaded every day meal. I used to have. Did you guys have sugar and cinnamon on toast? I used to have sugar and cinnamon on toast. No, no, but I have plenty of sugar.

Jack Selby
Cinnamon toast, crunch. Like, I grew up thinking, like, cinnamon toast. I'm getting my dairy. You know what? I remember begging my mom for Reese's puffs.

Graham Stephan
Remember those? Reese's puff cereal? And I thought it was so cool because the commercials made it seem like these kids are, like, the cool kids. Yeah, the kids who ate Reese's. But I thought they were like, this is the coolest people.

And I was like, it's part of a well balanced breakfast. Like, they say it in the commercial. Yeah, yeah, yeah. And so. But looking back, it's a dessert.

Like, there's no way that's helping a child. Even lunchables had a thing recently where I think it was, like, 70 or 80% of, like, your entire day's sodium were in one little tiny meal for lunchables. Or capri sun, which is loaded with sugar. But I'd see those silver surfers that would go and, like, turn into that silver blob of liquid and, like, go through walls and stuff. Oh, yeah.

Jack Selby
I thought that was so cool. So I'm like, I gotta have a capri sun. Do you have dunkaroos, or is that a canadian thing? No, no, I never heard of that. It's like, this chocolate, like, graham cracker thing that you like.

Canadian sounds. But there's no way that's healthy. There's healthy options now, though. Like, my kid isn't on, obviously, and she's not on the diet I'm on, but she eats more like a paleo diet. So, like, not processed food things.

Mikhaila Peterson
And the little snacks you can get now. You can get healthy snacks. So people who aren't looking into this, it's. It's silly. You can, like, you can still go the Dunkaroo.

I don't know if they make dunkaroos anymore. They were good, but, like, you can still go that route. But it's like, why do that when you have the healthy version that still comes in a little snack box? Like, it's made with real, real fruit. It doesn't have added sugars, stuff like that.

There's options now. So why do you think people gravitate towards the unhealthy foods? They're super addictive. Try getting off of them. Literally.

Try cutting out sugar. You know, there's studies showing, like, sugar versus cocaine in rats, and rats will take the sugar over the cocaine, and people are like, that's an insane thing to say. It can't be more addictive than cocaine. Try getting off of sugar. Seriously getting off of it.

The cravings are crazy. Like, when I cut out processed foods. I was having dreams about angel food cake. Like, dreams about it, dreams about brownies. It was really hard.

And I have experience getting off of things because with the hip and ankle replacement, I was put on OxyContin for a year, which, like, saved me because I was in. I was, like, suicidal with pain. It was insane. And the canadian healthcare system is so bad that it took a really long time to get the surgeries, but I had to get off of OxyContin. And getting off of Oxycontin was easier than cutting out sugar.

Cutting out dairy was really hard, too. And what's the reason for that? Is it purely cravings or is because sugar is in everything? No, it's cravings. It's definitely cravings.

Jack Selby
Yeah. And I've noticed, like, in my own personal life, if I've been buying these, like, chocolate milk cartons, fair life, which are like, macros, pretty decent. Oh, my gosh. This is. If you know, you know.

So I'll drink one one day and the next day come around, like, 05:00 p.m. Same time that the day before I was drinking it. I'll be like, I kind of need some, like, sugar in my system right now. I go right back to it. Yeah, the same thing goes like, you have ice cream one day, you want it so much more than next day than you did some random day.

Mikhaila Peterson
It's hard. You can switch these things out, too. But even so, at the beginning, when I was on more of a paleo diet, I'd be like, I cut out dairy because dairy can be hard for people with autoimmune disorders. It was really bad for my arthritis. And I switched over to, like, coconut ice cream.

And there are a lot of different coconut ice cream products, and they taste good, but they don't give you the high that you're looking for. And so you still get the cravings and everything. Dairy causes insane cravings, too. It was dairy and soy and sugar that were the hardest to get off of. Do you ever crave steak nowadays?

Not really. I get, like, hungry, and then it's steak. So it tastes amazing. So steaks still taste good. Yeah.

But for that first initial period of getting onto the diet, you get it. It doesn't taste so good. Oh, you know what's interesting? It reminds me of the. I did the Starbucks diet.

Graham Stephan
And this is for a video. Oh, no. And it was only Starbucks for one week straight. Day one was fine. Day two, I slept in, and I never sleep in.

I slept in day two, and I posted a video late, which, again, I never post. Late. Day three came around. I started to physically feel sick. I wanted to start throwing up because I felt so bad.

Like, even the idea of eating a Starbucks anything was as bad. And then Jack said, it can't be that bad. And I said, let's try to see if you just make it the next four days. And Jack did it. How did you feel on, like, day three?

Jack Selby
It was the same. So, like, day one, it's exciting. Cause, like, obviously Starbucks sandwiches, like, they just taste good. But then it's weird. Like, I didn't want to be, like, a wimp and complain about it.

Cause I try not to complain about things, but, like, day two and three, I felt, like, dizzy a little bit. A little bit nauseous, like, weirdly not hungry, you know, and I felt like I was kind of forcing myself to eat for lunch when I usually have a massive appetite. So it's weird. And then after a while, I will say near the end, the tail end of it, it wasn't so bad. Kind of get used to it.

I feel like it's the same thing in that super size me documentary. Oh, that was brutal. Apparently, a lot of that was fabricated. Yeah, he had longstanding everything. It was a longstanding alcohol addiction.

Graham Stephan
I think before then and partly during that might have skewed some of the results. So when the doctors were saying, oh, this looks like a person who has been drinking for decades. Oh, he has. He conveniently left that out. Conveniently, yeah.

So, you know, not to discredit. I'm sure some of it's valid, but I'm sure there's also some nuance to that that wasn't discussed in the movie. Oh, that's funny. I didn't know. That makes for a great story, though.

Mikhaila Peterson
It was a good. That was a good documentary. Yeah, I forgot about that. One of the things that happens when you change your diet dramatically in any direction is your microbiome has to adapt. So that's, like, all the gut bacteria in your gut, and they survive off of your, like, normal diet, and they can produce cravings.

So if you cut out a bunch of food, which you guys would have had to cut out certain groups of food, when you're only eating Starbucks food, it's giving you cravings for those food, and it takes a while for those microbes to die off, and then the cravings go away. Although really quick before we go into that, if you run your own online business, there's no better sound than hearing. And if you want to hear a lot more then our sponsor, Shopify, is there to help. For those unaware, Shopify is the global ecommerce platform that's already helped transform millions of businesses worldwide. For example, Shopify is an endless list of integrations, third party apps, and flexible templates to help customize your online store exactly the way you want to.

Graham Stephan
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Jack Selby
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Graham Stephan
And now let's get back to the episode. So what do you think is the. Ideal diet for the average person? I would cut out all processed foods and I would question dairy. Cause that can give people, like, fatigue and brain fog and skin problems.

Mikhaila Peterson
I'd question dairy for, like, the healthy person without an autoimmune disorder or something. I would go on like, a paleo. A paleo diet and cut out all the processed foods. Yeah, I think processed foods are, like, the one that I can say fairly confidently are just bad. Yeah.

And I would also, like, skew heavily toward meat. So I'd eat meat at every meal, include all the other whole foods that people are meant to eat. Like, I think the only reason that I'm stuck on this diet is because I was so damaged from, like, a number of different things. My house, when I grew up, when I got really sick, had black mold in the basement again, which I think contributed to a lot of the autoimmune problems. And then I was on antibiotics a lot as a kid, and I was, like, born through a c section, which can mess up your microbiome.

Like, I think there were a lot of contributing factors, which is why I'm, like, allergic to everything. But if you're a healthy person already, I'd look up Max Lugaver. He has a book. He talks about mostly cutting out processed foods, lowering or eliminating grains, and eating, you know, healthy meat. How do you prepare your steaks?

I use an air fryer most of the time. So I eat New York strip and cook it from frozen, covered in salt. You can air fryer frozen. That's the air fryer. Hack.

Do you guys have an air fryer? Yeah. Okay. Okay. So you've got, you've got, but you.

Jack Selby
Get a good crust on it. You get a better crust because it doesn't cook all the way through. Yeah, flip it. You do. If it's like this thick, you cook it for like nine minutes per side.

Mikhaila Peterson
Yeah. And it gets crusty on the outside. And what cut is it? New York. Okay, I'll give it a shot.

It'll change your life. You just take it out of the freezer, put it in frozen, it's wet. You don't have to thaw it if you thought it overcooks in the middle. That's interesting. I never heard of that before.

It'll change your life. Now what about such a hack, too? Even if you don't want to be healthier, so much easier. Yeah. Now what about doing the opposite and going vegan?

Graham Stephan
What are your thoughts on veganism? I don't think veganism is sustainable long term at all. I think it causes muscle loss. And I don't think that you can add in different supplements to get everything you could be getting from meat. So I'm not a fan of veganism.

Mikhaila Peterson
I've seen a lot of people who are vegan, and those are people who are open enough to try crazy diets too. Because if you go on vegan, it's very restrictive. And so a lot of those people will be like, well, it's not working. And they'll hop on this like lion diet, which is also crazy. So there's a lot of like, crossover from vegans.

I think initially people can feel better because they're removing dairy, which is causing a problem for them, and a lot of processed foods. So if you're just eating more whole foods, you're going to feel better. If you go the vegan route where you're just eating processed vegan foods, I think that's like the worst thing you could do. Now I'm curious, going into that, you did a TEDx talk and they decided not to post it. Yeah.

Graham Stephan
What happened on that? Did they communicate to you ahead of time? And why did they decide not to show your speech? They said it violated community guidelines, but they wouldn't tell me which guidelines it violated. And I was really careful when I was organizing that.

Mikhaila Peterson
And it was just a talk about, this is what happened to me. It would be great if we could get some studies out of this, because there's literally thousands of people on this diet who have gone from serious, like, bedridden autoimmunity or psychiatric illnesses to asymptomatic. That is impossible. Do some studies. That's what I said in the speech, and they just didn't put it up.

But TEdx has been completely. And Ted has been completely infiltrated with, like, political and vegan propaganda. If you look at what they're posting and what they're not posting, so you. Think they had an agenda, and they were pushed from one side to say, we can't publish this. This is bad for our look.

