Brain Health Expert Dan Murray-Serter Joins Us On The Join Up Dots Business Podcast
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Introducing Brain Health Expert Dan Murray-Serter
Brain Health expert Dan Murray-Serter joins us on the Steve Jobs inspired Join Up Dots business podcast.
Dan is a multi-award winning serial entrepreneur, who talks openly about failure, mental health, mental performance, and ‘braincare’ – which includes his journey using science to build habits, cultivating a positive mindset & the importance of nutrition for optimizing your brain’s health, after writing over 120 newsletters in a row (and counting) on the science of brain health.
He’s the Co-Founder of Heights, a ‘braincare’ company that makes the highest rated supplements for mental health and performance that help high achievers become more productive, focused, and mentally fit.
As he says “Neglect your brain and the rest of your body suffers. With the right nutrition, you can feel better, every day. What’s stopping you?”
With fans around the world, and with a year of extremely powerful lows it seems now is the time more than ever the world needs this.
So what made him turn his attention to mental health when so many people do not give the brain a second thought as its kind of hidden away.
Well lets find out as we bring onto the show to start joining up dots with the one and only Dan Murray-Serter
Show Highlights
During the show we discussed such weighty subjects with Dan Murray-Serter such as:
Dan shares how his idea for business changed drastically due to the pandemic that hit the world in 2020.
We talk about the moment that his business idea came to the fore, and the deep research that he then undertook.
We discuss the increase of mental health due to the comparisons that we now build against others every day.
And lastly we talk about………..
The Power Of Now, and why this book read at the right time, is the key to big personal changes.
How To Connect With Dan Murray-Serter
Return To The Top Of Dan Murray-Serter
If you enjoyed this episode with Brain Health Expert Dan Murray-Serter then, why not check out other inspirational chat with Virtual Assistant, Jack Canfield, Ian Pribyl and the amazing Chester Santos
You can also check our extensive podcast archive by clicking here– enjoy
Full Transcription Of Brain Health Expert Dan Murray-Serter Interview
Intro [0:01]
shouldn’t be hard life should be a fun filled adventure every day. So now start joining up dots tap into your talents, your skills, your God given gifts and tell your boss, you don’t deserve me. I’m out of here. It’s time for you to smash that alarm clock. And start getting the dream business and life you will, of course, are dreaming of. Let’s join your host, David Ralph from the back of his garden in the UK, or wherever he might be today with another jam packed episode of the number one hit podcast. Join Up Dots.
David Ralph [0:39]
Yes, hello there. Good morning to you. Well, good morning. And thank you so much for being with us once more on a Join Up Dots. You know, over the years, we’ve been talking about so many sort of different elements of getting the dream life and one of the things that we probably haven’t spoken about too much, is the thing that we all carry around with us that thing in our heads, yes, our brain. And today’s guest is a multi award winning serial entrepreneur who talks openly about failure, mental health, mental performance and brain care, which includes his journey using science to build habits cultivating a positive mindset, and the importance of nutrition by optimising your brain’s health. Now after writing over 120 newsletters in a row and counting, he’s an expert on brain health. He’s also the co founder of heights, a brain care company that makes the highest rated supplements for mental health and performance, but help high achievers become more productive focus, and mentally fit, as he says, neglect cheap brain and the rest of your body suffers with the right nutrition, you can feel better every day. What’s stopping you. Now with fans around the world and with a year of extremely powerful alows It seems Now is the time more than ever, but the world needs space. So what made him turn his attention to mental health when so many people do not get the brain a second for as it’s kind of hidden away? And of course, we’ve so many businesses, you just start them not with this one, you’re gonna have to get it all foodless all of the testing stage and bull out into market? Let’s find out with the one and only Mr. Dan Murray-Serter.
Brain Health Expert Dan Murray-Serter [2:22]
Great How you doing? What an intro.
David Ralph [2:24]
is lovely to have you here, sir, because you have hit at the right time because I generally, I’m very positive. I always say that I’m like Tigger on crystal maps, I kind of bounce out of bed. I’m always enthusiastic. But over the last year, I’ve discovered mental health, because of the situation that we’ve all been in the pandemic, where you suddenly think Hang on, things aren’t going the way that we wanted. Life is speeding restricted. I’ve had clouds over me, has it been a boom getting straight to the chase for your business? But what we’ve been through this year?
Brain Health Expert Dan Murray-Serter [3:03]
Well, that’s a good question, actually. And it’s an interesting place to start. But the company actually launched on January the sixth 2020. So it’s actually hard to say if it had a boom, because actually, as a business owner, I went through all the same problems everyone else did. In I was started started a company online, any commerce with a supply chain, and then suddenly a global pandemic hits and everything you think that you know about how to run that business very drastically changes, including who we hire, how we hire them, where we hire them from, obviously, the intention of having an office and not having an office. So the answer to your question is I actually this this company, and it’s worth saying I, I’ve had a few so this is my most recent company has never known an existence other than being born in a pandemic. So there have been a lot of challenges. What I would say is, we’re very proud of how fast we’re growing. We are currently we have one product at the moment, we were very tactical in creating the world’s best product for brain health. So nutritional product for brain health and mental performance. And we’ve updated our formula in our single product four times since launching since more science has come out without certain ingredients or for example, you know, if an NDA is one of the things that gets talked about a lot with COVID. So you know, we’ve upped our vitamin D dosage in the products as well. So it’s one of the things that we do is quite interesting is that consistently updating and improving a formula that goes into it based on the science and the fact that the world can’t, you know, suppliers do update their ingredients and the quality improves. So the reason I’m starting now is to say that we have seen a big demand for the product. We have seen a big rise, but I can’t compare it to pre pandemic, all I can talk about is this Company being born in the pandemic, which in itself has been quite an exhilarating if not completely exasperating and tiring, journey but wonder, fortunately, I’ve been completely supported on the entire time by making sure that my brain is well fed and staying on brand. So, you know, sleeping as well as I can, looking after myself making sure that I’m not overdoing it, and most importantly, working with our customers to make sure that they are happy as well.
