How Yoga Helped Address Traumas & Insecurities | Drew Lynch | Better Man Podcast Ep. 058

Dean Pohlman: Hey, guys. What’s up? It’s Dean. Welcome to the Better Man podcast. Today we have a special in-person video version of this podcast thingy, and I’m joined by Drew Lynch, who is a famous comedian, amateur man Flow Yogi Husband to squirrel lover. And I don’t I don’t know what else to say, but if you look up Drew Lynch, he’s a really cool guy and he’s he’s he’s quite funny.

Dean Pohlman: I’ve been to his shows and.

Drew Lynch: Yeah, thanks, buddy. I just ask that you plug the squirrel everything. I don’t care about any of the other stuff, but thank you for having me, Dean. I’m I’m a I’m a I’m a big fan of of you and I’m a big fan of doing podcasts on yoga blogs.

Dean Pohlman: We are we are we are attempting to sit in a way that helps our hip overall hip mobility. Now you see us fidgeting. That’s probably what’s happening.

Drew Lynch: It’s hard to do it, man. It’s hard to sit on the floor with a guy for an hour, and that’s what I hope to do every week.

Dean Pohlman: My foot is already tingling.

Drew Lynch: Yeah, man, I mine too.

Dean Pohlman: Yeah.

Drew Lynch: Oh, man, that’s so cute. They were both tingling on purpose. Tingling, losing circulation. But it’s important to modify. That’s. That’s what I’ve read. What I’ve heard.

Dean Pohlman: That’s true. I do say that. So Drew and I became acquainted during the pandemic. Drew, I think you you sought out some yoga on a website called YouTube.

Drew Lynch: That’s right. I love that. I love that French site. Yeah. Yeah. I sought out yoga and I was like, I’m into mankind. And and then I was and that’s what I typed in. I was like, I want yoga, the mankind. And they’re like, All right, that’s I mean, Dean does it for others, too. And I was like, I don’t care.

Drew Lynch: I’m such a I’m such a freak. I’m so masculine of I’m so friggin gosh. I’m just frickin creatine. I don’t know what men talk about, but that’s what I am now. I loved it. I loved I loved how, like, personable you were with your with your with your videos and you have like, explanations for everything that your that you’re doing.

Drew Lynch: It doesn’t feel like you have to get into like a like you have you have to have aAlternate versions of everything like you have somewhere. It’s just flow stay of some that are focused. I like that there were target muscle groups that that you could find and genuinely we talked about this before we just started the pod. But you know for me the pandemic was a blessing. And finding your videos is a blessing because I just I enjoyed it.

Drew Lynch: I enjoy working. I don’t I sometimes I don’t think that I really know. I think I am impervious to all of those limitations when it comes to work because I love it so much. And yoga was just that thing that I needed and still need to be able to access those those other things, those those resets and those those the necessary balance that’s required.

Drew Lynch: And so being able to wake up every single day during the pandemic at 4 p.m. and do yoga, it was it was awesome. I actually did smoke is where I smoked weed and then did yoga. I don’t smoke weed ever. But during the pandemic we were all trying out different versions of ourselves. Like, maybe I’m this person now, maybe I, maybe I’m, maybe I make bread or maybe I do pottery and I put my bread in and those parts that I make.

Drew Lynch: But for me, my thing was like, Oh, maybe I do drugs now and and so I would smoke and then get like real tingly in my body, kind of like how my foot is asleep right now. But, but, but I didn’t do weed for this. You could, though. You could go to like a doctor. You could go to like a medical doctor and be like, Hey, I might fall asleep.

Drew Lynch: Do you mind if I get that sweet strawberry kush yum? And he would say, Yeah, for sure, brother. And then he. And then and then you would have drugs. But I don’t do that. So I did. During the pandemic, I smoked and I got I got real, you know, real in tune and touch with my body and then and then did yoga with you.

Drew Lynch: And it was it was awesome. And it was not at all romantic. So my wife is.. My wife, She would come in she would come in from the she’d come in from the like from the from the living room. She any and would be like, you should walk in and she breakfast is ready. I’m like, yeah, I’m I’m with Dean right now please no please.

Drew Lynch: Okay it’s super super serious so yeah is grateful very grateful for your videos. And I think our our our budding friendship has been over comedy and your and your kid is adorable. I chased that kid around a restaurant.

Dean Pohlman: That was that was beautiful. You went to breakfast together a couple months ago and you went for play mode. And I think you chased him for a full 5 minutes. He wanted to run to the end of the hallway and back. Oh, yeah. Kept doing it and. Oh, yeah, you didn’t skip a beat. You just went with it.

Drew Lynch: Oh, yeah, man. Yeah, yeah. It was it was awesome. And also, French restaurants are full of themselves, so you kind of needed toddler and adult to run around, really, really neutralize the setting.

Dean Pohlman: The waitress hated you. Do you remember?

Drew Lynch: If I could remember every waitress that hates me because of just because I ask for it. They don’t like people who ask for tea. I know that for sure. When they think they I think they think they’re not getting tipped. If if someone asks for tea and I have to overcompensate when I tip, I tip I tip 40%, 30% because I look so young until like, who’s this?

Drew Lynch: Who’s this heathen coming off of a movie? And then I order tea and they’re like, Well, now I’m just getting mixed signals. Only adults drink tea, so now I have to drink tea to show them that I’m an adult. And I have a tip. Well, to show them that I’m not some frugal degenerate.

Dean Pohlman: So that sounds really tough.

Drew Lynch: It does to God. Those are my struggles. And they manifest in my back and that’s why I do yoga now. Yeah.

Dean Pohlman: I’m wondering if you could tell people so like, you know, we’ve hung out a little bit. We know that you’ve done, Man Flow Yoga for a couple of years. Yeah. And and your wife actually messaged me. I don’t know if she was your wife at the time. Fiancee. Fiancee at the time. She messaged me and she was like, Hey, I think a really cool gift would be to for you to come up with like a specialized yoga program or a workout for Drew because he has unique needs because he’s a standup comedian. So he has these specific pains that, you know, most of my content is like focused on people who work at a desk, sitting a lot in their posture issues.

Dean Pohlman: as far as I know, there’s not a huge I’m as far as I know, there’s not a huge market for stand up comedians. Maybe that’s maybe that’s something that I’m missing.

Drew Lynch: Well, I don’t think it’s a huge market, but I definitely think performers like I think I think performers and stand ups actually, you’d be surprised. There’s there’s a lot of there’s a lot of comics who do yoga. I was just chatting with Toni Hinchcliffe last night at the Comedy Mothership Comedy Club that just opened, and he does yoga pretty much every week.

Drew Lynch: So I think I think it’s it you might be surprised they’re there. It’s kind of like I do a lot of yoga with a lot of comics in L.A. and and so yeah, I don’t but I don’t know. I don’t know how I don’t know if you don’t have to necessarily look at it as like, “oh, what’s the market for it? But I do know that people I do know that comics do.

Dean Pohlman: That’s cool now. Yeah, but and then. And then before. But and then I learned about you and that you were a comic, and I learned about you too. Melanie gave me a little smile. I didn’t want to neglect you. And I looked you up and I was like, Oh, wow. Like, Drew’s kind of like a big deal.

Drew Lynch: Only kind of.

Dean Pohlman: Yeah, kind of a big deal. And. And then I finally went and saw you a couple of months ago.