Graham Stephan
This goes against what we kind of. But what was the agenda? Like, are they just anti meat eating or something? I don't even know. Like, who controls these?

Mikhaila Peterson
Or. I have no idea. But if you go to TEdxett or Ted, and you look at the videos that pop up, there's a whole bunch of vegan videos. There aren't any. Like, meat is healthy videos, which is coming back.

Like, it's not just me saying this. The studies are reversing. If you want to trust the studies, there's studies coming. I know Harvard wrote that thing that was, like, anti meat, but there's a doctor at Harvard, Chris Palmer, that's saying a ketogenic diet is how you treat, like, schizophrenia and bipolar and severe mental illness. So there are studies being done now on ketogenic diets, which is like.

Like, it's close enough, basically. I don't know. Who decides these things? How often is the media trying to silence what you have to say? I have no idea.

Like, it's hard to tell. A couple of months ago, views went down on my dad's channel, like, dramatically, like, 80% fewer. And on my channel, we think what had happened, because we got somebody who used to work at YouTube to look into it, that AI had picked up certain keywords and just auto suppressed it, which happens on YouTube all the time. It's not like a person being like, no, it's AI picking up keywords and saying no. And so that kind of thing happens.

In 2018, there were a bunch of negative articles about me being like, oh, she only eats meat. And doctors being like, well, this isn't going to last very long. And now that it's been six and a half years, and I'm fine. There are far fewer articles being like, well, she's about to die. It's like, oh, okay.

She hasn't. So it's not that interesting anymore. Why is it that people think that you and your dad are so controversial? I think they thought dad was paranoid at the beginning because this Bill C 16 thing, he was like, you're gonna misgender someone and they'll throw you in prison. And everyone was like, you're crazy.

And then that started happening, like, four years later. So that actually happened. I'm not sure if it happened in Canada. I know it happened in Scotland or Ireland, where somebody misgendered someone and they ended up in prison. It was a sentence, like, I don't know.

I'd have to look into it. But it was prison for misgendering. Like, it was on purpose. It wasn't an accident. It was, like, setting.

Graham Stephan
It was like refusing. Refusing to use pronouns more than anything else. And he was saying, well, people are going to be ridiculous with their pronouns, and then they're going to require to you use them, and you can't change English like that. And people were like, well, he's overreacting. And even at the time, I was like, I'm still behind what he's saying.

Mikhaila Peterson
But it might be he's, like, really worked up about this, and maybe it's an overreaction. And then, lo and behold, like, three or four years later, there's all this crazy trans stuff. I didn't think it would get to, like, where it's at now. So I can understand why that was controversial. And then to throw that on top, there was like, oh, the meat diet, only eating meat.

And then it's obvious why that was controversial, because nobody won. Nobody knew you could do that. And two, we've been saying, hey, it seems to put, you know, chronic illness into remission, which is a crazy thing to put with only eating meat. I think it's less controversial now that it's been a period of time. And I think there are more people saying what dad's been saying.

There's, like, fewer articles coming. Maybe it's not less controversial, but there are more controversial things to talk about. So, like, it's the same level, but it's now, like, the controversy's gone, like, up here. That's actually, that's actually probably it. People are like, this is crazy.

And then COVID hit and shut down the entire world, and they're like, oh, this is crazy. Yeah, that's probably. That's what I feel like is going on deep down. It's just purely that. So how does all that controversy change the dynamic with your family?

All we were talking about was, like, political stuff and controversy and, like, bad things, and it was really depressing. And it took about five years for us to be like, oh, wait, no. Maybe when a negative article comes out, people don't trust it and actually agree with you, and that helps. So then we kind of, like, changed our perspective on, oh, negative articles are actually maybe positive. Like, there's no, what is it?

Bad, bad publicity, which it turns out is true. It's interesting for me to hear that because, like, kind of as an outsider to that, where I see some of the articles, but I don't give them much attention. I would just think for you and your entire family that it wouldn't even bother you. From my perspective, it's like, oh, yeah, it's another one of those. It keeps scrolling.

Graham Stephan
It wouldn't even affect them. But the tear that it, like, does have an effect is. It's, I mean, it makes sense, but. You don't think about that. I know.

Mikhaila Peterson
I'd also seen, like, tabloids on celebrities where it's like, oh, so and so is now, like, hooking up with this other person or they're getting a divorce and things. And I'd heard celebrities be like, that's stressful. But you look at it and you're just like, well, nobody believes that. You don't get it until it happens to you. And then you think it affects your livelihood or your friends or something, and then it's really stressful.

It's, like, stressful to have a spotlight put on you in a negative way like that, and probably in a positive way, too. I mean, you see, like, kid celebrities grow up and get entirely screwed up, even though they're not necessarily controversial. So I think you just. It's been a crazy experience. Cause I went from being, like, normal university kid, going out and drinking.

I had lots of friends. I was, like, doing fairly well until I couldn't get to class. And then I was not doing well. But I went from being totally normal, not having very much money at all, to understanding what it's like to have money and have a level of notoriety. And it definitely changes your perspective.

Graham Stephan
It's weird how much out there does the mainstream media get wrong about you or about your family? I mean, everything from 2021 on backwards. So, like, 2017 to 2021. Like, none of that was true. The worst one was the Sunday Times in the UK, and it was after my dad was extremely ill.

Mikhaila Peterson
My family was, like, distraught, and we were trying to explain why he'd been gone. And I was, like, paranoid enough about it that I recorded the audio of the interview, and that was, like, massive hit piece. They called me, the woman called me a pouting Barbie and basically wrote in that I was controlling and manipulating my dad. Oh, and that he had schizophrenia, which he, like, didn't and never has. It was really bad.

Fortunately, it was so negative that the comments were like, this is ridiculous. But it was really upsetting because it was after, like, a period where my mom was extremely ill, my dad was extremely ill, and we were just starting to be like, okay, mate, let's try to get, like, life back up again. And then it was like, wham. Hit piece from the Sunday Times. I was like, this is really upsetting.

Jack Selby
I feel like people don't even read that stuff anymore, though, to be completely honest. Somebody does. Somebody reads it, but somebody does. But I feel like most people are, like, on Twitter or maybe like, the mainstream media, but I feel like that's also starting to decline. This was 2021.

Mikhaila Peterson
It had already declined by then. It's declined way more by now. I feel like in 2018, though, when negative articles were coming up, people were still reading them. But now since podcasting kind of took over and Twitter and social media. Yeah, they're dead.

That's why they all charge, like, a dollar to read these articles and nobody pays them. How many people are actually reading your articles if you charge them a dollar? Nobody. It's funny. Every website that I used to read for free and breed all the time, every single one of them is like, do our trial now for only a dollar for the next it.

Graham Stephan
But it makes me not want to pay for it. I know, and it's because they need money, because they're dying, because nobody's reading their content. What's the one that's loaded with ads? I think it's like Daily Mail. It's like one of those bad things.

But there's, like, ads that are on. On top of ads. Yeah, like, there's an ad, but then there's a pop up on top of the ad. We got to figure out how we can do that on the podcast. We can use that as a monetization strategy.

YouTube got rid of the banner ad ads. I think pop up lockers or something were getting too good, and I think it distracted. Those were annoying. I got YouTube premium as soon as they put ads on, though. Yeah, the best money I've ever seen.

Jack Selby
Premium is rising. But, yeah, it's gotten really bad. So I could see those going out of business. I don't know who keeps them going. They are.

Mikhaila Peterson
I mean, a lot of them have, like, some billionaire behind them. I'm not. I'm not even joking. I know that. So.

So some of them are getting donations, but we have, like, a couple of friendlier news sources. And I've asked them for their numbers when dad will write a guest blog or something like that. And I've asked for their numbers. And even their numbers, compared to what you get on social media, it's like nothing. And these are.

These are huge names, so I don't think they're gonna last. They have to seriously pivot. I don't even know how they could pivot, to tell you the truth. So why do the billionaires support these media publications? Like, what is the incentive for them?

Graham Stephan
They try to control the narrative. Yeah, but Adam is cheating them. I mean, if they have billions of dollars, it must be pretty smart. They'd be like, okay, well, apparently, like, buy out a Twitter account instead of, like, you know, daily loud or whatever. You said, like a Daily mail.

Daily Mail, Daily loud. So many. They're all the same. I don't know. Like, if they buy out that, it's just not going to get the same ROI as, I think, being in there.

Mikhaila Peterson
I think old. It's old. It's like, purchase these media companies in the nineties and then they still have. That, I don't think, like, credibility or something. Yeah.

And then they've just lost it. Yeah. Yeah. I don't think that would be the new way of controlling the narrative. Yeah.

Graham Stephan
I think our version is going to be, let's, like, buy a social media account, let's buy a YouTube channel. And then we could make videos or pay people to make videos in certain. Topics that drown out. How do you do that? Put money behind some sort of message and encourage smaller influencers to make videos on certain topics and just disseminated everything.

So. Pardon me. I wonder how common that is because some of the videos, I'm just kidding. If you paid certain channels, be like, hey, make a video on this, make a video on this. You could easily, with a good video, shift the narrative.

Mikhaila Peterson
Yeah, yeah. I'm curious how common that is or if it's happening right now and to what degree. I mean, I'm. I'm so far into conspiratory land that. Oh, I'd love to go.

It's not even funny. Like, since I can survive only eating meat and all my health problems are gone. Nothing is real. So what are some of your beliefs when it comes to conspiracy theories? I 100% believe that there's money behind certain messaging that's put out.

Graham Stephan
Like what? Like messaging on Twitter. Like Israeli Palestine war came out. I think that that one side is probably being funded, and I think there's funding behind universities now teaching students certain ways of thinking, because universities have gone crazy. But let's start with the university.

What's the purpose behind that? And why would someone wanna fund a certain agenda? Like, what's in it for them? I think most billionaires get into this and think that they're doing something good for the world. Like, even the fight against meat.

Mikhaila Peterson
Meat is bad. Eat these meat alternatives. Like, I don't think that came from an evil place. Nobody evil thinks they're doing evil. It comes from like, I've, I'm billionaire.