David Ralph [5:29]
Now I’m pondering this, Dan, I’ll be honest, I’m pondering this. Where is your office in like a volcano somewhere? Do you sit there stroking a white cat? It seems it seems strange that your business started just when the pandemic started. You might be like a Bond villain, but has brought me on there’s some wonderful marketing
Brain Health Expert Dan Murray-Serter [5:50]
100 100% Yeah. So when I was first conceiving the product, I thought, instead of just doing a business plan, why don’t you start big, always think with big vision, to start with a global pandemic, create the needs, then fulfil the demand. So you’re spot on this was all conceived the volcano, we actually chose Pompei as our location, we kind of like the mystery of history of the past. So that’s being you know, sitting around that volcano of volcanic historical site, making sure that we’re really planning out, you know, the next the next rain of tyranny.
David Ralph [6:30]
So let’s jump back a bit because this fascinates me because we help people build businesses through Join Up Dots. But we haven’t built any businesses where there is science behind it. A lot of people say, you had to create a business that is you that brings your authentic self, that sort of taps into a pain point. But with you as well, you’ve got to become an expert. You can’t just lob a load of sort of nutrients together and hope for the best. So how did you go through that? What was the first thought that you had when you thought actually great idea? And I think I can tackle this not one of these great ideas that you wake up the next morning when you think, Oh, God, it was good at two o’clock in the morning? I haven’t got a clue where to start?
Brain Health Expert Dan Murray-Serter [7:16]
That’s a good question. So it’s worth saying that the idea for the product and the brand came from personal experience. So I suffered with insomnia and chronic anxiety for six months and gone to the doctor and had been to therapists and sleep therapists and nothing had worked. And then after six months, I went for dinner with a friend who recommended that I go to a dietitian, and which, you know, the dietician sees sick people and helps him with nutritional intervention. And she diagnosed me within a minute and told me basically to take high quality DHT omega three B, vitamin complex and blueberry extract supplements, which I was very comp was the right word. I’m very sceptical about the honestly, mostly because I wasn’t really a supplement taker, I don’t really think that I, you know, I didn’t really mean they’ve worked. And I’ve heard a lot of, you know, they’re a waste of money type PR before. So from my point of view, that seems to be an odd thing to suggest. But she’s a nutrition professional. So I did listen. And within a week, I was sleeping like a baby. And I was a, like, let’s just say convert. So I called her up to tell her how amazing and remarkable what she’d done for me was, and she was pretty nonchalant, pretty uninteresting, and was mostly just frustrated, because she was like, Well, I mean, yeah, I told you. So like, I know that this would work. It’s not a surprise to me. So really interesting to me, because I’d actually spent 125 pounds on these three supplements, because she made it super clear that they have to be extremely high quality. So there’s a big difference in the world of supplements, for some reason, where there’s basically one big scam, where you can basically put in the marketing amount to make a claim. And that’s very different to the scientific dosage that makes an impact in your body. So when I like when I went to buy these supplements, you know, she was very specific, I can’t go to boots or holding a bar or anywhere on the high street, I have to go to Whole Foods or planet organics, I’m a really expensive, incredible where they’ll have high quality ones. And I was kind of shocked at the price. So all of these things, you know, kind of compounded to the personal experience of surprise and intrigue and thinking as you do that entrepreneurial mindset low. Surely I can do this better and surely, you know, combining the top nutrients that your brain needs to thrive. Like that’s got to be something that someone should do, right as in lots of people when I was doing my market research, you realise lots of people know what supplements they’re taking or get told to take supplements, but they’re quite individual, right? It’s like take vitamin D for their sake, a multivitamin for that. And there’s lots of these sorts of different reasons. But actually, you know, the more I was reading about it, and the more I read the science papers, the more I was learning it You feed your brain when it needs to thrive according to science, so this is not according to me it is according to science, there’s literally evidence to suggest that you can improve your mood, you can improve your energy, your like, lower your brain fog. You can also combat things neurological degenerative diseases like Alzheimer’s and, and Parkinson’s and dementia, and all of this through basically just feeding your brain what it needs to thrive. And I had this personal experience with with insomnia, right where she told me what to do, it was really obvious to her, there was no second guessing what I should teach told me specifically. And it immediately worked. So my interest was completely piqued. In fairness to you, like, I didn’t just come up with idea, like immediately and just say, Well, this is what I’m making. I went through with my business partner, a very long process of discovery. So what should we make? Why should we make it and that takes a lot of research with people. So the truth of the matter is, we started writing a newsletter. And we said to ourselves, we want to create a company that is in the brain space, we don’t know exactly what that means. But we know that we’re fascinated by the brain. And we know that there’s a lot of interesting opportunity for a consumer brand to play in this space that we don’t really know what that looks like yet, because they don’t really exist. So we know that we’re going to create one, but we’re not 100% sure what our product is going to be your way. But if we write this newsletter, and we start engaging with people who might be interested as well about learning how their brain works, according to science every week, then we can go on a journey with our community. And people will start to tell us, they’ll tell us what’s interesting to them, and why. And we will come to conclusions that way. So the truth is, no, I didn’t wake up one day and have an idea and think this is what the world needs. And honestly, the the idea for the product took probably six to nine months of speaking to people and getting feedback from our newsletter list before we ever started embarking on creating a single product.