Drew Lynch: I was like, I know he’s not a big deal.

Dean Pohlman: So he’s your friend of mine. He’s like.

Drew Lynch: It’s kind of a big deal. And then you went and saw him and you’re like, I never mind.

Dean Pohlman: Well, I didn’t know. I mean, I truly I went into this. I’m like, you know, I know this guy. Like, I don’t know if he’s going to be like, super funny, but, like, he’s probably, like, pretty funny, right? Like, he’s, he’s good enough to be a professional comedian. And, like, I was laughing the entire time.

Drew Lynch: That’s the goal.

Dean Pohlman: Which was it was it was a yeah, it was great. Thanks, buddy. But anyways, going back to like what got you into a comedian, you were actually originally an actor and you had some pretty, you know, significant success as an actor. And then something happened. And I’m wondering if you could walk me through.

Drew Lynch: Yeah, yeah, sure. I, I moved out to Los Angeles when I was really young, so I was I was 18. I knocked out my first year of college in high school. So I just thought, you know, I’ll take a year in L.A., kind of shoot my shot there. And then in a year and being there, I landed some cool Disney gigs.

Drew Lynch: I had an item and a manager and I had an had an agent. And then I worked at a comedy club at the time because a comedy club, you know, it’s always a night job. So you can have two days free to shoot, days free to audition, and you’re in the periphery of of kind of the acting world by just being around comics.

Drew Lynch: You know, there’s a lot of crossover between those two worlds. So I thought it was perfect. And I love comedy always. I love standup. I always admired it as something that I would never do to something that I could appreciate. And so they had a softball team, which why? Why? I don’t know why. I don’t understand why.

Dean Pohlman: What would be a more appropriate team for comedians?

Drew Lynch: Chess or bingo or karaoke, not something where grown adults get on a field and do something they haven’t done in 20 years. They’re like and expect to be good at it. Expect for things to not go bad. It’s the craziest thing we and we underhand like we we toss it at point blank range to some dude who’s going through a divorce and you think he’s not going to.

Drew Lynch: Yeah, yeah. Dave’s wife is leaving him and he who you think that he’s not going to knock one right at your head? So basically I was playing shortstop and again, like I played baseball as a

Dean Pohlman: Casue you’re short.

Drew Lynch: Yeah. If I could get more blocks, that’d be helpful. I played shortstop and a grounder hit me. Grounder took a bad hop and hit me in the throat. And I fell back and I hit my head on the ground. And I had a vocal contusion, a major concussion, which I later found out was a traumatic brain injury that didn’t heal properly. That’s why I had a lot of speech issues. I still sometimes have speech issues. I go to speech therapy every week and and honestly, yoga is something that has greatly helped.

Drew Lynch: We’ve talked about, you know, we talked about it earlier, but I think what’s something that’s really special about yoga is that you’re able to access some of those traumatic mental, those mental trying times that you had or things that are stored. Like everybody kind of knows this, or at least they say it a lot in the holistic world.

Drew Lynch: It’s if you have some sort of mental, uh, pain or anguish, it stores itself in the body somewhere. And so rather than just, you know, taking DMT and sitting in a corner or in the desert, you know, I don’t know, whatever. Like the point is, is instead of trying to access necessarily like what that mental thing is, yoga is such a, it’s an actionable thing.

Drew Lynch: And it’s almost like rather than trying to address the trauma head on through the front door, you can go around the back of the house and try to try to figure out why those feelings come up through your body. And so for me, you know, I’ve had a lot of anger. I’ve had a lot of, you know, had anger over the fact that that that my career was deterred or at least that particular career that I had grown up wanting to do, setting my sights on, actually still never left my sights.

Drew Lynch: And I’d still love to do acting. I was very angry at that. I had I had all these I had all this representation and had some good momentum in Los Angeles. And then, uh, no one wanted to represent me because I stuttered and I didn’t have control over my, my, I didn’t have control over the functionality of my motor skills.

Drew Lynch: In fact, to this day, I’m still figuring out why there’s some lack of connection in certain in the left side of my body, because that’s where I got hit. That’s where I you know, I still all the way up the left side of my body. I still don’t have that same level of control. And so when I got dropped and I wasn’t when I wasn’t, I wasn’t represented.

Drew Lynch: And I and I felt like I didn’t have any other place to go. Uh, I started to do stand up. I started to make fun of my situation, really make some self-deprecating jokes about it because that’s all you really can do. I mean, and it was a humanizing experience. It was one that was humbling. And, you know, I’ve grown a lot since then just in that… my god He’s writing right now.

Dean Pohlman: I’m writing Comedian and Self deprecatiom.

Drew Lynch: I lost it right now.

Dean Pohlman: I think it’s a cool topic to explore.

Drew Lynch: So basically I so basically I you know I a few years after doing that I was on the college scene and doing doing some stand up gigs at college cafeterias, which is, you know, the dream and then I started opening for Bo Burnham. Bo found…

Dean Pohlman: Oh, wow. I don’t know.

Drew Lynch: Yeah, he found some clips of mine online and was like, This guy’s really funny. And then we started touring together and then I opened for the late Ralphie May for a little while, and the year after that, I ended up getting on America’s Got Talent, and then I made it all the way to the end and lost. So I lost and.

Dean Pohlman: Yeah, make sure you get all the cameras.

Drew Lynch: Yeah, I have no money. So that was kind of the, uh, that was kind of…

Dean Pohlman: Do you get paid at all if you, if you, if you’re on the show, if you lose?

Drew Lynch: No, but you get per diem. So you get like, you know, falafel okay. In New York. So that’s cool. You street food. So, you know, it has its risks. Like there’s certain secret spicy sauces that are like delicious. But at the same time, you know, I would say one and one and five falafels, you get you know, you’re going to have that, You’re going to have that backfire.

Drew Lynch: You’re not going to you’re not going to get to keep that in your inside. You. So, uh, I lived in New York for three months doing that show, and I came in second place. I lost to a British ventriloquist, as you do, as one does. And and yeah, it was a great show.

Drew Lynch: It’s great experience because they told my story while at the same time letting me do stand up. And I think if you go back and see any of those clips, you’ll see, you know, my my speech was so much worse. My hair was so much more lush. But yeah, that was that was that time .

Dean Pohlman: Trade-offs. So, like, you, I’m. I consider myself sort of, you know, I don’t know if you can. You would. I’m talking to the audience now, but I don’t know if you would consider this. But actually, I’ve I realized that a lot of what I do is I’m an artist in a way. I create things. I’m a content creator.

Dean Pohlman: Yeah, it definitely has a goal. And it’s, you know, it’s backed by a lot of exercise science and there’s there’s results. It’s results oriented. But a lot of it is an art in a way. A lot of it is expression in a way. And something that I realized when I talk with other people who are also content creators is that you’re able to kind of make sense of things that happen in your life, through your art, through the content that you create.

Dean Pohlman: And for you, you know, that’s your that’s your, you know, your shows or your, your comedy. So I’m wondering if you can speak to how performing has kind of helped you move from this place where I’m going to be an actor. Oh, I’m getting some some traction here. I’m going to be an actor. Oh, I’m not going to be an actor the way that I thought it would be.