I've worked my entire life to amass this amount of money. I want to help the world for good. This is what I believe is good, and I'll pay people to make it happen. And it's just like a mistake. Yeah, but it sounds like kind of like an ego thing, too, to think that you know what is right for everyone else.

Oh, that's for sure. But I mean, I guess when you get to the point of having billions of dollars, you're such a small percentage of the population that you're like, like one part of you has got to be like, I am more talented and I am smarter and I am better. And these plebs can't think for themselves, obviously. Look at society. I could see that.

Graham Stephan
I mean, think of Dave Ramsey's approach of anti credit card. If he were worth $10 billion, imagine him sinking a billion of that into anti credit card. But because it's important for him and it worked for his people. Yeah. So if he's trying to help people, that could be a way that he would do that.

Yeah, I remember also I was approached by a diamond company. I don't remember the specific name, but they worked in the diamond industry and they wanted me to make a video about how natural diamonds are actually better for the environment and they're better for the consumer than lab grown. And they were offering a pretty crazy amount of money for me to make one video talking about natural diamonds as investments. I said no, because I started, but it sent me down this weird rabbit hole of looking up lab grown diamonds versus natural diamonds. In both the arguments, I didnt realize that there was so much that went into lab grown diamonds in terms of marketing, of how theyre cheaper and how they arent involved in the slave trade.

Theyre not blood diamonds. The more I got into it, the more I realized that a lot of what they said is outdated.

The natural diamonds are. Now, theres a lot of them that are sourced in such a way that are very ethical and that helps support these communities. But the lab grown diamond, that whole side wants you to believe that natural diamonds are bad. But both sides are really just thrown their arguments at the media of like, one doesn't hold their value, one's bad for the environment, one takes advantage of people, one doesn't. It's very interesting, but it's all just like two industries throw money at each other to try to one up each other.

Mikhaila Peterson
Was that the sneaky dime a dad? No. Working with them? No, I couldn't do it. I couldn't do it because it's a.

Good idea not to. Well, my thing is that like, just from my perspective, I'm known as like the frugal person. And just, I know myself. If I saw a lab grown diamond and a natural diamond, I'd go with lab grown purely because of the cost, and I'd probably buy that lab grown diamond pre owned. So I can't get behind a message of like, you know, getting a natural diamond, even though it holds its value when I look at the same thing for a 10th of the cost.

Graham Stephan
So just like from a principal standpoint, I couldn't even do that. But there's no amount of money that would, that would make me. And plus people would know. They'd be like, graham, come on, a natural diamond, you get a lab grown. Well, it gets worse than that too.

Mikhaila Peterson
Like if we want to delve into diamonds is it turns out just the fact that diamonds are valuable is questionable. I don't know if you guys knew about that, but from a stone perspective and how rare they are, they're not one of the rarer stones. So the whole diamond industry, I think it was made up in the thirties and it was like, diamonds are a girl's best friend. That was a huge market thing that came out. So the entire diamond industry, regardless of natural versus.

Graham Stephan
It's the same with a three month salary? Yeah, yeah, that was purely marketing. Yeah. I forget what the company was. Starts with the D.

Jack Selby
What is it, three months? Was it de beers or something? The beers, that was it. They came out with his marketing ploy that said that the diamond ring that you propose with should be equivalent to three months of your salary. There's nothing else behind it other than a marketing campaign to get you to spend more money on the diamond.

Graham Stephan
And if you didn't spend that three months, she must not be worth it, you must not love her. Was that based off of, like, research and data or something like that? No. Yeah. Three month salary?

No, it was purely a marketing thing. And now when I hear anyone say, like, oh, I'm gonna get this diamond ring, three months salary, I just, like, you fell into a marketing ploy. It's like, can you not think for yourself? It's true, is it not? Can they not think outside the box and think for themselves and do something different?

Jack Selby
I think that's super fair. A lot of people, though, you can't deny that they are affected by their environment, and you can't ask everybody to be hypercognizant of every single decision. I think they should question it. I think they should think, why am I doing this? Where did I come up with this belief?

Graham Stephan
Where is this expectation set? When you look into a lot of these things, it makes no sense. What are some of the other conspiracies that you have or other beliefs that maybe people aren't talking enough about? I don't think they're conspiracy theories. Cause I think they're true, but I don't have any faith in the government as a body that can organize people properly.

Mikhaila Peterson
And I think most people have seen that since COVID that wasn't handled properly. And I don't think the medical system knows what they're doing in terms of chronic illness. If you wanna go get a broken arm fixed, go to the hospital. Did you know the third leading cause of death is medical error? I know that.

I have no idea. That's the third leading cause of death is medical error. Nobody talks about that. It's dangerous. Doctors are dangerous.

That's what I think. Unless you're going to a surgeon, that's different. So I guess that's a conspiracy theory. Why do you think it's so high? I mean, my thinking is that human bodies are very complex.

Graham Stephan
Every person is going to be slightly different, and a doctor could only do so much to save people. Like, that's what I would like to. Believe in, least I don't think so. I think the pharmaceutical industry's got involved in medical care. So a lot of the courses or lectures that are done to doctors are taught by pharmaceutical representatives.

Mikhaila Peterson
So, oh, you have depression, and then you get, like, told or paid to give out certain antidepressants to treat depression, and then you're not taught about nutrition and what you are taught is taught by the government, who's taught by this food pyramid that was made by companies trying to sell their products. Like, the entire thing is just a lie. So why is medical death medical error the third leading cause of death? Because they're using pharmaceuticals to treat diseases that can't be treated with pharmaceuticals. But it's like a bandage, is what you're saying.

Jack Selby
And then they're financially incentivized. It's like a bad bandage. Like, even when I went, I was on enbril and methotrexate. Those were the drug names for arthritis. And initially, when I went on them, they, like, worked.

Mikhaila Peterson
So I had arthritis in, like, 30 ish joints. It was everywhere except for my spine. It was in my jaw. It was everywhere. And it worked initially.

And I went from being, like, basically wheelchair bound to running around like a little kid when I was in grade three. By the time I was 17, I needed my hip and ankle replaced. So it didn't stop the progression of the arthritis, but it, like, masked the symptoms for a while. Um, that's what these medications can do. Getting off of antidepressants was way harder than getting off of oxycontin.

That's like new. People don't know about antidepressant withdrawal. Psych med withdrawal is horrible. It's horrible how it exacerbates your psychiatric symptoms. That's what it feels like.

So when I got off of it, I was like. I felt like I could feel my depression lift when I was on the antidepressants, because you can still. You still feel the depression on the antidepressants. It's just, like, masked by this kind of, like, heavy fatigue, warm, cuddly feeling. But underneath, you can feel the pain of depression.

And I got off of that, and I had two years of antidepressant withdrawal, which was one of the worst experiences of my life, with just insomnia, crawling feelings all over my body. I had no idea that antidepressants caused withdrawal. No idea. I knew that if you on painkillers for a while, like, with the hip and ankle replacement, that causes withdrawal. But I didn't know these other medications cause withdrawal.

So I just. I don't have any faith in the medical system anymore. Most doctors don't know they cause withdrawal. And most people, they'll go into withdrawal when they stop taking them. The doctor will say, that's your psychiatric illness, and then they'll go back on them.

So this is coming out now, too. But, like, the medical system probably needs ten or 15 years to catch up with, like, diet and which new medications cause withdrawal, things like that. Have you noticed there be any studies about withdrawal from Adderall? I haven't read studies. I know a lot of people who've gone the diet route and gotten off of Adderall, so this is just like anecdotal.

I haven't read studies, and it seems like you get more tired and your thoughts can be more scattered, and it's mostly fatigue. It doesn't seem like psychiatric medications where it can cause things like akathisia or just being uncomfortable in your own skin, or having lights hurt you or noises hurt you. Like, that's what antidepressant withdrawal do. And with painkillers, it's more like a really, really, really severe hangover. Like, if you drank way too much, you get, like, you sweat, you get nauseous, your pain receptors can be heightened, so you feel like you're in pain.

That's kind of what, um, like, opiate withdrawal is like. I don't know about Adderall. Adderall seems to have less withdrawal, but I've heard about Adderall withdrawal, too. Any medication you take daily, your brain kind of adjusts to it, and if you pull it out, suddenly your brain has to shift back. And you should be taught that before you take a medication every day.

Graham Stephan
So are doctors financially incentivized? Oh, 100%, yeah. Do they get paid more if they recommend? Because I don't know exactly how the pharmaceutical industry works. I know that you have these reps that go in and the reps are paid by, like, if they could get this doctor to prescribe this medication, but the.

Does the doctor get a kickback? Yeah. Doctors are paid as well. How is that allowed? If, like, if I recommend this one medication over another?

Like, I'll make more money with this, though. The regulations in America are crazy. Like, compared to Europe, for example, where you're not allowed to do that. Like, there are place. There are places, most places that's banned, but not in America.

Mikhaila Peterson
In America, too, you can have ads on television for drugs. Like, you're not allowed to do that in Canada, or you can have billboards for drugs and things. That's not legal in most countries. Yeah. What was the commercial I used to see a lot as a kid?

Graham Stephan
I think it was a zoloft, right, with the little bubble thing, and it was looking so cute. Extremely impossible to get off of. It's extremely hard to get off of. So what do you think is the difference, then, between depression and someone who's just really, really sad and how can you tell which one you are and, like, treat them appropriately? I think it would be tricky to tell, but it depends on the level of depression.

Mikhaila Peterson
I think most of America has some level of anxiety that I think could be alleviated if they were eating healthier. But if you're going through something like a divorce or your relationship is screwed up, or one of your family members died or even your dog died or something like that, and you're feeling sad, then you have to attribute that to what's going on. If your life is pretty good and you don't have any reason to feel sad, that's probably depression. So I remember my dad said he'd be in therapy and someone would come in and they'd be depressed, and he'd be like, well, how many friends do you have? Do you see them frequently?

Are you in a relationship? How's your work? Like, he'd check off aspects of their life, and if everything was going well and they still felt like this, then it was probably depression. How often is it, though, just to have an off day? Because there's some days where objectively, I could look and say, everything is fantastic, but I just wake up that morning, I'm just.

Graham Stephan
Just not feeling myself. I just don't feel like doing anything. It's just an off day. I think that's pretty normal. I don't have very many off days where my mood is hitting dramatically, where I'm like, this is an off day on this diet.