David Ralph [11:56]
Do you know I love this because I’ve been on a bit of a journey recently, oh, well, over the last three or four years, I had acute burnout about three years ago. And so from that point
Unknown Speaker [12:05]
on, as well
David Ralph [12:06]
as sourcing is exhausting. It’s taken me about three years to get past it. And then just recently, I’ve met a business partner who is totally focused at having non sugar in your diet. And from the information that she’s given me how the sugar affects the brain, and then gives you a complete slump afterwards. And it makes me look at everything. Now one of the things that I have been doing myself is increasing my intake of fruit and vegetables, and one of the things I’m doing is like a green juice every morning. And that seems to me like a no brainer, but people can do because it has made me feel so much more stimulated and perky. And I was one of those people that would have said our green shake who wants that. But once you actually look at it, and you realise that you’re bypassing your digestive system and getting it straight into yourselves, the science started to open up the sense to me, and I’d look at it and think this makes sense. I can see this. So I went through this. And I was saying to my wife, you should do this, you should do this. This is gonna be brilliant, you know, because she’s always on a diet. He never works. She’s lost about seven pounds in about three weeks, you know, and she’s now into fresh fruit and vegetables. So my question is, if the fresh fruit and vegetables are all around for her, why do you even need additional supplements and nutrients? Is it just a case of people aren’t getting their fresh batch and stuff fibre day?
Brain Health Expert Dan Murray-Serter [13:40]
Well, great question. But actually fresh fruit and veggie doesn’t really scratch the surface. So I’ll tell you this as a vegetarian myself. If you’re not eating fish, and you’re not eating meat, you’re not getting enough you’re not like most chances are obviously there are exceptions to the rule. But most chances are if you’re like me, which is a good healthy vegetarian, I eat healthily I eat regularly. I work out a lot you know I do, I try and keep myself fit and I’m conscious of what I eat. I still weigh under index on omega threes and B vitamins. And the reason is because omega three is typically found in fish. Now fish get them from algae. So actually fish synthesise all of their omega threes from algae, which means that algae is a far more sustainable place to get your omega three source from but as a vegetarian, I can tell you that I don’t sit around eating algae or seaweed. Right. So you know, the practical fact is I don’t get omega threes full stop at all. And there’s a lot of people through my category nice and loud. There’s a lot of people who say, well, you can get you know enough omega threes from flaxseed and stuff. But not only is that not quite true because it’s a different type of omega three is a la which then doesn’t convert into D ha which is what your brain is made of. But not only is that not true, but like most of you people that say that love to say, well don’t you just eat enough flaxseed? And the answer is like, Well, no, I’m not a bird. I don’t sit around eating flaxseed either. So, you know, the the likelihood is that vegetarians are under indexing massively on a nega freeze, and B vitamins. B vitamins, like, you know, generally we’re told is, it’s all if you’re vegan, for sure, and often if you’re vegetarian about the importance of having b 12. And supplementation if you if you are deficient, sorry if you’re vegetarian or vegan, but the reality is, you are most likely deficient in mostly that’s humans, as well. And actually, the surprising thing and this is like to say we know that we have some extremely informed customers like the founder of planet organic is one of our customers. And she has a subscription of hikes for her and her entire family. So husband and three kids, because I think this is scary, but worth considering. She doesn’t believe even the highest quality food and she’s an omnivore. By the way, she doesn’t believe that even the highest quality food like the time that they sell them planet organic has enough nutrients in it that your brain and body need. So sadly, because of the way that we over farmed things, fertilise things, etc. Even the owner of pretty much the UK largest organic food store doesn’t think that we get enough of the vitamins and minerals that we need in the food. So that’s quite damning, and exactly why lots of nutritionists still say, even if you do get a good diet, a good balanced diet and stuff, it is good to supplement as well, just in case now, the reality is the clue is in the name like supplements. So ideally, if you can have the perfect diet, then by all means go and have the perfect diet. But if you’re human, and therefore slightly fallible, and not quite perfect, so you’re more like me, then the reality is supplementation is a very good idea. It’s almost like an insurance policy. Now, you’re talking about fruit and vege. I mean, that doesn’t even slightly cut it for your brain, there’s lots of good stuff in there, by the way, but if I just take you through the brains composition is 90% fat, and 60% of that fat is the single compound da chain. And you cannot find any gha in fruit or vegetables. So you know, I mean, you’d like that you can find it in aggregate. But again, very rarely, I’m sure you having algae for dinner. So the reality is you’re they’re not feeding your brain, which is your most important organ, the key ingredient that is literally made of the key nutrient that it has made up, that is fine, by the way for a period of time, because we have like dynamic and intelligent brains and bodies that can, you know, use up resources from other places and, and like even, you know, improvise, so to speak, however, a great analogy that I was given by someone else, so I’m not going to steal it as my own because it’s too too intelligent, but it’s very helpful is imagine you’re building a house, that house you know, you build it with brick and cement. But ideally, you know, you will continue doing that. But you would occasionally, you know, take out a brick and then replace it with polystyrene. Now, if you do that enough times that, you know, the house will still stay up for a long period of time. If you do that too much and too frequently, and you replace too many bricks with polystyrene, the thing starts to crumble, it starts to fall down and the foundation’s get a bit weak. Now that by the way, is usually where symptoms of mental health problems whether they start with something simple, like fatigue, and exhaustion, or then they get into becoming potentially very serious things like that. And now it’s like insomnia, like I suffered, you know, those are your brain’s alarm signals saying hey, something is massively wrong here go sorts out. Now, in your case with burnout, you know, that could have been professionally just, you know, your brain telling you, hey, I need you to take a rest. Now this is too much. In my case, that was my brain saying you actually have a nutritional deficiency here, we’re starving for nutrients, you got to go sort out, which is why when I went to therapy, when I spoke to the doctor eating sleeping pills on people, like none of these things actually worked until I went to a dietician. And she gave me these supplements and they work so quickly. Right? So the reality is your body does kind of know, sadly, like the feelings that we get when these things happen. You know, sometimes our body wakes up and actually tells us there’s a problem that we need to sort out. The thing that alarms me, and that also is a huge positive is people do not understand, like I didn’t understand that nutrition. And supplementation are literally part of the mental health journey, whether that is getting from a problem to the baby back to a baseline, right. So whether it’s from anxiety and insomnia or in my case, and then back to feeling good again, or feeling good and wanting to perform better. So if you think about how we think about that, from a physical point of view, you know, you talk about your wife like losing weight or going on diets and stuff and whether it sticks you know, you know that these things are logical when it comes to our body, but when it comes To our brain to some reason we employ different attitudes and don’t think that nutrition is a key part and key component there. Whereas, actually, according to science, it is absolutely the fact it is 50% psychological and 50% biological. And we can impact that with the choices we make by what we eat, how we supplement and how we think about what we put in our bodies.