Drew Lynch: Yeah. I think the thing that I love most about standup is how singular it is. It’s it’s something that you can be fully in control of. And I think that in a way, that’s what many art forms are starting to realize. Their direct relationship with what they create is all of them. So it’s like in a way we’re all getting good at wearing many hats.

Drew Lynch: I just think standup has a a backyard faceted version of that. It’s like, yes, in addition to making the videos that we make to showcase our art, the process behind standup is very much, I’m going to write down this thought, I’m going to edit this thought, I’m going to figure out how I want to deliver this thought, and then I’m going to perform it so that from start to finish there is write, edit, direct, perform.

Drew Lynch: So you’re kind of doing, you’re doing all of these things. And then when you want to layer it on to how it goes, how, how it ends up, you end up shooting it or producing something from it. And, and then and that it, the process starts all over again where you almost you edit the direction of that video and figure out how you want something to swish.

Drew Lynch: That’s the direct. And so, you know, I think I think what’s really cool about the time that we’re in with the Internet and with so many people finding ways to express themselves is, you know, in one way it can saturate a place, but in another way, if you find it to be organic to you or unique to your process, people will resonate with that and what I love most about standup is that I really enjoy the, the, the editing component.

Drew Lynch: You know, I don’t ever get to tell people, I don’t ever get to tell a lot of people this. But my injury taught me how to write. It taught me word economy. It taught me that every single word matters and that the last two words or three words or one word of a sentence can. If you change it, it can it can change the whole context of what you did, the initial part of the thing as you were saying.

Drew Lynch: So I think it was a blessing and that it taught me how to write while at the same time teaching me how to be human about this very difficult or trying experience. So I don’t know. And I think that that’s why, you know, we were talking like we were talking about this before the show as well. But I think that’s why my my frequency is just a little bit different than a lot of other comics.

Drew Lynch: I think a lot of comics that frequency level is. Why is this funny? I want to make this funny on and and I just I don’t always think that way. I think I think very and I’m very much a technician. I want to know why something works or how it works or how it came to be. Understand? It won’t ask questions about it.

Drew Lynch: Why is it why is it why is it painful? Why is it why? What’s the source of why? That’s good. Why is it bad? You know, I ask a lot of questions and I want to know. My first instinct isn’t to always be like, oh, let me make this funny. So I think you asked me, you know, you asked me you were like, you know, when you do standup or if you’re a comedian, do you find it difficult to turn, turn off?

Drew Lynch: And it’s like to me, I find it difficult to turn on as far as that. Oh, let me just because my resting state is to just analyze. So I think what’s unique about comedy and comics is they’re they all have their own individual approach to how they want to get someone to laugh or deliver or articulate their point.

Drew Lynch: And you can get you can get you can get someone who’s very different than me, a comedian who you could get in here who’s who’s all smiley and they’re disarming and they’re like, well, you know, you know, I don’t think I’m the comedian who is like, oh, I’m everybody’s friend. I think I’m quiet, I’m introverted. I, you know, I make certain observations about things that might have nothing to do with anything.

Drew Lynch: So that to me is what’s cool about not just content creators like such as yourself, that things can be unique, but specifically toward stand up. It’s how they’re able to how we’re all able to share the same goal but approach it differently.

Dean Pohlman: MM Yeah. So I didn’t realize how much for you the creative process of coming up with, you know, a standup performance. It seems like there’s so much analysis in it, but that analysis is very therapeutic in a way, like you’re analyzing all of the questions that you ask yourself that one would ask themselves in order to, How do I make sense of this thing that happened?

Dean Pohlman: How, you know, what’s what’s my reaction to it? What does that say about me? Like you’re doing all these things that you’re so you’re I would assume that this is very helpful to your overall mental health.

Drew Lynch: Yeah, it definitely is. I mean, it’s interesting. The mental health is becoming more and more of a thing that people are aware of and that they want to keep balanced. And and and I think, you know, comedians especially, they they come from a place of it’s almost always like from a place of pain, almost always. Some comedians are just they’re just silly, funny people.

Drew Lynch: And they’re extroverts. And they they come in and they’re just they’re gregarious and and and they’re just like, yeah, I was just I was kind of class clown. And that’s why. But I think there’s a lot of comics out there who they have some source of pain. So they understand.

Dean Pohlman: I mean, first and foremost, example Robin Williams, right? Mm hmm. Yeah.

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Dean Pohlman: All right, guys, I hope you enjoyed the episode. Let’s get back into it.

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Drew Lynch: Yeah, exactly. You know, I mean, he’s someone who I think, you know, he hid it very well. But at the same time, he was someone who was such a multi he was a dimensional actor as well. He was he was just so much more than a comedian. And I think I think the reason I struggle to I think the reason I struggle sometimes to fit in is because I’m trying to fit in.

Drew Lynch: You know, it’s like it’s like you go from you grow from feeling like you can’t like you don’t belong to hopefully and eventually appreciating the fact that you don’t. Because, you know, there’s any number of comedians I’ve met where, like I said, their, their frequency level might be different and they might. But and I always wonder, I’m always like, oh, why is it that I why is it that I can’t be that way?

Drew Lynch: Is that that that doesn’t resonate with me and in a different way. It’s like, well, I have to learn to appreciate my strengths for what they are. And how that applies to yoga is like, you know, you get when you get done with a session, you know, you feel accomplished. I don’t like using the word grounded because I think it’s I think it’s overused.

Drew Lynch: I think it’s tired. But the what I what I want to articulate is that when you get done doing a yoga session, you you feel like you’re you’re even closer to yourself. You know, you just feel like you’re yourself now and and you’re going into the day in the in the most confident or accomplished version of yourself and finding the finding finding your videos during the pandemic and waking up and just making that a routine. Let me get into the next thing that I was going to do that day, which was nothing because it was the pandemic. So I pretended like I was going to do it and I was like, Yeah, I’m going to do yoga and I’m going to go to work.

Dean Pohlman: Created some amazing content that ended up, you know, I think it helped you. Sure.

Drew Lynch: Sure. Yeah, I mean, it definitely I mean, it definitely helped a lot. But I, I mean, I just, you know, I tried to I try to tell you that it’s it it could not have come at a better time. The pandemic and your videos and the in the combination of those two things for me, because I was just working myself into the ground and not taking the proper precautionary steps, posts, precautionary steps to try and heal many of the things that I’d never addressed, which to me, I’ve healed quite a lot from my from my injury physically.

Drew Lynch: But it has led me to the realization that the less that I care about the way people feel about my speech, the less that I think, the less that I care, the less that it, the less of us of an impact it has on the fluency of my speech. So it’s just kind of this thing. It’s like this catch 22 of like, you know, the less I care about something, the better it is.

Drew Lynch: And then when it when I care about it more, the worse it gets. So it’s just this vicious cycle that, you know, you try to, you try to find that recipe, uh, in that, in that mental, physical balance. That’s, that’s a big, big pillar for yoga is like mentally find this place, mentally find this thing and use that as your, as your, as your, as your mantra for this session.

Drew Lynch: And have that hopefully get represented and manifested through that physical outlet and have those two worlds meet. So it’s very heady stuff, man.

Dean Pohlman: Yeah. So how do you, you know, oh, by the way, every time Drew mentions Man Flow Yoga, he gets $1,000. So if he seems like he’s saying it a lot. Yes, we that’s what we agreed upon. Pull out.

Drew Lynch: Pull out My W9 Leo [Note: Leo is the MFY videographer].