Mikhaila Peterson
But, I mean, I still have off days, so that's normal. It's like, depression is when every day is difficult, even if it shouldn't be difficult, and everything is hard, and, you know, it feels like you're walking through molasses, like. Or you go into a social situation and you're thinking about what you're gonna say. You're not able to communicate with people, and you're awkward. Like, you can get to a serious level of mental illness.

Graham Stephan
Yeah. So for someone just feeling sad, like, going through the checklist of, like, diet, exercise, friends, what do you think is the easiest thing for people to begin to solve? I would start with diet, and I would cut out grains and processed food and then see how you feel. That's, like, the easiest step. And even if you're doing that, like, replace them with other foods you like.

Mikhaila Peterson
So look up, like, paleo alternative to pizza and eat that instead of the normal pizza you're eating. Like, I've got on my Amazon, I have a list of, like. Like, healthy swaps for lazy people, which just. Just like, instead of eating, like, complete garbage, eat the healthy version of that garbage. It's still not the greatest health food, but at least you're cutting out some of the, like, toxic stuff that americans are eating now.

People can start pretty slow, and if you're really depressed, you, people kind of need to start slow, like, being, like, only eat meat. And they're like, I can't even get out of bed. There's an example of that. It's a bit processed, but there's, instead of eating, like. Like, potato chips, they had these, like, chicken chips.

Graham Stephan
It's chicken meat, and it tastes the same. It's a weird mental thing to, like, eat a chip and then you're eating chicken, but it tastes the same. It's those things. Yeah. There's also, like, there's sweet potato chips now that are cooked with, like, olive oil or avocado oil.

Mikhaila Peterson
You could just, like, swap to that. It's not quite as, like, satiating the chicken things. I've had, like, beef chips. Cause they make. There's a bunch of products now that are just, like, beef and salt in bags.

Who's like, jerky? Which is. I love jerky. Everybody likes jerky. Only crazy people don't like jerky, but eat that kind of thing as a snack instead.

Graham Stephan
Yeah. What do you think we're gonna look back on in a hundred years and say, I can't believe we did that. Can I talk about the trans stuff? Sure. It could be.

Mikhaila Peterson
You want that on YouTube? Yeah, that's what I think. We're gonna look back on and be like, that's crazy. And I mean, like, putting kids on hormones or doing surgery that makes them, like, infertile as a teenager. I think that's what we're going to look back on in 100 years, for sure.

Britain's reversed it. Germany's gone, like, full steam ahead, encouraging it. Certain states in America have backed off, so I think it's already reversing. But we'll definitely look back in time over the last three years ish and be like, oh, wow, they were doing what to children, and what do you. Think it's gonna take for that to be a more normal dialogue?

Jack Selby
People need to transition as a younger person, and maybe they get older and they don't like that decision, unfortunately. I feel like a lot of people are gonna have to get hurt, and then they're gonna have to come out and say, hey, this was, you know, I was really depressed. I was confused. When I was 14, I went to a psychiatrist. They suggested this I thought that was a good idea, and now I'm stuck with this forever.

Mikhaila Peterson
I think that's gonna have to happen to more people, unfortunately. And what about those who do it as an adult? Like, they live their entire life feeling a little bit out of their body or whatever, and they're like, okay, I'd like to make a change. This is kind of how I felt. That's what I've been thinking, too.

Jack Selby
Thinking about for yourself? No, no, but just the people in general who. That's what I've been thinking about, Jack. You know? No, but for the people who have gone their entire lives thinking that, like, I am born in the wrong body, and I do not feel like I am my gender, and I felt this way since a kid, I'm, you know, you could say I'm 25.

Graham Stephan
You're an adult. You're fully developed. This is something I've been thinking about for a long time, and I want to be who I feel like I am on the. You know, in my mind, my perspective. Is, something's wrong with your head, bluntly.

Mikhaila Peterson
But I also don't care. So, like, if I also don't know what that feels like, so if they're going to do that and they're 25, then, like, that's their choice. I think doing it to a kid is insane. Like, I don't. You, like, you guys remember when you're, like, 13 or 14, you can't even see straight.

Like, I couldn't even use my brain properly until I was, like, 22, probably. Like, it took a while. And as a teenager, you're going through all these fluctuations, like, you're going through puberty. It's uncomfortable. Like, doing that to kids before they can think is a completely different story than, like, consenting adults.

I still think messaging and propaganda can impact adults, obviously, but I'm more concerned about, like, pre 18. I agree. I think there is a difference when you're a kid versus, like, when you're making a fully introduced or olds. That's crazy. Yeah.

Jack Selby
I mean, I don't even remember anything from when I was, like, three years ago. I know. Yeah, neither do I. My thing 100 years from now is shorts and TikToks is attention span. Do you think it's gonna go back to long form, or do you think it's gonna get shorter?

Mikhaila Peterson
Everything's gonna be in, like, VR, though, or AR in 100 years. Like, we have no idea. Probably AR for everything. To me, it just seems like such a strong dopamine hit, especially if you're growing up as a child. Do you think, though, ever regulate it?

Like, I know in Florida they just passed a bill that you have to be 16. I think it's before you can have social media accounts in Florida. Probably smart. Yeah. Which I think makes sense, but if.

Graham Stephan
It'S a little checkbox, it's like, oh, yeah, I'm 16. Check. You just put in 13. Facebook, I think, is. Yeah, Facebook, I think, has always been, like, 13.

But you could just say, I'm, you know, whatever age. I'm 13, that's fine. So I don't know. I think it's really got to be on the parents, but I can't imagine what it would do to your attention span and the way you function to not have TikTok. That's what you grew up to.

It's like, that's what your brain has to be accustomed to. Anxiety, too. I don't know if you could reverse that. Cause imagine you go from the ages of, like, two years old to five, just scrolling TikToks like those instant hits. It would be no different than having a kid sit at a slot machine and just constantly hit the buttons.

Mikhaila Peterson
Yeah, I do think people are capable of healing their brains from, like, serious damage, but it would probably be going in the right direction if that was regulated. Even the emotional, like, seeing people who are face tuned or behind video filters, like, what that does for a teenager, like, that's hard on adults, let alone teenagers. What's been your experience with that? Because I know from my perspective, I don't really notice. I think it's more like, I don't feel like guys usually do.

Graham Stephan
The face tune sort of stuff probably impacts girls more. And from what I've read, especially teenage girls, being like, that's what I'm supposed to look like when you can't because it's not real. That's not good. And that definitely, like, let alone diet and our environment and things, and, like, not having enough friends and not exercising, causing depression, that's gonna cause depression, too. Did you feel like you fell into that same sort of trap of comparing yourself to other, like, face tuned people online?

Mikhaila Peterson
Yeah, I was at least older. Like, when I kind of got exposed to that was more like 23, 24, which is a safer age than, like, 13 or twelve or eleven. I think you have to be careful who you follow. I'm better at it now. I saw one, this is years ago of.

Graham Stephan
I think it was one of the Kardashians, where someone went through all their photos and pointed out exactly where they were altered. And it was wild. And some of them, you see the lines just kind of curve and they're. Adjusting things that you wouldn't even think of adjusting. It's completely some random indent that they want, and they're.

Jack Selby
I don't know. But me growing up, being ten or eleven on the computer for the first time, like, the thing back then was celebrities without makeup, and you would be. Able to go through, no, I remember that too. Totally different. And for me back then, I'm like, what out makeup?

Graham Stephan
It's why, like, as a kid, you start to even notice the differences on that. I don't think any, like, you assume people at a celebrity point are immune. Like we talked about earlier, like, oh, tabloids. Why would that bother them? But they're also just people, so they read the comments underneath, just like anyone reads comments underneath.

Mikhaila Peterson
And they're impacted. You do get desensitized after a while, for sure, but, like, we're still social animals and, like, want other people to like us and things, so they're still impacted by what people say. Otherwise they wouldn't use things like facetune. Speaking of, how do you keep your ego in check after getting very popular? And, like, I know you guys grew up a little bit more on the poorer side and then acquiring a lot of wealth and having people, like, revere you for so many different reasons, like how they enjoy your belief systems and ideology.

Jack Selby
How do you not let that get to your ego? It was probably harder to begin with. Cause it's super exciting, right? Especially if you don't have a social media, and then it starts growing, you're like, whoa, this is really cool. That novelty wore off, and then I'm probably kept in check by God, mostly not by my own value of myself.

Mikhaila Peterson
Otherwise, I think it's probably impossible to keep it from going to your head. So I don't value, like, compared to a number of years ago, I don't value the social media component as much as I value things that are actually happening in my own life. And I wouldn't necessarily attribute that to, like, choices I'm making, necessarily. I would give credit to God for that. How does God play into that, exactly.

Just, like, changing what I'm attracted to. So I used to be attracted to making a lot of money, and that was, I think, partly because I grew up not having very much money and partly because I was, like, I was so sick that I was like, I can do this and I can prove myself. And making money shows people that you're valuable. And I think also being a girl, I was like, I don't know, attracted to that in a way that I probably shouldn't have been attracted to it. And, you know, people who are obsessed with money, you shouldn't really, like, be like that.

And so I think I was kind of like that. But it felt okay. Like, it felt like I was poor, and I'm just trying. I'm trying to do good things, and I'm, like, being successful, and that's a good thing. But then I was ending up not paying attention to, like, more real things in my life.

And it's not like I wasn't paying attention to them, but I wasn't obsessed with those things. Like, I was obsessed with the goal of, like, being successful. And then when I started, like, honestly, when I started reading the Bible more and had a, like, felt more of a relationship with God and Jesus, that changed my heart to not valuing the more, like, vain aspects of my life as much so, like, social media, money. Were you religious growing up, or was this something you discovered as an adult? No.

Like, my dad always taught me the psychological significance of the Bible. So, like, very metaphorical. What job? He's the one that he gets completely tortured by Satan, and he's like, he loses his kids, and Satan makes him very ill. And I was always like, oh, that.

I kind of identify with that because I was so ill. And I learned about Noah's ark, and everybody kind of knows about Noah's ark and stuff, but I didn't really. I didn't pray. We didn't go to church. I went to church once with my grandma.