David Ralph [20:20]
Let’s listen to Jim Carrey. And we’ll be back with Dan Murray-Serter
Jim Carrey [20:23]
My father could have been a great comedian, but he didn’t believe that that was possible for him. And so he made a conservative choice. Instead, he got a safe job as an accountant. And when I was 12 years old, he was let go from that safe job. And our family had to do whatever we could to survive. I learned many great lessons from my father, not the least of which was that you can fail at what you don’t want. So you might as well take a chance on doing what you love.
David Ralph [20:50]
Now, that phrase, Bear, I’ve been pondering this a lot recently, Dan, because what you’re talking about is something that’s prevalent at the moment mental health. Now, if I go back to the 70s, when I was growing up, if I had complained about mental health, I would have been told I was a big girl’s blouse and just pull your socks up and sort of get on with it. Is it is it now is it the case that we see too much is mental health because there’s so many distractions and comparisons, and we’re not just living a simple life like we used to where you didn’t have what that person was doing in another country, you you basically only saw what your next door neighbours were doing. And they were doing exactly the same as you. So there was more of an acceptance. What do you think?
Brain Health Expert Dan Murray-Serter [21:35]
Well, you’ve asked a few different questions. I like the general question, but I guess I’ll unpack it and a couple of different ways like Firstly, there is no, I mean, yes, you would have said that in the 70s Sure, there was literally no question whether you have mental health, we all have mental health, like we all have physical health, right, you have the mind, the mind is either healthy, or it’s not healthy. Those things are massively on a spectrum. So there is no one life, you know, sees a sum up or down, whether you’re healthy or not, you’re somewhere on a spectrum, you’re likely to go up and down. And there are likely to be lots of different things that impact, you know, what you consider to be your mental health. Now, the reference you just gave, which is, you know, comparison, ultimately, right. So comparison is the thief of joy is like a famous quote that comes into that. And yeah, obviously, there is another factor of you know, comparing with your neighbours who are doing the same thing, moving on to keeping up with the Joneses moving on to seeing on social media, this person with a Ferrari and that person with a module, and you know, the way that that actually makes us feel about our accomplishments and what we achieved. And that is 100%, like an issue of, in my opinion, you know, that’s, that’s an that’s an issue of consumerism. It’s an issue of capitalism, it’s an issue of living in a society that is completely set up towards growth. It is our responsibility as individuals to try and, and this is the way that I work on those particular angles. By the way, it’s our responsibility as individuals to take like, say, personal responsibility as much as we can, for our sense of self worth. So to know that I am enough and to understand that I am incredibly lucky to have what I have at any given day. It’s really easy. If you’re imagining an African, you know, an African Boy, you know, if it was lucky enough to have a mobile phone to see that I wake up in a bed every day with running water coming out of the top right? How does that comparison compare? So one of the most scientifically proven hacks to helping you deal with your mental health, especially when it comes to comparison, and feeling like you’re enough, is gratitude. And you can totally have gratitude, incidentally. So you know, like I said, I’m going to unpack your particular point of view here, which is comparing. And if the issue of comparing is that you think other people have more than you, then what’s the opposite of that is the fact that you have more than most other people. And actually, because you and I are speaking the English language that grew up in Britain. As a result, we are absolutely growing up with more than about a billion people in the world who might never know the kinds of freedoms that you have for living in countries like Britain or America. So
Unknown Speaker [24:28]
the hack that I did was I posted notes to myself, that says, I’m grateful for waking up today. And I did this during COVID. Because during COVID how many people around the world were going around living their normal life catching the random disease and dying? answer a lot of people so suddenly, like you’re brought into perspective on a global scale of how precious life is, and you know, it’s very easy to wake up and feel very better with your lot in life and like, you know, stuck in a bedroom. for four months have just launched a new business, I needed to see investors investors wouldn’t see me understandably, my company very, almost failed. And it’s very easy to feel better. But then I can also remember the flip side, which is I woke up today and took another breath and lots of people didn’t. So I haven’t noticed I’m looking at it right now it says, Hi, I’m thankful for waking up today. I wrote it on plain paper. It fits it well, it’s originally by my bed. Now it sits in my living room table. But the reason I put on my bed was because I wanted it to be the first thing that I woke up and saw every day, I can’t guarantee to myself that I’m going to wake up feeling grateful, because I might have had a bad night’s sleep, or I might just be in a shitty mood. But I can wake up, I can change