Drew Lynch: Seriously we’re just get this right now. I’ll give you my email .

Dean Pohlman: I’m curious for you like what do you think it is about you know, what do you think it is about the way that you’re doing yoga that allows you to go to that place where you’re realizing, oh, this is what’s bothering me and I’m now, you know, for you, it sounds like, you know, you’re very self-conscious of the way that you speak, especially if you’re, you know, always in front of an audience.

Dean Pohlman: Like for me, if like if I was conscious of it, if I was self-conscious about my flexibility. And every time I recorded, I was like, Oh, people are going to be like, You’re going to be judging me because I’m not flexible enough. I That would be that would be very hard.

Drew Lynch: Yo, Dean’s stacked. Just so you know. I would like this to be on the record as well as the thousand dollars thing is, dean is ripped, bro. You see, Dean like you guys see him on the end, like, on cameras right now and like, he looks I’m sure he looks great, but in person, it’s even like.

Dean Pohlman: It’s just smaller. Smaller clothes.

Drew Lynch: It’s crazier, that’s what I’m saying. But yeah, I don’t know, because I stood next to him. It’s like it’s his veins have got veins. All right? He’s he’s just like, you know what I mean? He has two kids now and he holds them like this. And and he it isn’t even like he he tries, he breastfeeds, you know, that’s how strong is he could breastfeed.

Drew Lynch: He doesn’t, but he could breastfeed at the same time for 15 days. But he hasn’t produced milk.

Dean Pohlman: You know, my daughter my daughter thinks that I breastfeed sometimes. So she’s she’s doesn’t understand. She does. She doesn’t you know, she’s she’s working.

Drew Lynch: Well, that’s because you got pecs. Do you get chest? You know, I’ve seen how many videos you do for chest and pecs and shoulder monitor for all this. I don’t blame your daughter for trying to suckle or pecs, dude. It’s ridiculous, man.

Dean Pohlman: Suckling at the pec.

Drew Lynch: Suckling.

Dean Pohlman: At the pec, there’s a new Phrase.

Drew Lynch:you know, the the Internet teat seriously, man, he’s got. And it’s like the perfect amount of like chest hair, but also not I’m a straight guy, man, but I’m just like Dean, like, it’s too much, dude. Like, it’s way too much. You can’t be like, I get it. You do yoga all the time, but you also look it.

Drew Lynch: And that’s frustrating. I was like, you know, I was like, I think you see, Dean, you’re like, Why should I do yoga? And you look at Dean, you’re like, Oh, I mean, I guess you could just do all this from yoga. I met him. He’s in friggin being salad and quinoa with with, you know, saffron flakes or whatever weird Austin crap you do out here.

Drew Lynch: It’s ridiculous, man. And it’s just it’s upsetting. So my point out of all this is, is Dean makes me mad, and I’m happy to be here. You know, he’s just you guys see him on the camera, adds 10 pounds. I think I don’t know. That’s what I thought. And I saw Dean. I was like, I don’t know what the camera does for anybody else, but it’s frustrating. So is good. But but anyway, yeah. I love your videos, man.

Dean Pohlman: There’s another thousand. Great job,

Drew Lynch: Leo. And write it down. We have a tally board. Go write it Down, dude. Suckling at the peck of of of welfare. I don’t even I I’m going to quit comedy. I don’t need to I’m going to retire off of this gas station money dude, you know, I mean Dean scratch offs two. Oh, he. I complimented him again. Bingo. Suck it.

Dean Pohlman: Which all leads me to the question. Yeah? What do you think it was about doing yoga that allowed you to really question some of the things that were that were bothering you?

Drew Lynch: Well I had done hot Yoga before, I didn’t like I didn’t hot yoga before and I think it was always it was always like, look, when the pandemic, you know, when that happened, you know, obviously yoga studios were the first thing to shut down. It was like yoga studios, obviously, you know, I mean, you can be hot breathing on people in close quarters and downward dog facing, you know, people’s face.

Drew Lynch: You don’t know what’s a face and what’s a booty. And it’s crazy, dude. Things get things get crazy in hot flow yoga, coeds. So when that shut down, I was like, you know, I knew that I, I see. Here’s the thing is that like, I had a personal trainer in 2019 and I looked really good, but I felt terrible.

Drew Lynch: Like, I just I wasn’t I just wasn’t taking care of the the, you know, I wasn’t going back and healing the proper things and using those those muscle groups correctly. So, you know, I think, you know, it’s a big thing that you talk about is it’s not just it’s not just like the flexibility. It’s it’s building strength at the same time.

Drew Lynch: So it’s pretty amazing. It’s pretty amazing what we’re able to do with just our body weight, you know, like it’s like if you hold something long enough, I mean, and the key is to try and be flexible as well as build strength. It’s it can I mean, it can I mean, it can dress it. There’s just there’s some confidence in that.

Drew Lynch: There’s some confidence in the fact that you can sit or you can stand or you can for for a an endless amount of time because of the training that you’re able to do so.

Dean Pohlman: Mm hmm. Do you think there was something so like, you know, you talk about, you know, combining flexibility and strength. And for me, when you’re talking about going through the back door to kind of to analyze.

Drew Lynch: Accessing the trauma, that access.

Dean Pohlman: Trauma, what I mean was it was it because you were actually being still for a while? Was it because you were breathing? Was it because you were focusing on your body? And maybe you maybe you did like maybe you did a pose and you were like, oh, all my traumas right there in my hip flexor.

Drew Lynch: Yeah. I think I do think that I do think for me I got, you know, I got injured on the left side of my body. And so you’re you have to do this thing with injuries where you almost have to lie to yourself to get back to the truth. And that sounds so like foo foo foo. But I just mean, like the truth was that I got hurt.

Drew Lynch: But also the truth was that you can get back to where you want to get back to so long as you start to implement that as your mantra, as you start to implement that as your what’s the word, what’s what’s the word that they that they like. At the start of your every yoga session. Yeah. Your intention. That’s the word.

Drew Lynch: And so like when I say you have to like lie to yourself to get back to the truth, the truth is you got hurt and the truth can also be that you can get back to 100%, but you’ll never get there if you always believe that you are stuck and that something doesn’t work. And that is where I struggle the most.

Drew Lynch: The reality I start. I’m I’m a very I’m a very empirical evident person. So if something is right there in front of me as an example, that’s what I believe. I have a difficult time believing something that I can’t see. And that’s where other people like, you know, like my wife is a great example of that. She’s someone who like, she believes something before she sees it.

Drew Lynch: Like she’s just she just has that, that, that, that inner stillness where it’s just like I can just believe something. And it’s like, for me, I need. I need a solid track. I need a solid track record. I need I need traction and proofs and examples. I want to see all of them. I, I analyze, analyze, analyze. And if the reality is every day I wake up and I have a difficult time speaking and I have a difficult time using the left side of my body, that’s what I see.

Drew Lynch: That’s what I believe. And so the fallacy is that you are in that state permanently and that it’s unchanged. But just because that’s what’s current doesn’t necessarily mean that that’s what is permanent and I guess I can’t really remember my, my, I guess my point was just that I every day when I, when I do yoga, I, it would teach me that, you know, you get, you get you can use that side.