No. And my dad wasn't religious, and my mom wasn't religious. But when she had cancer, she almost died from cancer in 2019. And it was like, a crazy rare cancer that, like, nobody has. And there were, like, 18 case studies and everybody died.

It was really awful. She had surgery, and then the surgery, the surgeon, like, nicked something and it wouldn't heal. And she was dying, and she wasn't religious at all. And then one day she goes, I'm going to be better by our anniversary. So my dad and my mom's anniversary, and we were like, okay, mom, you're on a lot of morphine.

That's. That'd be great. Um, and she goes to. For surgery in the US, and it didn't work. And she comes back to Canada, and on their anniversary, she just healed, and nobody could understand why.

And she was like, it was God, just like, kind of out of the blue. And I was like, okay, that was strange. And I don't really know how to understand that. And she was just like, that was God. Like, he spoke to me.

He said he would do that. And it's been really since then that I've been like, oh, maybe these religious people aren't so crazy. Like, maybe there's more out there than what I was thinking before. How do you even start by becoming religious? Do you start by reading the Bible?

I started by reading the Bible, reading the gospels, and then wanting it. Like, I wanted it. I wasn't someone who was scoffing at it at that point. Like, early on in my life, it was like, oh, christians are like, the homeschooled kids that don't. That think Harry Potter is evil, but I think I had so many hard things happen to me and, like, terrible things happen to me that I was like, if that were true or if I believed that, like, I want that.

I want that faith that my mom has because, like, she started to believe in God and Jesus. Her cancer healed, and then she became, like, a nicer, more, like, welcoming, more patient person. And I was like that if I had that faith in something higher that I think would be beneficial for me. So I had to want it. I wanted it.

It. And then I started reading the Bible, and it was really, like, a number of years, a couple years later that it just clicked. And I was like, okay, I get it, but I didn't get it for a long time. I was just reading the Bible. I tried to go to church a few times, but I was like, I don't really understand it.

I don't really understand. How has it changed your outlook today? Well, I went into it a bit. Like, a lot of what changed for me was I used to value different things than I value now. Like, I've always.

I've always wanted kids and things, but I was like, but I. I really want to be successful, and I want to build, like, we're building an app, Peterson Academy, an online education app, which is launching in, like, June. It's right, like, happening right away. And I was like, I want to be successful and to have money so that I could be one of these, like, billionaire people to try and change society for better. That was my aspiration, and that was because I was so sick and was like, we need to be teaching people not to eat processed foods.

And just, like, something as simple as that. I was like, I want to get to the level of power that I can do that. So that was more my goal. And then since I got saved, I would say it's more family oriented. It literally switched to that.

Even though I have all this business opportunity and the social media opportunity and things, it's just like, I don't care as much. And I think I was caring about it in an unhealthy way, probably. You know, I hired somebody to do housekeeping and stuff. I wasn't just paying as much attention to that because those tasks kind of bothered me, and now they don't bother me as much. It was small changes like that, and then I'm also calmer overall and, like, happier.

It was a very strange change going from somebody who grew up in, like, the middle of downtown Toronto and, like, thought christians were. Does that give you more purpose? It's mostly calmness and joy. Like, I was also the type of person that if anything bad happened to me and a lot of bad things happened to me, I was like, what can I do to fix this? Like, what are all the ways I can do to fix this?

Like, when you have a work problem and you just try to attack it from every angle. And that happened when I was sick. I was like, I'm going to do everything to get better. And I eventually got to an all me died and was like, okay, that seems to work. And my mom was always like, it's up to God.

He'll figure it out. And I was always like, okay. But it's also kind of up to us because you can't just, like, sit there. You have to, like, do things. And I think now I can understand you should still do things, like, not doing things just because you believe in God isn't the right way to act, but I know that it'll work out eventually.

I don't have to push as hard as I was trying because it's not like, reality isn't just up to me. To me, that sounds like a lot more confidence, though, that you have the confidence that things will work themselves out. Yeah, it's like faith that things will. Work out also, it seems, like, very outcome oriented when you're placing all of your emphasis on how hard you're trying. And it's like, I'm only trying because I want a positive outcome, whereas if, you know everything will be okay regardless, then it's like, obviously you can still try, and you should still try, but knowing you'll be okay regardless of outcome is, like, a little bit.

Well, it's psychologically a huge relief. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Kind of like, God's got me. We're fine. You don't just, like, drop everything.

You're still gonna go through hard things and try and figure them out. But you don't have to, like, stress out that your life is gonna be over whenever anything bad happens. Did you ever feel like when you ever, when you were having conversations with your dad, that he was, like, psychologically studying you? Oh, yeah. Like every conversation forever.

Up until now, yes. You felt like it? Well, I mean, he does this thing where I can't glare at you because I have Botox in my eyebrows, but he glares at you and studies you, and it's like, yeah, and thinks and puts his hand up here. Yes, but then is he present in. The conversation, or is he focusing on the meta of the conversation?

Jack Selby
Like, you're saying this, but you really mean this. You're saying this because of this. Like, there's so many abstractions, I feel like, from the actual. He's kind of in the metal, like you said. Is he correct, though?

Graham Stephan
Because I kind of find myself doing the same thing and be like, oh, you're saying this, but that's because of this and this and this. Well, it's true, though, because a lot of people will tell you something, and it's not what they're trying to tell you. They're, like, alluding to things, or they're, like, twisting the truth a little bit, and you're like, no, what you mean is. Or how you're feeling is. So I'd say it depends.

Mikhaila Peterson
Yeah, he's probably correct. Does he ever just, like, cut right to the chase, then? Like, you say something, he's like, I mean, I know what you're saying here. Not as much anymore. I think since I've gotten older, I feel like he did that a lot when I was in my early twenties, though.

Jack Selby
Wouldn't that make it harder to connect, though? Because it seems like there's, like, there's different layers of the conversation rather than meeting on common ground. Not really. Like, like I said, he brought things down to our level. Like, throughout me growing up, he wasn't always high, high level.

Mikhaila Peterson
It was pretty high level, but we could still understand him, so. No, we could still meet on common ground. Do you think you've picked up on those tendencies? I don't think so. Like, I probably do when everybody else does, in terms of trying to figure out why somebody's saying something or something like that, but not to the degree my dad is dad does it.

I'm not even capable of that. Like, his level of thinking in the abstract and verbal fluency. Like, I'm not even on the same page, so I don't think that's something I could have just picked up on. I think you'd have to be born with that kind of level of thinking. Do you ever feel like you're living in his shadow?

That's a tricky question. A bit. Like, I get that question quite a bit. Like, does it bug you or something? That.

But, like, it doesn't bug me. I don't really feel like that. I mean, there's comments on, like, there's comments on my podcast and comments online. They're like, oh, you wouldn't be where you are without your dad. Like, that's true, obviously.

Like, anybody whose sibling or parent gets famous is going to impact everybody around them. Like, that's obviously true. I'm mostly grateful for it. I just. So I'm not concerned about it.

Do I feel like I'm living in a shadow? Like, maybe a bit, but I don't care. I tend to see kids of people who are well known or very successful find it hard to live up to those expectations that people place on them. Or you always want to do better, or they just throw it out the window entirely. Right.

Graham Stephan
It's pointless to even try because I'm going to be a failure in comparison. Or it's something where it's like, I have to exceed what they've done so that way I could prove myself and that I have what it takes. I probably had more of that. I think it was also easier because I helped build dad's social media channels, and I started, like, kind of taking a management position in 2018. Oh, that was pretty early on.

Mikhaila Peterson
Oh, it was really early on. So, like, he was putting videos on YouTube, but my brother helped start the podcast. I helped negotiate, like, speaking events and kind of help set them up with people who could get them touring. I set them up with a different publisher. I did Instagram and Facebook in, like, 2013.

Like, super early or 2014. So because we started working together early on, it was kind of like a family project. So it doesn't really feel like I got left behind, I think because it was like, oh, I was helping. Does that ever worry you? I hear so many people say you never want to work with your friends and family.

I've probably had the opposite experience. Like, I talked about it a little bit earlier. So many people that I've met since 2017 that are, like, new people have been awful people. Like, I didn't realize what percentage of psychopaths show up. When you have any type of, like, money or wealth, you come across a psychopath every now and then as a regular person.

And then the more assets you have, like, the higher the percentage of psychopaths you show up on. Could you give us an example of that? Well, just, like, briefly, we've had employees that we thought that were pretty close to our family that have turned out have been, like, lying and stealing money. That's happened a ton of times. It's like, every third person.

It's crazy. It's been crazy bad. And so I was like, is it bad luck, or is it just. You have to be more selective about who you're with, depending on who you are. And so is it worse to work with, like, family and friends?

My experience has been no. Like, most of the people I trust are from before 2017, and then my family trusts each other because we're family. I feel like I've had the opposite experiences. Like, everyone that I've met is, like, super trustworthy, but now we have a. Maybe we're just not attuned to, like.

Graham Stephan
Maybe that's it, man. I don't know. I've found, like, with the people, and it's been a number of people, it takes, like, three years to find out, because eventually you find out, but it takes a long.

House, you know, that. That are longer. Like, five years. But eventually you're like, oh, you've been lying five years. Okay.

Jack Selby
Never cutting it close to the wire. Yeah. That's how long we've known each other. You guys are probably. Okay.

Okay. Probably. Probably never been in a year or so. Yeah. Do you think modern dating is completely screwed?

Mikhaila Peterson
I mean, it can't be completely screwed or people are completely screwed. So I don't think it's completely screwed. I think it's rough right now. I don't even know where you'd start. Like, my ex, I met online, and that was what app.

Terrible. Plenty of fish. Plenty of fish. So what is that? Like, coffee meets bagel?

Jack Selby
That's, like, a one where you're going out to, like, find your soulmate. It was supposed to be like that, but, like, meeting people online is shifty. That didn't work out. We won't go to go into details there, but it didn't work out. So what do you do?

Mikhaila Peterson
I don't know what you do. I would say meet people in church, but I'm all like, you know, that's the direction I'm going in right now. I think you can find good people there. I don't know about meeting people online. It's so tricky.

Just, like, be careful, I guess. Go out for a lot of sober dates. Like, don't go out for drunk dates. That's a bad idea. Do you think it's harder for men or women in terms of dating?