what I see first thing, and what that makes me remember, and seeing a notes like that is one way of hacking gratitude. So I just kind of wanted to start there and just say, you know, yes, absolutely. We all have mental health. Yes, absolutely. We are stuck in a world where we are driven to be jealous of other people. And we can blame everyone else about that. Or we can take some personal responsibility for trying to hack happiness and gratitude back into our lives. And actually, that will humongously impact your mental health. Now very quickly, David, the other side of this is your brain health. So what you’re talking about is the mind. And the mind is driven by the ego. And the ego always wants more. But you can’t really have good mental health if you’ve got bad brain health. So, you know, if your brain for example, if you haven’t had enough water today, right, if you’re not drinking enough glasses of water, then your brain will start to dehydrate. And if your brain starts to dehydrate, you feel brain fog, you don’t feel energetic, you’re unable to complete tasks do work, think clearly, and you feel sluggish. And you can simply fix that by drinking more water. But that is a brain health issue, which will immediately impact your mental performance. So he says taking a glass of water. There we go. The same is true with nutrition. So if you feed your brain what it needs to thrive, suddenly your brain is not starved, you might be sleeping better. I mean, the most common things that people report with better brain health is that they’re sleeping better, that they’ve got more energy in the day that they experience less brain fog, that they can think clearly their memory improves. These are, you know, these are all things that we want for ourselves in life. The question is, are we willing to do the simple things that it takes to achieve them? And a lot of this, like I say, comes down to getting a conversation not just in mental health, but also around brain health and nutrition and hydration are two guaranteed ways to improve those areas.
David Ralph [27:52]
I agree with you and I drink four litres of water a day. Now one of the reasons that a lot,
Brain Health Expert Dan Murray-Serter [27:56]
yeah, must be better. Well, you said you’re very energetic. There you go.
David Ralph [27:59]
I am very energetic, but one of the reasons is I’m just actually coming out of a serious bout of gout. I get gout in my throat every now and again. It’s very, very painful. So I have to keep my fluids up. And I do notice a difference when I’m actually sort of re hydrating myself and dehydrating. Now, one of the one of the things that really interests me now being devil’s advocate, and I have to say, Dad, I agree with you 100%. Okay, but there’s gonna be people out there that might have a different viewpoint on what you’re doing. And why is it now then that we are so focused on things like mental health and brain care, and adding nutrients to it? where people have been running for 1000s and 1000s of years not, and still creating masterpieces, and paintings and Einstein and all these incredibly brainy people? What is the difference?
Brain Health Expert Dan Murray-Serter [28:52]
Super question quite a lot. Firstly, you’re always going to get outliers anyway. Right? So, you know, it’s, there’s virtually no point, if that makes sense in comparing our everyday sense of wellbeing and happiness to people like Einstein, and Picasso. And it’s also very worth saying that both Einstein and cafe were absolutely high on the creativity and also borderline insanity metric as well. So it’s very, very common. You know, it’s kind of like they say that people with autism, right people on the spectrum, you know, those kinds of, you know, genetic, mental health impairments and also usually contribute enormously to society and abandonment of humanity, but a lot of the time at the detriment to that individual’s sense of well being and happiness. So, you know, the the spectrum scare the genius and madness is extremely close and kind of a hard one to compare that you are totally right. The other thing to say is that Yeah, supplements are actually, you know, part of a requirement over a period of time for people whilst food is being poorly manufactured. So again, this sort of comes back to the fact that the old way, you know, the hunter gatherer away, and then obviously, like moving forward through society until we started to do mass market, microwave type shopping in freezers, which obviously, anyone with growing families knows that’s kind of very common with fast food and all this stuff, you’re talking about comparing a modern junk food diet, we’ve got two junk food diets. One is we’ve got junk food, and the other is we’ve got junk messaging in society. So you know, all of our adverts are geared towards, like making us feel like we’re not enough and we need more, that’s junk advertising and junk words and junk values. And, you know, the junk foods like, you know, how often do you desire, you know, sugary coconut sugar? Well, I mean, you know, it’s terrible for you. But it doesn’t mean that you don’t want it it doesn’t mean you haven’t grown up wanting those things. But how often did Einstein oppa Casso desperately want a burger? Well, another
David Ralph [31:08]
one is when when you look back on it, but if we referenced a speech that Jim Carrey did, but you might as well do what you love, is this now the thing that you love as it comes across big time you, as deep as you’ve gone, you want to go deeper, you want to go deeper and deeper and deeper. Is this something that you’ve done?