Drew Lynch: There is there is there is proof in and there’s it’s evident that that can be accessed and that it can be used. So just find a way to teach yourself or believe in yourself through the act of doing this that you can get back to 100%. Hmm. So that’s what’s art. And I think like it’s amazing when you see someone bounce back from an injury, you know, especially like, you know, you put you put a lot emphasis on like knee, like knee, knee.

Drew Lynch: I mean, protecting the knees is so important. Like, it’s important for for everybody. But, you know, like, if you have something that that happens here, you know, it’s a hard thing to come back from if you have a meniscus or an ACL or any of that. It’s a hard thing to come back from. And I think how quickly you people heal is how quickly they are able to convince themselves or believe that they are basically already back to that.

Drew Lynch: So it’s like you almost. Yeah, like I said, you have to the mind is a powerful thing and you have to teach it to you have to trick itself and, and that’s what’s so frustrating is like you are the computer, but you’re also the hacker.

Dean Pohlman: Yeah. So what I’m getting from this. So your injury was such a, such a strong part of your belief system that you needed something, that that you needed something. But you doing, Man Flow Yoga every day or let’s not even say was mentally you just moving and like exercising the left side of your body every day was something that helped you, you know, on a daily basis?

Dean Pohlman: Hey, no, look, there’s proof that this is the opposite. What’s also, you know. Hmm, intriguing to me is that this injury happened in one, what, year?

Drew Lynch: 2011, I think it was 2011 is when it happened.

Dean Pohlman: Yeah. So even, you know, eight years ago at this point, it’s still something that is so strongly part of your mind. Yeah. You know, it’s just goes to show, you know, the power of your release that you have on you. And so also going into what you were saying about recovering from injury, I used to think that. You know, I thought that because I was healthy that I would you know, I’d go to the let’s say I went to the doctor or something or I had COVID, let’s say I had COVID and and they’re like, well, it’ll take five days to recover.

Dean Pohlman: And then, you know, it’ll take five days for the fever to pass or whatever. And then after that, to recover my well, I’m really healthy, so it’s going to take me three days. And I think about other injuries where let’s say it’s a six week injury for like this specific break is a six week injury for this bone to heal.

Dean Pohlman: And I thought like, Oh, I’m really healthy, so we’ll take less time than that. And what I have realized or what I have learned through anecdotal experience, just from talking to people, is that more important than your physical well-being? Is your the strength of, your mind to believe that you are recovering more quickly or to have a positive mindset?

Dean Pohlman: I had a friend who had a who had a very serious longboarding accident. His name is Chris Barcott. He’s a former lacrosse player. He lived here in Austin for a while, but he had this really serious accident and he could barely focus. He could. And his mom went to the hospital and like helped him meditate. And and he he he recovered way more quickly than anyone thought that he could because he was focusing specifically on his mind.

Dean Pohlman: And so I think this is like a truly under explored area of recovery. And it’s it’s kind of cool to hear about, you know, your experience with I don’t know if that all meshes together. No, I think that’s kind of what I’m thinking.

Drew Lynch: I think it does. I think it does. I think that like the spirituality component is the hacking opponent component of the of the mental. So that’s that’s what that’s to me what spirituality is because people talk about the three spirituality, you know, spiritual, physical, mental right that they talk about. And I think the spiritual is that awareness of those other two.

Drew Lynch: That’s what I think that it is. And that extends itself to whatever religion or whatever your belief, or even if it’s not, it it can still be. It’s like it’s like a state of not mind. That’s what it is. You know, we talk about the state of mind, okay, that’s mental. But if you’re if you have that awareness of what that thing is and what you’re capable of and that belief system, just like with your friend, that’s all spiritual, that’s all that’s all trying to look and believe.

Drew Lynch: They believe and attain things that. Mm hmm. They have to be they have to be supernatural because they don’t they’re not they’re not here right now. They’re the truth is, is that they’re not here right now. But when you when you pull that back and you look at that on a on a larger scale, that’s basically what a dream is.

Drew Lynch: That’s basically what a career is as basically what you do. And I guess to some extent what I do, it’s your you’re inventing an idea or you’re executing an idea from which you just pulled out of whatever. And so, man, some of the some of the some of the most inspiring people I’ve ever met are people who are just they’re they’re they’re relentless in their optimism.

Drew Lynch: I think I’m relentless in my execution, but I don’t think I’m necessarily as relentless in my optimism. And that is just that’s that unbreakable spiritual hindsight or foresight. Sometimes it’s it’s the craziest thing I’ve ever seen. So, um, and like I said, I’m just, I’m just such a tangible, real individual. And I think, like, I could be, I could be completely wrong here, and this could be something that’s, like, controversial.

Drew Lynch: But I think maybe a lot of men like that. I think men are very like mechanical sort of. I see it. This is what I do, you know. And then I think I think women have the ability or maybe they’re their more easily access to to that ability to have that optimism or that or that that sort of relentless spiritual vision or plan.

Drew Lynch: You know, and and at least in my experience, that I think is a hefty balance between my wife and I in that how opposite we are. And I have a great appreciation for it. So in there. But, you know, I just think I just think that I don’t know, like I just I just think that there’s there’s something to be learned from people who are able to do that.

Drew Lynch: And maybe it’s just because the influence from my dad, my brother, my uncles, my grandpa, they’re all very just like, well, this is the way it is this I see this, that means this. They’re just very logic based people in, in. And I think that that has its strengths, but I also think it greatly has its limitations.

Drew Lynch: If you see something and then it is, then it is. And then and and there is no room for growth in that, because you are I wouldn’t say content with what that result is, but you are you are it is made clear. And and I think people like philosophers and and and poets and are civil like civil activists like all they all they see is in that formula is where it is.

Drew Lynch: So what if it, what if it’s seen in a different way or what if there’s more to it? That’s just crazy, man. It’s crazy. It’s crazy to try and think that way. So that’s that spiritual component that I think, you know, on on honest on a scale like yoga, I know where it applies.

Dean Pohlman: So there was a I actually had a podcast interview and by the way, I do want to I want to do an answer quick story, because I thought that’s funny. During your show, Drew is super Interactive with his audience during his shows. So, you know, he doesn’t have just a prepared or just a prepared script that he goes out and performs every time he actually involves the audience.

Dean Pohlman: You know, he’ll he’ll bring back jokes that he that he put in earlier in the show. And I remember one one time you were interacting with the guy and you were specifically calling him out for being like, very matter of fact, know. Like, you’re just like my family. Like, yeah, that’s a fact yeah, this is that. And you say that and I had a podcast interview earlier and we were talking about the difference between people who are like that versus people who are not.

Dean Pohlman: I don’t know if it’s differences in personalities, but there’s a cognitive level where like it has to be like analyzed and thought about and logical. And there’s a semantic level which is more subconscious. And the people who are who can perceive things more on a somatic level are able to access their emotions and and understand them better than somebody who is only looking at things from a cognitive basis.

Dean Pohlman: Yeah. Where they are limiting, they are limiting their, their understanding, their limiting their understanding of things because of their perceived lack of emotion when really they’re more emotional. And I think we’re I think I’m losing people because I don’t truly understand what I’m talking about.

Drew Lynch: Know. But but it’s not something. No, I don’t think you’re losing people. I just think it’s it’s something that’s hard to be understood because it’s inherently a catch 22. It the thing that is built like you can’t you can’t cross anything a belief system if it I mean you can call it a belief system, but if the system’s expression is purely based on just existing, there’s not much belief in that because it’s real, you know what I mean?