Graham Stephan
Because it seems like women have way more choice, but the choice isn't that good, and men don't have a lot of choice, so they kind of take whatever they could get. I don't know who it's harder for. I feel like it's harder for both sides right now. I think it's extremely hard for both sides. I think it's riskier for women.

Mikhaila Peterson
Cause if, like, a woman ends up with a bad man, then they can go down, like, a route where they end up with kids and things and, like, it's rough, and that's gonna be rough for the man too. But. And so maybe I'm just talking about this from a female perspective, but even just getting pregnant makes it riskier for women. But I think both sexes are having a miserable time right now. I mean, it depends if you're interested in a topic.

Like, I'd probably get interested in some sort of niche and then try and meet people in that niche. That's probably the route I'd go. Or meet people through work and then meet them sober and judge them harshly. Do you think dating apps are making it worse for people, harder to meet and have true connections with people? Yeah, I think it's too easy.

Like, even with Tinder, and I haven't been on dating apps in, like, years and years, but even with Tinder, it was just like, being able to swipe through what people look like without even knowing who they are that quickly. Can't be good for people, especially not from an evolutionary perspective. And, like, how many people did we used to meet? Not very many people. Now we have social media, and you have all those options.

It's crazy. Dad and I wanted to make a dating app. We were thinking of doing that after Peterson Academy. That would be based off of the understand yourself criteria. Yeah, we'd incorporate that into it.

So you could judge people's personalities, get matched to people who have, like, similar interests, but also the right compatible personality with you. Do you think that would be a really successful metric to use? Is personality based, or do you think that there's something detached from that? Just some, like, raw chemistry or values? I mean, I don't think you can just be like, this is your personality, and now we're gonna mesh, but I think you can screen out a lot of people.

So, like, you guys are extroverts, I assume. No, there's no way there's no way. You have a podcast. What did you get? Totally, totally correct.

Jack Selby
97. There we go. Yeah. What did you get? He got 70%, I don't think.

Graham Stephan
Still extremely extrovert. And the questionnaire, it's like, how easy do you make friends? How easy is it to communicate with people? It's very easy for me. It's.

Mikhaila Peterson
That's. But that can be agreeableness to those questions. It's not. I was. I was highly disagreeable.

Graham Stephan
I came up during, like, that. I was, like, really low. I think I was, like, 15 on and disagreeable or whatever. It is, like, very low. My thing, though, is it's only cause of the YouTube channel that people come up to me.

It's really easy because they'll come up to me and say, graham, I watch your channel. I do this, and I just sit there and I listen, which I'm really good at listening, so I don't have to go up and talk to people. But that, to me, is exhausting. My idea of a good night is home alone. I don't know if it's extraversion or not, but I will say I wasn't entirely shocked when I saw that.

Mikhaila Peterson
Really? Yeah. I'm not an extraordinary. I'm definitely not. And the reason we are more than the average person.

Graham Stephan
No, I can be in front of a camera. I'm talking to a camera. There's a few people in the room. You're not talking about camera at all. You're talking.

I'm just saying. But, like, this is. This is for a camera. I'm talking to a kid. But I'm just saying it's for camera.

So it's easy for me to be, like, in front of a camera, and I know that, okay. Like, for 3 hours, I gotta be my best self, get hyped up on coffee, and I could do this. So if we go to an event, I would say this speaks introversion to me. We go to an event, and let's just say it's an event. I know a lot of people that they're gonna recognize Graham, like, oh, my God, I'm such a big fan.

Jack Selby
Graham's gonna be like, okay, how do I, like, stay in the corners and away from everybody, right? Yeah. So I can see that. And that sounds like introversion. However, I will say around the right people, you love talking.

You really like when we're hanging out, usually I'll say he does a vast majority of the talking, and I'll do a lot of the question asking, and he seems like he livens up on the topic. If it's YouTube related, money related or aquarium relationship relationships, I love talking about. Yeah, there's four topics. Great. Anything else?

Graham Stephan
It's hard for me with small talk. That's the one that might be because you're disagreeable. Like, disagreeable people will be like, small talk is stupid. I have better things to do. And that'll over, like overtake some of the extroversion.

Mikhaila Peterson
Extroverts don't just want to talk to anybody. They like talking. If you're disagreeable, then you won't want to talk to everybody but the people you like talking. Yeah, that sounds. And 15th percentile is pretty low.

Jack Selby
And disagreeability. Yeah, yeah. It scores on, yeah, agreeableness and 15 percentile is pretty low. Jack was like the most agreeable person and I was like the most disagreeable person, which is an interesting dynamic. We have very like, flip flopped results.

Mikhaila Peterson
Oh, that's funny. There are very few that were, that were on par or similar, but we get along great. And so that's one of the things where it's like if you're trying to match people based on compatibility, it's like. So there's ways to get around that. You don't just match if you have the same personality.

Now, sometimes that can work. But like, neuroticism, which is how anxious you get. If you have a highly neurotic person, you should either just avoid them, no offense to anyone who's neurotic, but like. Or you should match them with someone who's really low in neuroticism because two neurotic people will just fight all the time or be anxious all the time. So those would have to be on the opposite for extraversion.

If you're going to have someone that's like at 97, if you go out with someone who's at like five, they're going to want to stay home all the time and you're going to start wanting to go out and seeing people and having a social time that just long term probably isn't going to last. So you probably want somebody similar in extroversion. But other aspects can change, like agreeableness. You can have someone highly agreeable with someone with very low agreeableness. And you can have two very low and agreeableness people and two high and agreeableness.

Graham Stephan
I tend to think the older I get, the more disagreeable I become because I'm kind of set in my way. He's going to be the guy that like, yells at the kids as they're like running in the streets. And you're running too fast. Or the people that go down the road in their car, your car's too loud, and he's gonna sit on his mansion. Do that.

Mikhaila Peterson
I can kind of see that, to be honest. I could see that. It's probably pretty accurate. That's totally fine. There needs to be those people in neighborhoods.

Jack Selby
It's a staple. Yeah. Is there any personality trait that's just objectively bad? Honestly, neuroticism isn't great. Women are, on average, more neurotic than men.

Mikhaila Peterson
So they score, on average, 60, and men score on average, 40 percentiles, 90 plus. They're, like, highly sensitive, very volatile, irritable. It's the measure. If you're scoring above 90, I would say you should look into, see whether or not you're depressed. And then that's skewing the results, because some people with depression score really high, and then when they're not depressed, they score lower.

Jack Selby
And is this stuff that's, like, coded into you? So, for example, you take the test when you're, like, 15. It's likely to be similar by the time you're 70. It's not anything that, like, you can actually make a change. So, for example, you take it, you're not depressed, but you're like, like, 85.

Neuroticism, and you're like, okay, well, I guess, you know, I'm just probably not gonna have many friends. It depends. Openness. You can change with psychedelics. They've done studies on psychedelics, and if you take them, your openness levels will go up.

Mikhaila Peterson
So that's interesting. Neuroticism can change whether or not you're depressed. So if, like, one of your family members just died and you take a personality test, it's probably gonna skew the results. The other ones, though, are pretty stable. So I started taking these tests before they were online, um, from my dad.

And my personality has stayed remarkably stable throughout, you know, from, like, 13 to now. Other than the neuroticism, which went way down after I got healthy and off of all the medications. Now, I'm curious, slightly separate from that, when you met your husband, did you immediately know it was the right fit? Pretty much, yeah. So it was really fast.

Like, we met and got married three months later. Three months? Yeah, three months. How many times did you guys see each other in three month period? A lot.

Like, it wasn't like if you knew someone for, like, years and you saw them, like, once a week or something, you could have just combined that in that three month period. Like, we saw each other every day. Do you think it's important to, like, know someone for see over an extended. Normally? Yeah, because there's psychopaths everywhere.

Graham Stephan
Because you just said it took, like, three to five years to see if they're stealing money. I know. And this is a person you work with. This is fair. This is fair.

Mikhaila Peterson
Don't smile. It's fair. I knew. I knew with my current husband, and partly that's because, like, I was 29 at that point, so I'd, like, met people. It wasn't, like, 22 or 23 and naive, and I'd met people, so I was like, no, this is right.

And he's got, like, a unique combination of personality traits that, like, match mine. He's extroverted. He's very entrepreneurial. Like, he wants to build things. He's super smart.

So these are things that are rare. It's hard to find people. Like, I feel bad for people dating nowadays. Was it a logical decision for you where you kind of looked at the personality traits and the qualities and said, this is what I want, or was it an emotional reaction? Whereas, like, you just gut level, this is it.

It was mostly emotional, but then the logic also helped. Sure. So it was mostly emotional. Like, we met. We stayed up talking all night.

He's probably more extroverted than me, which is, like, difficult. So that kind of, like, lined up, and you could just tell that from having a conversation with someone if you hit it off, and it's like, like, back and forth and back and forth and back and forth for hours. So, like, that happened. But then it was also, you know, I, like, poked and prodded around to see to get more information. I was like, did you test.

He's smart? I think he'd done the personality tests, like, before? No, like, run your own tests. Like, I know that's, like, a thing that some, like, what do you mean. Run your own tests?

Jack Selby
Like, here's a really poor example of one. But, like, let's say the guy's at a bar or whatever, and the girl sends her friend over to, like, go, like, hit on the guy or something. Something like that. Or, like, you know, do I look weird in this something? Or whether.

You know what I mean? Like, I'm poking and prodding, kind of. He told me he wanted to marry me, like, a month after we met. It was really fast, and I was like, okay, you have no idea what you're getting into. Right?

Mikhaila Peterson
Like, you don't know me very well. I was like, I. Horrified. I was like, I'm divorced. I have a kid I, like, run my dad's companies.

I work all the time. I was like, I never want to do laundry. I, like, basically threw everything that was like, there's a lot of baggage here. So I guess that was kind of a test. Was like, here's all the reasons that, like, this is gonna be not as easy as you think it is, maybe.

And he was like, that's fine. I was like, okay. I can imagine it would be, honestly, really intimidating to enter the Peterson family. You know what I mean? I feel like there would be a lot of psychoanalyzing going on and especially meeting the family.