Brain Health Expert Dan Murray-Serter [31:30]
Yes. Yeah, totally. I think I have been looking and you know what, I’m a super honest person. I don’t I try my best to speak from the heart, but total genuine authenticity, because it helps me feel aligned as well. When I used to run my mobile company, grabel, which ended up failing, but at the time, it was the UK is number one fashion app had real success rates, millions of pounds, had millions of users, bla bla, bla, bla bla, I would always admit to people that I was not enjoying that. I would hate people, like, you must be so happy must be so lucky. I was overly honest, including some investors, I was like, something just doesn’t work for me here. Like, I’m not that happy, I’m not really enjoying it. And I’m not that interested. And that’s the truth. You know, I’m very, like wearing my heart on my sleeve. I, I feel I mean, everyone that needs me says that I like whose passion or not. So I’m also super, I’m super blunt. You know, I’m not trying to be rude to other people. But I’m like, this doesn’t interest me or this isn’t my thing. And I care so deeply about this topic. Because I, when I had my period of insomnia and anxiety, as I say, I’ve also had depression, I’ve had burnout. And I have had a dilemma. So I’ve had quite a few different mental health problems over the time. But the worst one, by far out all of them was insomnia, because after trying everything to try and get rid of it, I thought that that was my new reality. And the problem with insomnia is, it’s, it’s very cruel. And it also doesn’t, you literally just don’t believe after a period of time that it will ever stop. So the feeling of, of having it stop and sleeping again, and sleeping so well again, and anyone that suffered with sleep problems can understand why this is so meaningful. And knowing that there is actually a solution out there that has lots of great rap that there’s a really good opportunity for brands do a great job and clearly communicating scientific benefits and helping people understand why it can help them and how it can help them. That stuff is a reason to get out of bed in the morning because I had a personal experience, which I come back and talk about with confidence and say, This isn’t a scam, it’s not bullshit. This is my personal experience, it really did happen. And I’m excited for other people to show it. And whilst that was like a big uphill battle at the start, you know, we have we’re now the number one number one rated supplement on trustpilot, which is the number one trusted rated reviews website. So we are like number one rated suffer in the entire world. And if you go and look at other supplement reviews from people, it’s usually things like nice company, good product, cool brown blog, their content. I was not like that. I was like, you know, this changed my life helped me sleep gave me energy, you know, all of the outputs, the things that we want in life, those are the tangible reviews, people are actually sharing benefits of our products. And that is a hugely different motivator to running a company that’s like growing and making money like every single trustpilot review that comes in, I go straight on Twitter and share and that’s how excited I am. I take a screenshot and I share it. I’m like, Oh, it’s happened again. You know, I’m like, I’ve done hundreds and hundreds of these tweets and now they get the odd like and no one’s really that interested in me. showboating but you know, so so
David Ralph [35:02]
jumping in Danny? Is this your legacy work? Do you think do you think this is? Because I always say to people, I can’t imagine stepping away from Join Up Dots now. And so many people launch a podcast, they do 100 shows, and then they stop. And they always explain the reasons why the show stopping. I can’t This is me and me is this. Do you think you’re the same?
Brain Health Expert Dan Murray-Serter [35:27]
That’s a great question. Um, so I think that building the brain care category. And that’s, you know, the company is called heights that we talk a lot about brain care, because we think about it in terms of, you know, skincare haircare, oral care, these are all spaces where people understand that a little bit goes a long way. And if I’m lucky, and I’ve done my job, right, I think that the idea of brain care and people actually, you know, we’ve invented this term, this word and building this category. I think, if I’m lucky, my legacy will be that people actually started creating other brands, competitors, like, there’s this groundswell of people clamouring to satisfy the consumer demand around brain care, because people are finally waking up and understanding that it’s an important thing that can help them live longer feel better, you know, that would be an incredible legacy to leave. So I think less about, you know, my company’s success, specifically in terms of legacy and more that, you know, in 2030 years are people around the world talking about their brain kind of routine, if they are what a legacy to leave,
David Ralph [36:29]
Let’s hear from somebody who sadly did create a legacy, Steve Jobs.
Steve Jobs [36:34]
Of course, it was impossible to connect the dots looking forward when I was in college. But it was very, very clear looking backwards, 10 years later. Again, you can’t connect the dots looking forward, you can only connect them looking backwards. So you have to trust that the dots will somehow connect in your future, you have to trust in something, your gut, destiny, life, karma, whatever. Because believing that the dots will connect down the road will give you the confidence to follow your heart, even when it leads you off the well worn path. And that will make all the difference. Now, you’ve
David Ralph [37:09]
already kind of concluded that your dots have been joining up the fact that you’re you was living a lifestyle that wasn’t conducive to sleep and depression. And then you started seeking answers. And when you’ve moved through, does that make it so much easier to then project forward knowing that things do join up, as Steve was saying, you can’t see it going forward? But you’ve just got to have the trust and the faith that things will come out? Okay. Yeah, it’s
Brain Health Expert Dan Murray-Serter [37:37]
a good question. Like, I think, I think the experience of having things failed and learning. And also, you know, the past experience of realising what is or isn’t aligned with the things that I care about in life. And, you know, whether I’m living and breathing and behaving in line with my personal values, that stuff is probably the most important way that I can join up the dots to how I’m going to thrive and be successful in the future. So yeah, that’s that’s really, to me, like the past experience is such a valuable way of, of predicting whether I can be in this for the long haul. Does that
David Ralph [38:20]
make sense? It makes total sense, because I think I’ve been in on that same journey where I, I struggled, and I really struggled. And then I got successful, and then my body gave out. And then once I sort of sorted my body out and sort of came back, I thought to myself, I don’t know if I even like this, I don’t know if Am I doing the right thing. And it’s taken me quite a while to realise, but actually, the thing that I enjoy more than anything, is trying to bring fun and value into other people’s lives. Because as you say, I was sitting on the sofa every day for about four weeks, and my foot was absolutely killing me. And every day I was thinking, at least I’m feeling this pain, and somebody else isn’t, you know, so there is that sort of positive. But I couldn’t quite join up the dots for a period of actually, what’s the next step? Where am I going, and I have found by actually, if you reconnect with your younger self, and you really understand who you were before the responsibilities take hold, then that’s a good indication of where you should be heading. And so now in exactly the same way, I’m all about not just creating businesses, but bringing fun back into it, enjoying yourself being more authentic, providing more value to people and creating businesses based on what the business gives you. Personally, brain wise, health wise, more than just your bank account.