Drew Lynch: Like that you you can only believe what it is that you see, obviously. I mean, that’s that’s the most obvious statement I think anybody could make, right? If this is here, then this is here. That’s the most basic rubric for a proof, right? So there’s not much belief beyond that in in, in like we were talking about your room for what’s, what could be subconscious or what could be what could be more.

Drew Lynch: So, you know, you look at this great leaders who, you know, like even something like Steve Jobs, like, you know, he was someone who he saw something for what it was and then he saw something for what else it could be or even something like, you know, Walt Disney seeing something for what it was, but seeing something for what it could be.

Drew Lynch: And that, I think, is more of a belief system because there is the idea that there is a third component part past. If this is this if this is here, then this is here. Well, what’s that third part? Well, what if it’s there? What if it’s not this? What if it’s what if it’s more, you know. So I think for the process of yoga and how I can relate it to the process of stand up, a lot of people, they’ll ask me, they’ll say, like, I want to get into stand up, but I just don’t know how to start.

Drew Lynch: And I think a great place to start is by asking yourself questions and asking, asking a set of questions that are the thing that you want to talk about. And that’s a good way to start getting to right. Most people will sit down and they’ll write and they’ll be like, What do I think is funny about this?

Drew Lynch: And and I don’t or how do I make this funny? And I just think that that’s such a a difficult process to try and penetrate because you’re just like like, yes, that could be funny about it. But I think a good way to get to that is just by asking questions like what’s the nature of this thing, where do I see this thing?

Drew Lynch: Who uses this thing? Why do they use that thing? When would they not use that thing? What if that thing wasn’t here? You know, that’s just a relationship to a noun, you know, like so this could be all super heady, but I’m just I’m trying to I’m trying to, I guess, just kind of bridge the gap or maybe just connect with how that applies to me and what it is that I do versus, you know, you and what it is that you do.

Dean Pohlman: Got it. So when you you you also mentioned that, you know, when you started doing yoga around this time period, 2019, you also realized that you were doing too much. You were doing too many shows.

Drew Lynch: Yeah. Yeah, I did. I was going over like 220 days of the year that year. It was too much.

Dean Pohlman: So did you when you realized that what were some you know, did you make some, you know, other than just reducing the amount of days that you were touring? What or I’m assuming you what were some changes that you made into and when you realized like, hey, I feel like I’m doing too much. And also, was there something like what?

Dean Pohlman: What brought you to that realization that like, okay, I’m, I’m doing too much.

Drew Lynch: The pandemic, That’s it. I had it was it was an act of intervention. And if that’s divinity or whatever or if that’s just bat soup, whatever you see, I think that I would have probably never stopped and it probably would have led to more complications physically. I needed to be able I needed someone or something to tell me that, to tell me no and tell me that something wasn’t possible in order for me to realize and accept the power of of no.

Drew Lynch: And of not being able to do something. So it’s clear that I was running from something and I’m and and pre I mean you go back and even listen to videos. I think I won’t because I, you know, I can’t stand listening or seeing myself because I have imposter syndrome. But I if you go back and you hear or see videos or anything from me in 2019, like I think my I think my stutter was even worse then.

Drew Lynch: And it’s like, there’s just so much power in knowing your limits and knowing that that, that that’s not going to serve you. And I was saying, yes, everything in 2019 and 2018 to all the years in my career, I was saying yes to everything, not just to get to the next level of my career, but also to try and validate why I was here in the first place and why why this injury happened.

Drew Lynch: And, you know, I did the same thing on America’s Got Talent. I, I never wanted to win the show until I got to the end. I didn’t want to win it. I was just excited to be there. And then I just kept get advancing, advancing. And then when it became clear that I that I could win it, then all of a sudden, my, my, my.

Drew Lynch: It’s not selfishness. It’s just I realized that I had this deep seeded insecurity. I really. I didn’t realize it at the time. I realize it now. But I this deep seated insecurity to use some sort of physical outcome, like winning a competition through stand up where I talk about my stutter as a means of as a means to an end, as a means to validate why this all happened.

Drew Lynch: Because I needed that and I kind of carried that through till 2019. And still a part of me carries that right now is using those external those external goals or those quantitative benchmarks.

Dean Pohlman: Yeah.

Drew Lynch: To validate everything leading up to this point. And so the pandemic was just this excellent, like, you can’t do this anymore, you can’t go, you can’t perform. You have to sit and spend some time healing and figuring out why, why you are this way. And I think speech therapy does the same thing, like speak my speech that I’ve gotten to the point now where my speech therapist and I, we just talk we just talk about something.

Drew Lynch: And before it used to be just like exercises like it used to be like here’s some notecards, here’s some things, right? Talk about this. Like you practice this and then I’ll be talking to her and I’ll just it’ll be whatever been banal things, just a mundane and then I’ll stutter and then she’ll talk about we’ll talk about why, like what?

Drew Lynch: What happened there? What is it that you thought there? And so that’s where this is. This is complicated level of it’s complicated level of speech therapy where it’s like, you know, if, if, if, if, if that particular thing is causing you to stutter, let’s figure out why that is. And so in the same way that that applies to what we’re talking about here, it is trying to access that physical representation through what is emotionally hindering you and and, and so we’re all kind of doing the same thing, like every version of what we’re trying to do through a remedial practice.

Drew Lynch: It’s trying to accomplish the same thing you know, like if you go to like a a float tank or a sound bath or you go to chiropractor or you or you get massages or you go to physical therapy or you do yoga or acupuncture. We’re all trying we’re all trying to access that same thing, which is what is that pain point that we can try to go through the go to the back of the house to to to to to find to get to the nucleus of and I’ve tried all those things that I just listed to come to the same conclusion, which is that it, it’s, it’s inside me.

Drew Lynch: I have to figure that out. And by having the pandemic happen and discover just that time where I get to just sit literally just just you on the screen, me in my that I’m going to get a new one. I get a Man Flow Yoga mat today. That’s exciting. It’s not, it’s not even for doing the podcast. Dean, just like I just I make so much money, you can deduct.

Dean Pohlman: It from the thousand dollars for my ending I give you, so I.

Drew Lynch: Know that’s going to set me back. I know these were worth a few G’s. Yeah. So, so, yeah, that was that. That to me is what the value of that, what that lesson was.

Dean Pohlman: That’s so striking to me because so, you know, I, I mentioned the interview I just did with somebody else, but, you know, something that we were talking about was he was a competitive lifter. And for him, he thought that if I just win this competition, then I’ll feel like the way that I want to feel. And for him, you know, being strong was a way of ultimately being being strong for him was a value is something that he wanted to achieve.

Dean Pohlman: But ultimately it was his way that he understood it himself to be worthy of being loved. And so, you know, in a very similar way, like your your quest to validate, you know, why this injury happened. You attempted to do that through external validation, like if I win this competition, I can justify this happening. Yeah. And it’s it’s it’s just it’s significant to me and I like to say it’s interesting to me because interesting as a word that you use when you don’t have anything else to say about it.

Dean Pohlman: But it’s significant to me that, you know, despite all of the success that you’ve had, you know, seen as a comedian, that, you know, you were still looking for this thing had to have happened for a reason. And I’m going to justify it with with something. Yeah.

Drew Lynch: Yeah. Seeking it. Seeking that my leg is officially a sleeping.