You know what my mom said? We were facetiming, and I was at the cottage, and I was like, oh, this is Jordan. His name's Jordan too, by the way. Nice. So if that's gonna be made fun of, it can happen now, but thank you.

You are the agreeable one. She takes a look at him and goes, are you gay? That was the first thing she said. Why did she say that? She wanted to see if he had a sense of humor.

Jack Selby
Oh, that's funny. It wasn't like, there was no way that was a serious question. She's like, did he take. No, no. Which is good, because, like, can't be easily offended around my mom.

Mikhaila Peterson
I don't know. He's not overwhelmed very easily, so I don't think he was worried about it. And my dad's way nicer. Like, he does. Really?

I feel like I know. No, my dad, you'd be very intense. And, like, what do you want out of life? You know what I mean? Are you gonna treat my daughter right?

Not really. He's pretty nice. Like, when we had parties or anything, or I had friends come over, they were initially scared of my dad. Cause he's loud. People are like, oh, your dad's scary.

And then they'd, like, meet my family. They'd be like, oh, your mom is scary. But you'd think he'd be hardened by everything that's gone on. He's not. How?

I don't know. Like, even from people coming in, like, new employees or something, where we find out they're, like, conning us. I was like, we can't trust people. We have to be, like, aware. And he's just like, nope.

I don't know how he's not hardened. He's just, like, a nice, compassionate guy. Was your husband a fan of your dad beforehand? And how do you get so much trust in such a short amount of time? So we'd been working together a bit we'd been working together, so I knew him a little, but it wasn't, like, romantic at all.

I just knew him. I was still in Toronto. I was considering moving to Austin. I knew he lived in Austin, so I was like, oh, you can show me around Austin. And he, like, drove around showing me all the homeless people.

And I was like, who is this weirdo? I was like, this isn't a tour of Austin. I wanted. I think the older you get, especially as a female, because I know I was super naive when I was, like, 23, 24, and didn't know how to judge people at all. And I'm just getting better at it the older I get.

I could just kind of tell, like, you have this intuitive sense as a girl. If you're with someone and they make you feel safe, and it's not really logical, it's really intuitive, and I think it's built in to keep you away from, like, dangerous men. And so I was around him, and I was like, oh, you make me feel safe. I haven't felt that really. That was a big part of it.

And then we'd work together, and then we got along really well, and then we spent all our time together. So it wasn't like we were seeing each other two or three times a week or two times a week. It was, like, all of our time together. And if you spend all of your time together, even in, like, a three month period, it's quite a bit of time, but that would be fast, and I wouldn't necessarily recommend that for people. Was there ever a financial imbalance between the two of you?

Graham Stephan
You obviously running a very successful business. Oh, yeah, 100%. How do you navigate that? You know what I think because I was already set financially. I wasn't necessarily looking for somebody with that.

Mikhaila Peterson
Like, I think in a normal, like, male to female relationship, they're probably looking for somebody who can provide for in a financial way more than I would have been. I was like, I'm set. I'm good. I've taken care of myself. Like, I don't really need anybody.

So I was also in a good place to, like, enter a relationship because I was like, I'm not. Like, I'm lonely and I want to be with somebody, but I don't need somebody. He's also taken a lot off my plate. Like, I wanted to marry somebody who could. Oh, this was the other thing I told him when I was trying to scare him away.

I said, um, because we were already working together, and he was like, I was slowly giving him more things to do, being like, can you also handle this? Can you also handle that? And I was like, whoever I marry, I want to be able to work with. And I don't know if that's normal for a relationship, but I was like, if I'm going to be with somebody, I work all the time, like, all day on things, and I'd rather be working with, like, my husband. Otherwise, I'm going to be working with other, like, men, most likely all day.

And over that, like, first three, three month period, he took a lot off my plate, and I was watching and seeing if he could handle it because I've tried to give a lot of my work away before, like I said, and it's been like, oh, this is too complicated for you. And that's like talking to lawyers or negotiating contracts or just, like, things you think that, I don't know, people could just do that? That not everybody can do, even. It's like, you guys have a podcast and it's, like, successful, and you're like, well, anyone can do this. They can't.

And so I gave him more and more and could see how competent he was money wise. We weren't on the same footing ground, but he's better at negotiating business and running things than me, which is a huge relief. So I've been able to give a bunch of work away. It's funny, I'm the opposite of that. I would not want to work with my spouse.

Why, though? I'm a difficult person to work with, I think Jack could attest to that. That I am very picky, highly disagreeable. I want things done a certain way, and the last thing I want is to, like, have a relationship that's intertwined. What if they agreed with you, though?

So this is what I scored, by the way. I scored first percentile in agreeableness. So you're like a 99 or whatever. The top score is the most agreeable. No, I'm first percentile.

That's at least disagreeable, which I think is why I've been able to handle, like, all meat diet and, like, some controversy would be just being like, screw you. I'd like whatever. But Jordan and I don't really disagree on things. So when I first started working, it was definitely a transition because I didn't want to give away some things because it was like, some of these are mine and I built them and they're like my babies and you can't have them. But we agree on most business decisions.

If it was someone I didn't like, agree with, that would be a problem we agree on most, and when we disagree, he's right a good percentage of the time, and it's like, okay. That ended up being valuable. I feel like if you find something like that, if you have someone you're working with and they're annoying or they're just slowing you down, it's the worst thing in the entire world for a relationship. I think, like, we're in a unique position, which is why when I told him, when I was trying to scare him away, I was like, you know, this is a lot that I'm expecting here. I didn't think I was going to get married after I got divorced.

I was like, there's way too much baggage, and there's, like, a specific thing I'm looking for. Is that, like, a thing that women experience after divorce? 100%. I had so many. After I started talking about the divorce or just told people I was divorced, my belief, and I think that's from growing up in a more conservative family.

My belief was, okay, I'm just gonna be single because I have a kid, and I don't have any value. Like, I literally, that's what I thought. And I had a bunch of people, especially more conservative women, who haven't even told people that they're divorced or that they have a kid. They haven't admitted that on social media, who are like, I'm gonna be alone forever. And they're, like, 26.

I was like, you're a very attractive woman, and you're very successful. Like, that's just a lie. You've been sold. So, yeah, I fully believed that. Like, I was okay with it.

I was like, I'd rather be alone than in a bad relationship. When should people end a relationship? At what point? Because I know there's a difference between, you know, you make a commitment to somebody and you want to work through those problems, but then there are also some problems that you can't work through or that aren't worth working through. Like, it's hard to say.

I think if you're getting danger vibes from the person you're with as a woman, that you should really pay attention to that, even if you can't understand why. Cause I think that's built into us, and so don't. Don't ignore that. And then I would say, don't get, like, don't just get married unless you really, really want it. It's a lot easier to end a relationship if you're not married.

Definitely try not to have a kid with that person, because that just screws up everything. But if you're in a situation where you find out that person is lying, even, like, small lies, I think, then be on your guard and maybe address those lies. And if they don't fix themselves, I. Would leave so lying in any circumstances on a. Yeah.

But I find that people who lie, they don't lie about one thing. They lie about, like, everything a little bit. They're comfortable with lying. Yeah. And.

Or are. And I know gaslighting is super overused, but if they're saying, oh, this happened, you're like, I don't remember that. You're like, oh, no, just trust me. That happened. That kind of behavior and, like, lying about things, I'd say, like, get out regardless.

Jack Selby
What about just not bringing up something? Maybe it's bothering you. You have some thought or something, and it pops into your head every once in a while, but, you know, it'll ignite some big argument or whatever, and you're like, you know what? It's not really worth it. This is probably a me problem.

It makes me a little uncomfortable, but I'm just not gonna. I used to be like that, especially when I was in a bad relationship. I was like that a lot. It was like I didn't really understand how I was feeling and didn't want to hurt feelings and stuff. I don't do that ever anymore.

Mikhaila Peterson
So if there's something bugging me and I'm worried about the repercussions, I say it anyway, regardless of the outcome, like, every time, because it's a form of lying, but mostly because those problems don't. Even if it is a you problem, then say, like, hey, this bugged me, or, I'm concerned about this. It might all be me. But, like, can we talk about it a little bit to see if I'm the problem here or if this is a problem we should work through. And I think 100% of the time, that's better to do.

Otherwise, you don't say it, and then they just sit in your, like, soul and fester there, and they never go away. So you can't just, like, forget about something that. It depends. If you're, like, a volatile person and they did something and you're like, okay, let me give it a week, and then see if I'm still irritated by it and you're not, that's different. But if it's something repeated that you're just not mentioning, I think, seriously, bring it up.

Because if you can't communicate with, like, your spouse or your girlfriend about tiny things, that bother you, then, like, how are you going to be deeply in love and you shouldn't be in a relationship where you're worried about hurting their feelings. Like, if you're. And I think that happens more probably for men because women are a bit more sensitive, but it happens for women with men as well. If you're with someone and you're worried about hurting your feelings all the time, then probably find somebody else as well, because that's exhausting. But part of me wonders.

Jack Selby
People can have a natural predisposition to being okay with higher levels of discomfort and secrecy, right? Oh, yeah. And if they're truly hardwired that way, then it's like, okay, well, just let them be. If it works for them, then you know what I mean? I can't say in a dogmatic way that you need to be completely transparent about every single problem that you have in this relationship for everybody out there, because certain people are just coded differently.

Mikhaila Peterson
I think I disagree with that. People who are super agreeable. And I scored. I scored weird on agreeableness. It, like, it splits into compassion and politeness.

I scored first percentile. And politeness. I didn't score first percentile on agreeableness. I scored like 83 on compassion, so I ended up more like a 40 or something with agreeableness. So I know I said that wrong earlier.

It was politeness where I scored really well. Politeness. Yeah. So you offered me this. Before we go, politeness is more like.

Politeness is a bad word for it, maybe. Yeah. It's more like not being blunt. I scored high in the bluntness. You did?

Graham Stephan
I did. He's very blunt. Okay. Okay. That's what I did.

Mikhaila Peterson
Apparently it's been an. Apparently it's been an issue. I don't know. It's. I mean, it's only an issue once you.

Graham Stephan
Before you get something, it comes off harsh, I think. So some people might take it the wrong way. So sometimes people come to me and what do you think of it? I'm like, it sucks. It's really bad.