Brain Health Expert Dan Murray-Serter [39:51]
100% Yeah, I think you’re spot on. I think you’ve got exactly the right outlook, but it takes a bit of experience to get there doesn’t matter. This is the thing. People like you and I can talk about this. As much as we like, but often, we know from doing this through our own experience, sometimes you need to live it yourself to really believe it.
David Ralph [40:09]
I get more questions from people that are doing stuff that they don’t like when anything else. And I always say to them, accept where you are, and start touching into your emotions, feeling your emotions, really thinking, Is this making me happy? And more often than not, I don’t hear anything from them again, they never sort of come back to me. But I think the happiness aspect of our lives is missing. Due to what we’ve been talking about the comparisons, the ego, creeping up with the Joneses, the more and more and more. And when that first lockdown hit, and everything closed down. I used to sit in the garden with a drink reading a book, and it was the Power of Now by Eckhart Tolly.
Brain Health Expert Dan Murray-Serter [40:57]
Oh, there we go. Talking about the favourite here.
David Ralph [41:00]
I read it about here in quotes to you.
Brain Health Expert Dan Murray-Serter [41:04]
Oh, yes, absolutely. I was actually gonna quote it earlier than I thought, you know what, it’s gonna be a bit nice. Potentially I’ll either
David Ralph [41:09]
No, no, it’s spot on. But the reason why I’m saying that was because I read it about five years before it was mumbo jumbo. It was just total rubbish. And I thought, oh, can’t put up with this. This time, I was quiet. And I was happy. And the weather was good. And it made total sense to me. And I think that’s one of the issues that people have. They don’t allow themselves to just tap in on the emotions of Am I happy or not?
Brain Health Expert Dan Murray-Serter [41:39]
Ah, God, so lies so many great points you just made. And by the way, there’s another another great thing that Eckhart Tolle, he says in his next book, which is a new earth, He says, This is paraphrasing, right, because I don’t know the exact words. But he says that, you know, you can read words, like if you’re wondering if like these words are mumbo jumbo mumbo jumbo or total crap and not meaningful to you right now. Or, in fact, they are the most profound thing that you’ve ever read. The two differences between that are all based on your mindset and where you personally are in your journey at that moment in life, because and how would you know that these words are the right ones for you right now, because they are the only ones you’re experiencing right now. And your interpretation that you’re able at this point to make from those words, is the only interpretation you’re able to make right now based on your life experience today, your perspective of the world and how you see things. And you could come back to the same page, the same words, the same lessons, like you said, five years later, with a totally different mindset. And suddenly, it unlocks the entire world for you. And the words haven’t changed, but your life experience has. Yeah, and I think that that is really profound and really true. And I know this room. And the same as you I was recommended to read Eckhart Tolle only about 10 years ago when I was 25. And honestly, like, really not my cup of tea at all. Whereas now, I’ve got the audio book, I got the book, I highlight the book, like clips, I got quotes that I write out, you know, I find so much of what he says totally profound. Why? Because I’ve been on a personal journey since then, of self discovery of mental health problems of realising that, you know, I’m not the centre of the universe. And actually what I want, and my happiness is all extremely unimportant compared to, you know, contribution and being part of society and part of something greater. And these are all mumbo jumbo concepts, the first time you read them, if you’re too heavily wrapped up in what you want uuuuu, then the power of now can be an incredibly frustrating, and very jarring and almost offensive book. Right? It challenges. My cat doesn’t agree. But it challenges a lot of the root cause of self belief considerations we have about ourselves, which really deeply rooted in the army. And that book is literally constructed purposefully to make you reconsider the idea that you are that important at all. And that the only thing that is important is this moment that you’re experiencing right now. So yeah, I mean, I completely relate with you. And I love I love the depth of the book that enables you to understand, for him to understand that a lot of people that read it think it’s total rubbish, but they might not do in a couple of weeks. Yeah,
David Ralph [44:38]
it’s very, it’s brilliant. I’ve read it about four times now, but I can’t watch him on video. I can’t ease to see
Brain Health Expert Dan Murray-Serter [44:48]
it. Yeah, it’s really ironic but his audio book I do, I do listen on 1.1 point five speed which is not so terrible, but you need to speed him up a little bit. very ironic what he’s talking about that you know that Power of Now the president in the moment, and I’m also kind of being like, no, that’s true, but hurry up
David Ralph [45:07]
pretty well, before we send you back in time on the Sermon on the mic to have a one on one with your younger self, where are you hoping for? For brain care? What What, what are the next dots that you want to join up?