Dean Pohlman: Oh yeah. Do you want another. Do we want another black. No. Do you want a five minute stretching break now. You know, do a pitch and be.

Drew Lynch: Embarrassing a stretch in front of you.

Dean Pohlman: I’ve been moving the whole time, man. You want to know?

Drew Lynch: I’ve been holding it. I’ve been holding it together. Did you know core strength, dude? I’ve been just like, man, I need to. I need. I need. I need Dean to see that his that his work holds up. I guess in that example, I’m the work so.

Dean Pohlman: Can I ask you another Question?

Drew Lynch: Yeah, of course.

Dean Pohlman: So the, you know, so pandemic happens, comedy shows end. What changes did you notice like when you stopped touring as much as you did what? You know, what happened? What happened for you? How did your health change? How did your you know, dare I say, did your relationship improve? What are the things…

Drew Lynch: Relationship relationship improved greatly, not just with myself, but with my my wife as well. We were it just it just I think we all I think we all I don’t know if we learned anything as a as a as a as a as a whole unit of of the human race. I don’t know if we did, because.

Dean Pohlman: I think we learned the importance of human connection, but.

Drew Lynch: I think I mean, I think we did. But I also think we kind of jumped right back in like just I don’t I mean, I don’t know, maybe there’s a there were people who were anxious to get back. I was anxious to stay in. I was anxious for it to never end because it just it felt like one giant sleep over.

Drew Lynch: And it did feel like, yeah, I appreciate the friends that I don’t get to see and I appreciate those experiences that I’m going to have, but I just, I, I was so much in it that I didn’t have that, that, that appreciation for, for it because it’s like with anything, when it’s not there, that’s when you learn to be.

Drew Lynch: You get the perspective of appreciating it. Mm hmm. But I would say my relationship was excellent. My my my mental health was much better because I just. I wasn’t committed to working or saying yes or following through with the things that I committed to months before. And that’s the thing about touring. That’s the thing about doing stand up.

Drew Lynch: I’m blessed to be able to do it. I’m thankful it’s I can make money doing this. I make money just with my ideas to the process of, like I said before, the process of having a thought, editing it, um, directing it and then performing it. That is what I do to be able to support myself and my family.

Drew Lynch: It’s a, it’s a miracle of a thing. But at the same time, when you tour, you have to accept dates months and months in advance. So you might be in a different mental headspace at the time that you accept it for the time that you go to to perform it or deliver it. So I had to, uh, I was just grateful that I, I didn’t have to, I didn’t have to follow through with it because if I say yes to something, I will always follow through. I mean, to to it’s probably a it’s probably a downfall. I mean, it’s.

Dean Pohlman: It’s a nice Midwestern thing.

Drew Lynch: Yeah. Yeah, exactly. I mean, and, um, and so, you know, I think your word is your word is everything. So and, and it is to yourself as well. And I don’t want to be someone who’s dishonest with anybody. And I don’t want to be I don’t I don’t want to be dishonest with myself either. So I think the thing that the pandemic taught me is it taught me just the power of no and the power of not having something is actually it can be just as powerful by conserving that energy or using it to benefit something else that you actually care about, that you want to be giving it or giving your word to so.

Dean Pohlman: Do you think if you continue to do that now that the pandemic’s over?

Drew Lynch: So I think I’ve definitely gotten better at it for sure. I definitely have gotten better at it and I’ve definitely gotten better at a recognizing a time that I like having an instinct and then acting on it because so many times I’ll say yes to something or I used to say yes to something and I was like this. I as soon as I said yes, I was like, I was like this, you know, you don’t want to do this. This is silly. You know, you don’t want to do this.

Dean Pohlman: Yeah. Do you have a process now for like when you when somebody ask you to do something to you, do you like to say yes or no?

Drew Lynch: I think it’s just I think now I’ve just gotten to a place of being less emotional about it. Hmm. I think when you’re a business person and you run a business just like. Just like you do, uh, you make a series of decisions all, all day. And if you get emotional about those decisions when, when you don’t have to, then you’re expending your energy where you don’t need to.

Drew Lynch: And so now I look at things very impersonally, and I think that because I appear in different I can look it can seem like I’m cold or it can seem like I’m not appreciative or not thankful for that. But it’s just I just it teaches you this inner this inner strength and you’re distilling process of what’s going to serve me.

Drew Lynch: And you can do that for so long where you’re serving others and you’re spreading yourself too thin in the process before you, you really just start to zero in on that voice, I think, you know, and it’s it’s I think yoga does a great job of that. I think yoga like that stillness, you’re able to be like you.

Drew Lynch: But yeah, I think yoga and Man Flow Yga specifically and no other yoga, but man flow does that.

Dean Pohlman: What do you think is one belief, habit or mindset that has helped you the most in terms of your overall happiness?

Drew Lynch: Oh Jesus. Mm hmm. Mm.

Dean Pohlman: You can’t say Man Flow Yoga.

Drew Lynch: What? I know. I say $1,000 makes me happy. And however I can get that. No, I think. I think something that’s I think something that’s helped is recognizing. And I don’t always do this well, but when I do it well, I’m at my best. And it’s that when I can recognize that something is a challenge and that it’s difficult and that it’s just a test, and that is what that is.

Drew Lynch: No. Then I’m never at and I’m nothing. There’s nothing is better than me at I’m I’m at my best when I’m able to recognize that if I get absorbed in the victim nature or the the attack. Oh. Of how that day could appear on, on me or towards me by just simply by how difficult it is.

Drew Lynch: That’s when I’m at my worst and there is no middle ground. So I am constantly throughout the day at my best and at my worst. And that’s crazy. It’s crazy to think about that. There are those extremes. But I’m an extreme I’m an extreme person. I think I’m an eccentric person and I’m compulsive. So if I commit to something I fully commit to it.

Drew Lynch: And if I commit to the thought that, uh, this is bad, I’m terrible, and I will, I can’t get past this because this isn’t a test. This is just a reflection of my, uh, lack of execution or talent or ability or whatever. Then I’m at my worst. But if it’s the opposite of that, where it’s that rare time, I can see it for what it is, which is just all right.

Drew Lynch: This is just a little bit challenging. It’s an opportunity for me to get more creative or more or push even harder than I win. And it’s just it’s it is a balancing act. And it’s like if you can if you can if you can just make those binary decisions where you can just go, all right, and I’m choosing I’m choosing to acknowledge this for what it is, but continue on choosing this to acknowledge for what it is, but continue on non emotionally.

Drew Lynch: That’s been the process that I think I’ve, uh, I’ve, uh, I’ve best, I’ve that best to sort of best serves me.

Dean Pohlman: Okay. What is your favorite color?

Drew Lynch: Blue. Easily. Oh, green.

Dean Pohlman: Oh, I was. It was… Monty Python.

Drew Lynch: Oh, gosh. Oh, sorry. You don’t.

Dean Pohlman: Count. Never mind. That was I was I was stumbling for the next question. It was so weird. And I thought of you.

Dean Pohlman: All right. Sorry. Back to the question I wanted to ask. Yeah. What do you think is one thing that you do for your health that is undervalued or overlooked by others?

Drew Lynch: Oh, stretching. And I mean that. No, I mean that like genuinely at night, my process now at night, I come back from shows, I get I put on some t, I get in the splits and I just write. That’s what I do.