Mikhaila Peterson
And if compassion is also low, then you also don't really care as much about how they feel. When you say the honest answer is my thing, it's like, hey, if this sucks, I think it's bad. I think that's better. But I do feel bad. I don't know if it's better.

Jack Selby
I think, be honest. Right? So, like, if you don't like something, be like, hey, look, I'm not gonna lie. That's not my favorite. Here's something that can maybe, like, improve it.

Mikhaila Peterson
See, that's what I would do. Boom. That sucks. Yeah. I do something more.

Graham Stephan
I told Jack that, like, I talk to people how I want to be talked to. And so if I show somebody something, I would love for them to say, I hate it. And so do you want other people to talk to you the way that they want you to talk to them? I just assign that same standard to everybody else. That's just what I know.

It's just what I know. No, it's an agreeableness thing. That's all it is. So my husband, super disagreeable, and he'll do the same brutally honest thing where I was like, okay, that made that person uncomfortable. And because that person's uncomfortable now, I'm uncomfortable.

Mikhaila Peterson
So maybe we just tone it down a little bit. But he's like, well, I'm just telling them the truth. I'm like, okay. But, like, it's funny. I've had the exact conversations with Macy.

Graham Stephan
Sometimes I just think, maybe they're fine. And she says, no, you hurt their feelings. I'm like, no. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, I did. Same conversation.

Totally fine. Extremely polite. Yeah, extremely polite. But I was like, no, that wouldn't hurt their feelings. No, they're dumb.

It's like a dumb. That's exactly. Yeah. And it does. It's interesting.

Mikhaila Peterson
Yeah, I've had those disagreements with Jordan, and then their feelings are hurt and, like, see, other people are like that sometimes, but interesting. But back to what you said about, like, not saying things. Agreeable people are more likely to become resentful over time. I learned this from my dad. So they're less likely to say things that are bothering them because they can put up with, like, kind of burdening themselves rather than burdening the other person.

That's just what agreeable people are. Like, super compassionate, super polite. And they want everybody to, like, be calm and happy and very pleasant to be around usually agreeable people. But over time, if you don't bring up these things, they'll also get resentful. And that happens a lot with women who are super agreeable.

They'll go out of their way to do things for other people. Like, hey, would you pick this up for me? Hey, would you do this? And they'll be like, yeah, sure, that's no problem. And eventually they'll be like, hey, you know, you spent the last five years asking me to pick up your song box, and I've hated it the entire time.

And snap. Now, I'm not saying all agreeable people will do that, but I'm saying if you're agreeable, you're more likely to get resentful over longer periods of time. So you should still bring up things that are bothering you, because usually just talking to people, you can frame it in a way that's, like, puts a bunch of the blame on yourself, too. Like, hey, I'm kind of feeling a little bit weird about this. It's probably my fault.

Like, how do you feel about this? And then at least it's out in the open. I firmly believe that after going through a divorce and doing the complete wrong thing should have addressed a bunch of things a lot earlier that were in my head. And I was just like, it's probably me. I don't think it was me now, but in.

At the time, I was like, it's probably me. I should just, like, you know, think differently or something, and then you want someone you can be open with. Otherwise, relationships are no fun. I agree. I think you can say the exact same thing in two completely different ways.

Jack Selby
You can and get different responses, and it's kind of just about reading the situation and knowing that certain people are receptive to different sorts of, like, okay, I want to transmit information that we should change this aspect. Different people are receptive in different ways. And you kind of have to figure out the language. Yeah. And then play that game a little bit.

Like, I know I have to approach Graham differently. If I want to enact change, then I have to approach, let's say, my mom or something. Yeah, yeah. It's just. I think that's just normal.

Mikhaila Peterson
And if you can, like, I think if you're agreeable to you, you're better at reading that. I think. Although I'm not. I'm just. I'm not taking that from anywhere.

Jack Selby
Here's the thing. I think there are very few people out there. Maybe gramsy an anomaly, but very few people out there, where if you say something very bluntly, it comes off as accusatory. And I think people have a natural gut reaction to recoil at that. And I think that's just, like, coded in our DNA.

It's like, okay, well, you're not one of us. You're one of them. And so that's why I think, like, if you're actually trying to engage in persuasive speech, you can't alienate the other person or say something that is even received as accusatory. Right. Maybe you're not transmitting it in an accusatory way, but it's being received that way.

And if you have, like, a goal that you wanna achieve, then you have to understand how they receive information and then play that game. And I just think, generally speaking, like, saying something super bluntly and harshly is not gonna yield the desired outcome. I basically agree with that, I think. So I'm way more likely to change what I'm saying so that it'll be received by the other person in a more positive way, even if the underlying message is the same, like, rather than Jordan, that'll just be, like, blunt, and he'll just say the message, right. Um, but my compassion, and I think that's what it falls under for.

Mikhaila Peterson
Agreeableness was high enough that I could have actually been a bit blunter, and I've seen that with how he speaks, because sometimes he'll be a little bit less blunt. I could be blunter and get a better response from people. And I was actually overdoing it on the niceness, especially in work, and being taken seriously in work work. Like, I was writing emails in a way where people just weren't taking me as seriously because I wasn't as being as authoritative, because I was being overly polite, because I'm compassionate. And so it depends on the situation, right.

But I think for people who score really high in agreeableness, they can tone it back to get more towards the mean, like, more towards the average person, and it would benefit them. And what's your recommendation for someone who's blunt and someone who's disagreeable? I like. I like, I mean, like, my husband's super disagreeable. I like it.

I find it refreshing. I would say, though, if you're around, like, this is what I tell him too. I can usually pick him on it more easily than him, though with certain employees where I'm like, if you say it that way, it's gonna hurt their feelings. And he's like, no, it won't. Just like, exactly what?

And then it does. It'll be like, see? But then it'll have to happen, like, four times. I'd really know if I hurt feelings. I will say, I want to add this to people here.

Jack Selby
If you just say flat out, yeah, I don't like it, versus I don't like it, because x and you point out a very specific thing that can universally be seen as, okay, that's probably not the best way. So I'll send him an intro that I devised for, you know, one of our podcasts, and he's like, it sucks. And I'm like, okay, well, like, what do you want me to work on? Yeah, you know, like, if you were like, you need. That sucks.

But I would change the text font to this. Yeah. And I think it would look better. I'll be like, okay, I can actually do something about this. And to get to give Jordan credit, that's what he does.

It's not harshness. Right. But it's like. It's like harshness with a shared goal, because I have the same goal as him. I want to make a banger intro, but if it's just flat out, this sucks, it's like, okay, well, thanks a lot.

Graham Stephan
See, when I'm thinking about it, I'm not thinking anything about Jack. I'm thinking this intro itself is not good. So to me, I kind of separate. It's like, the intro versus Jack's effort. Like, I attached the two.

I'm like, this intro sucks. This is horrible. But I don't think come up with horrible intros anymore. No, but something like that. I detached the person from the thing.

So if I see, like, a horrible thumbnail, I'm like, that's. That's awful. Yeah. I don't think anything of the person. I think that's just a disagreeable thing to do is, like, objectively, you know, whatever you said wasn't quite right, or whatever you did wasn't quite right without.

Mikhaila Peterson
Without attaching it to the person. That's interesting. I don't think that way. Okay. I always attach it to the person.

And you were saying, how do you tell them when it's gonna hurt somebody's feelings? I can feel their discomfort. Like, so if you're in a conversation, you're saying something, and they. They'll make, like, certain movements or their. Their voice will go up a little bit.

I can feel that I'm uncomfortable. He's not into that. I feel like I'm really good at reading people. No, here's the thing.

Jack Selby
That was the disagreeable miss. But, like, we'll have guests that come over to the house to come shoot a podcast. There have been multiple occasions where the guest comes up to me and they say, is it just me? Or. I feel like Graham doesn't really like me, and they say that to me, and I'm like, no, trust me.

When you walk in and he doesn't greet you, and he's just, like, tinkering with his aquarium. It's because he's in his little world, and he's happy. It's not the fact that he doesn't like you. So you weren't joking about aquariums? No.

Mikhaila Peterson
That's agreeableness. Yeah. Yeah. So it's not that. It's just like, they feel like he doesn't give them the attention.

Jack Selby
He doesn't like them or whatever. And I do think you're not super attune to, like, you know, what other people are feeling in a conversation. And he's generally pretty. He probably doesn't. Doesn't care.

Mikhaila Peterson
Like, the lower in agreeableness you are. You probably don't care. My mom's pretty low. Like, for a woman, she's low. She scored 30, and she didn't score high in compassion.

Like, she just scored 30. It's low. It's kind of, like average man. And she didn't really care. She'd say things that were true and harsh and blunt.

She'd say them to my friends sometimes, and they'd, like, like, be uncomfortable, and she just wouldn't feel it or care, and I would feel it, and so I'd be like, well, I don't want to feel that. So, like, can you make your words change a little bit? So I think that's just agreeableness. Yeah, that's really interesting. And then I would say to somebody like that, that, like, hey, maybe it would make you better off if you were to care a little bit.

Jack Selby
But I think, like, by virtue of being disagreeable, even that can't, like, persuade them. Cause they're like, you're wrong. Nah. Yeah, yeah, it might be a. That's just, like, a one way stop, you know?

Mikhaila Peterson
I think one way stops there. Like, the only way you'd change any type of behavior is by making mistakes and seeing a pattern and being like, okay, when I do x, this happens. And then you'd be able to convince yourself it's not a good idea. I feel like I'm like that, too. I don't necessarily take suggestions from other people.

I do, but, like, it's nice to make my own mistakes and then see how that played out. Well, thank you so much for coming on the podcast. We really appreciate it. Also, thank you guys for helping us out here. That this setup is absolutely amazing.

Jack Selby
I don't even know how many cameras. Lots of cameras. Sure. It's going to look great. So we really appreciate it.

Thank you, guys. Link to all your info in the description. Okay, perfect. It was nice meeting you guys, too. Till next time.

Mikhaila Peterson
See ya.

Mikhaila Peterson on Cancel Culture, Depression, and Fighting The Woke Mob

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1: Introduction

2: Health Struggles and Diet

3: Media and Public Perception

4: Cancel Culture and Society

5: Closing Thoughts

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