Brain Health Expert Dan Murray-Serter [45:21]
Yeah, um, so in all seriousness, you know, like, the most important thing for me is, is the ability to have an impact on people. So I, I’m super chuffed and very honoured to get to do the work that I do the most important takeaway, or most important thing, you know, we’ve had around 50,000 people that have taken our brain brain health score, basically, our brain care score. And for me, that is like, if I can turn that number from 50,000 to 500,000, that’s a great place to start. And the reason for that is because it enables people, it gives them a bit of a map, right? It asks you as a four minute class, and it gives you a bit of a map to ask you, you know, what you’re doing, what your actual behaviours are, and how healthy again, and you can take that test, by the way at your heights.com, forward slash, brain care, hyphen school, or you can just go to your heights.com and see it on the homepage there. But I think the really important thing for us on the score, you know that that test is put together by a lot of people a lot very smart people with PhDs etc. And it helps if we’re not selling a product, it just helps people understand the gap that they need to do and some of their own things that they need to do in their life, you know, whether that’s take a breath, or one minute, every single day, whether that’s a little bit of mindful moments, whether it’s drinking a little bit more water, you know, these aren’t things that we as a company, can monetize. But they are certainly things that are going to make you feel better. And if we, if we’re the company that helps you feel better, and you haven’t even given us a penny, in order for us to do so then that might seem like short term bad business owners, but in my mind, that’s exactly how you build trust over a long term with with consumers, and how you help build out a brain care category. So that would absolutely be my big starting point. On my next big milestone, go from 50,000 people taking the brain care score to 500,000. Brilliant stuff. And
David Ralph [47:24]
for everybody out there that’s interested in bass, a course brain care is great. But there’s so many other ones there’s mind space, which is a good one or headspace. Is it headspace minds by head? Yeah. Yeah. Which is really good as a programme on Netflix, there’s a sleep one Oh, yeah, it all helps you get yourself back in on track. And once you Brian needs functioning, you know, you are you’re functioning without VAT is like the power pack, but you forgot to charge up inside your brain. And once you get it going to full capacity, you literally have sparks flying off yours is a total different world that you live in. Well, this is the part of the show that we’ve been building up to. And this is the part called the Sermon on the mic when we’re going to send Dan back in time to have a one on one with his younger self. And if he could go into a room and speak to the younger Dan, what age would you like to speak to? And what advice would he give him? Well, we’re going to find out because when I play the music and it fade, it’s their time to talk. This is a sermon on a mic.
Outro [48:31]
We go with the best beat of the show. The sermon.
Brain Health Expert Dan Murray-Serter [48:51]
So, Dan, you are 10 years old, and 1013, let’s say. And I think most importantly, I’d like to talk to you about body image. So I know that a lot of your personal confidence and self worth is absolutely wrapped up in the fact that you’re overweight. The fact that you seem to be chubbier than other kids and the fact that other kids bullying you about this stuff. But in the long run, the most important thing to know is a your never actually valued in society about your weight, you’re valued by your contributions and what you can bring to the world and to other people. And secondly, is that, you know, we all have choices. And when it’s the right time, if it’s the right time and you feel like it you can take the person or choice to do something about your weight and you don’t have to be resigned to any other opinions. About what you look like and how you feel. And at any rate, how you look is actually an incredibly unimportant factor of who you are. And when you grow up, you will become less and less interested, as we all do about how you look and more and more interested in how you can help contribute to the world. And ultimately, that’s the only thing that people should and will end up judging you on. And that’s my sermon,
David Ralph [50:26]
short and sweet. So, Dan, what’s the number one best way that our audience can connect with you, sir?
Brain Health Expert Dan Murray-Serter [50:32]
Yeah, so you can connect me on any social media platform at Dan marisota. That’s SCR Teo. And I encourage you to check out our heights. So that’s your heights.com. And, you know, if you’re if our listeners would like David, then I’m more than happy to set up a 10% discount so people can try it. I’ll set up the code Join Up Dots 10.
David Ralph [50:57]
brilliant, brilliant. And last question, why is he called heights? I’ve been wondering that all the time?
Brain Health Expert Dan Murray-Serter [51:02]
Ah, great question. Well, because I’m in the world of mental health and brain health in general. And everything’s very depressing. Everything’s very positive mental health is a very stigmatised term. And then secondly, a lot of the advertising that targets people around problems of brain health and mental health, etc. It’s all very trigger LED. And so I thought to myself, with my business partner, Julian, and we had this conversation, you know, what’s the opposite of that stuff, while it’s an uplifting brand that talks about what people can achieve, and how they can achieve what they will achieve, and really focus on us as a human race, reaching the heights of our ability by taking care of our brain a little bit each day. So the whole idea was to create a brand that is uplifting and all about reaching our heights, as opposed to focusing on fear and scaring people into buying our product, which I have to say is a much longer term strategy. It doesn’t work anywhere near as well as fear, but it certainly helps us sleep at night. Yeah, absolutely.
David Ralph [52:02]
I love that. I love that answer. Well, Dan, thank you so much for spending time with us today, joining up those dots. And please come back again, when you’ve got more dots to join up, as I do believe that by joining up the dots and connecting our past is the best way to build our futures. Dan Murray-Serter. Thank you so much.
Brain Health Expert Dan Murray-Serter [52:20]
It’s been awesome.
David Ralph [52:22]
Mr. Dan Murray-Serter from heights Yeah, brain care. It’s weird, isn’t it because you don’t think about it, it’s just in your head and you just sort of walk around. If you had like a skin condition, you’d go to the doctors and if you if your feet hurts or whatever, we don’t really focus in enough on the brain. But 100% 100% if you do the right stuff for your brain, first and foremost, everything else starts functioning better, I went through a very dark stage. For me, it’s not dark compared to other people. And I know that one of the things was I was just brain tired, I was just fatigued. And once I got my energy back in, all the rest of it started to take care of itself. It’s not you know, 100% I do have my ups and downs. But certainly if you can find the happy and you can find the positive vein being start cooking on gas. Until next time, my friends thank you so much for being here on Join Up Dots really appreciate everyone leaving ratings and reviews on iTunes really does help the show continue to grow. And until next time, we’ll see you again. Look after yourselves. Cheers. Bye bye.
Outro [53:30]
That’s the end of China. You’ve heard the conversation. Now it’s time for you to start taking massive action. Create up church and create your life. Easy only you live. We’ll be back again real soon. Join Up Dots Join Up Dots Join Up Dots Join Up Dots. Jolene, Join Up Dots.