Dean Pohlman: Oh.

Drew Lynch: Uh, and you work more every night. Every night. And I just, it calms me and, you know, because that could so easily be filled with, like, a lot of other comedians with it could be filled with drinking or partying or staying up late or, or binge eating. Like I have to find that actionable, healthy outlet or else like I just play the extremes and it’ll end up being it’ll end being drugs or, and not being, like, addicted to like just, you know, what, like alcohol or whatever, you know, whatever. So that to me is, I think, yeah, that’s what I would say.

Dean Pohlman: I hear that and I usually don’t insert my own experience in this section, but right now, being newborn dad, I don’t have a ton of time to sleep. So my evening routine is not at all what it once was. But I still find myself before I go to sleep. I make sure that I just sit and like a 9090 out in the living room with all the lights off for like three or 4 minutes on both sides.

Dean Pohlman: And like, it’s not, you know, a lengthy process. I don’t get to journal. There’s not like a whole, you know, 30 minute wind down bedtime routine. Now, like, just those few minutes of stretching makes a huge difference.

Drew Lynch: Yeah.

Dean Pohlman: So all right. Next question, what is your most important activity for stress relief?

Drew Lynch: Um, I mean, it sounds so obvious to say working out, but I think that’s what it is. You know, um, I work out and then I’ll have a wind down with some yoga and then that helps.

Dean Pohlman: Is it easy working out when you’re traveling?

Drew Lynch: It is for me. I mean, it is for me. I mean, travel is a big stressor. So, you know, I don’t know, you know, I, I would say working out okay.

Dean Pohlman: My answer what is the most stressful of your life?

Drew Lynch: I think the most stressful part of my life is is is is just me. It’s just the pressure that I put on myself. You know, it’s a difference from when you when you work a job, from when you work a career. I think I tell I tell people this all the time. I think I’m a great employee. I don’t think I’m a good employer to myself.

Drew Lynch: I’m just like, I’m so diligent and dutiful to whatever it is that I need. And then as an employer to myself, I’m I just I never give really I don’t give myself a break. I don’t I, I just put myself through that that stress and that pressure. And there’s a part of me that really appreciates it. I do appreciate how hard I can be on myself because I, I produce results.

Dean Pohlman: You know, and you wouldn’t be where you were if you, you know probably weren’t as hard on yourself as you are.

Drew Lynch: Right? So it’s just about like we’ve been talking about. It’s just about that, that, that balance of, you know, not abusing that not not not abusing yourself and being okay with, uh, some just being or just being okay with it.

Dean Pohlman: That it is enough, whatever it is. Yeah.

Drew Lynch: Yeah, exactly. So that’s really hard. That’s a big that’s a big deal. I struggle and I struggle immensely with feeling like I’m enough being enough. Yeah. And, and that’s probably in all facets of my life.

Dean Pohlman: Yeah, I hear that. And last question, what do you think is the biggest challenge facing men in their wellbeing today?

Drew Lynch: Uh, I mean, that’s tough. It’s tough, it’s tough. It’s tough to really break it down to like it’s tough to break it down into what I think is hard for men because I don’t think I consider myself to be a very like and very uncomfortable when there’s a group of guys who are like HEY, you know, and I walk in, I’m just I’ve got such like I don’t think I have beta energy.

Drew Lynch: I think I have like gamma energy where I’m, you know, where like, you know, I’m not like, right, guys, I’m not that guy. I’m like, man, you know, it’s like 140 days till the next solar moon. And people are like, what? And like, well, I don’t know. I just thought that you should know that. And they’re like, Okay, then I don’t feel bad about the things that I think.

Drew Lynch: But I, I know, I think, um, I think that’s, I think a struggle for men is like, at least I’ll say this in my, from my experience with my dad, my brother, they’re, they’re even more black and white in terms of how like logical and how binary many of their decisions are. Like, I attribute so many of my strengths to my dad’s ability to be business minded and, and approach something in a very analytical way.

Drew Lynch: And I think because of the influence of just what I wanted to do growing up performing and, and, and I just think, I think like I’ve seen I’ve watched my dad and I’ve watched my brothers struggle to be themselves. Mm hmm. Because of the typical mold that they feel they must fulfill by being a man.

Dean Pohlman: And so there’s this this standard ideal of what a man should be. And it sounds like, you know, you see their struggle with it. But even you, you just answered. But it sounds like you struggle with the same thing because you feel uncomfortable like being with a group of men. Yeah.

Drew Lynch: Yeah, I do. I mean, I just. I feel sad. Is that it’s necessary that I. It’s not. I this is where I’ve gotten better at. Like, forgiving myself is like it’s it’s not necessarily that I do feel uncomfortable, but beating myself up for feeling has become less and less. And that has actually given me more security in the fact that in being a man and like, you know, I can look at I can I can look at a group of my friends and they all have like different strengths.

Drew Lynch: And I appreciate those strengths for what they are. And I think the maturity and finding the maturity in my ability to see those strengths and appreciate them for what they are unadulterated, no, there’s no jealousy. There’s no envy. That, to me is what’s given me the ultimate security as a man is being like, well, listen, these are these are my strengths.

Drew Lynch: And even something that I’m describing right now is a strength. My ability to be able to see what other people do well and appreciate those things like that’s like the teacher in me that like that that’s, that’s like this older sort of seasoned outlook rather than like having this younger sort of like competitive, you know, you know, so that to me has really, I think, made me sit back and feel more grounded, more secure as a man, is that I can have appreciation for other people who happen to be men, sometimes in their strengths.

Drew Lynch: So to answer the question of what hinders like what is just I think it’s just guys need to just we live in a time where we’re very accepting of of all you know, not all but we were getting to be in a place where a lot of people are accepting whatever about whatever, you know, any eccentric eccentricities. Every person is willing to, you know, at least be more willing to accept than they were 10, 15, 20, 40, 100 years ago.

Drew Lynch: So leaning into why it is that you’re different and not fitting, whatever that mold is, making something work for you is is how you have to is how you have to do it. And if you’re somebody at all like me where you’re different or you’re neurotic or you, you know, you know, like when I have meetings now, like I’ll go on, I’ll go on like a my professional meetings or somebody I haven’t met.

Drew Lynch: I’ll go on a walk. I’ll, I’ll, I’ll, I’ll have stretch parties with my team. Like if I have like, like in, like my editor or my assistant come over like will like we’ll have like literally I have like stretch parties. It’s random and it’s weird, but to me it works and it’s where I get my strength. So I have to be able to lean in to what I, who I am and what gives me what gives me joy.

Drew Lynch: And if that’s weird or that’s seen as different, uh, that’s okay to me because before I used to be so worried about being different and not fitting that mold that now it’s like I have a greater appreciation because everybody else appears to be the same.

Dean Pohlman: Mm hmm. Yeah. Guys, thanks for joining me for the better podcast of this special video edition. This is Drew Lynch, famous comedian and and black and white thinker or that’s not the right term for eccentric and and one or the other binary. Yes. Anyways, I don’t want to I don’t want to pigeonhole your description. I’m just going to say comedian.

Dean Pohlman: Thanks, but I think that was a really cool conversation and thank you for you.

Drew Lynch: Shake like men.

Dean Pohlman: For being here and guys, I hope you enjoyed this episode. I hope it inspires you to be a better man and I’ll see you on the next episode.