The most important piece of equipment on your farm, part two: health equals wealth

Chris: Welcome everybody to another episode of the Ag View Pitch. We are going to talk today about wealth. But the first part of the wealth is health. We can't get the wealth without the health. I did a podcast, uh, here, I don't know, a year or two ago called The Most Important Piece of Equipment on the Farm. And I thought, hey, it's about time that we review that again, although this one obviously is not titled that. But this is the most important piece of equipment on your farm is you. And it's really all about having a conversation here today that we are going to be heading into spring. If you're listening to this later on, you're going to be heading into a busy season. When you head into a busy season, what do you do? What do you do to take care of yourself? What do you do to take care of the most important commodity on the farm? And it's really not a commodity. You are the farm.

You are the person that's making all this stuff happen, and you want to be there for your friends and your family and understand why you do what you do. But with all that said, I want to introduce Dr. House, not the one on TV, but the one here with us today, Dr. Kurt House. How's it going, Kurt?

Dr.

Kurt

House: I'm well, I'm well. How are you?

Chris: Good, doing good. Um, you know, thank you for being here. Um, in full disclosure, you're my doctor. Um, uh, you have to put up with me occasionally, and I really appreciate that. Uh, and, and you've, you know, you're really super well respected in our community, and, and you're a great person in the community, and I have a great family and everything, and I'm honored to have you on here today to help us talk about a few key things. And I kind of prepped you a little bit. I said I kind of want to hit on some things that as farmers we do not do a very good job of when we get busy as hell. Okay, we're— when we go into whether it's planting season or harvest season or whatever, we avoid exercise, we avoid sleep, we avoid nutrition because we eat cupcakes and crap. A lot of us, some of us are luckier than others.

Some of us still have moms and grandmas around that bring hot meals out, but more of us as time goes on have less and less of that blessing. Uh, another one is, is mental health. Another key one is safety, and safety is something that's paramount that should be talked about before we even get into planting season or harvest season for that matter. And I threw one other one in there, uh, I told you about online, or before we got online here, is water. I think we avoid water too a lot of times. I mean, we drink everything else but water, and probably water is the best thing. So with that said, I want to start with exercise, and I want to ask you a couple of questions around that. What's happening to us if we're not exercising? If we're, you know, we think we're getting exercise— my dad always used to say that, I'm working my ass off, I don't need to exercise.

Well, you're not doing any of the shit you need to do to make your body healthy. So talk a little bit about that, Kurt.

Dr.

Kurt

House: Well, you're 100% right. I, I say, you know, what happens to any piece of equipment when we sit around and we don't use it, whether it's, you know, barn or, you know, a tractor or a farm, right? It breaks down. It doesn't do well. Our bodies do the same thing. Our bodies are intended to work and to do the work. And if we're not getting exercise and exercise, you know, I tell my patients what we're aiming for is 150 minutes a week of exercise. What that means is I want to have my heart rate elevated. And it doesn't have to be, you know, we don't have to be tacking out at 140, but if we can have our heart rate, you know, above 100 for 150 minutes. And, you know, ideally, you know, that would mean, you know, for 20 minutes— you know, or to 30 minutes at a time. And if we're doing 30 minutes 5 times a week, there's 150 minutes.

So, but if we don't do that, we don't gain the cardiovascular benefits that we get— we should get from exercise.

Chris: So the cardiovascular stuff I get really well and I agree 100%. One thing I've studied, and tell me where I'm wrong or right, one of the two, is that weight training from the standpoint of strength development and strength, strength maintenance, cartilage, muscle, bone structure, all that kind of stuff. If, if you're not doing any kind of strength training, at least maybe a couple of times a week, even if you're a farmer and you're carrying buckets around or you're working underneath machinery or carrying shit around, you're, you're still not like systematically working everything. It's kind of your— it's like hit and miss random stuff, right? Talk a little bit about strength training.

Dr.

Kurt

House: Absolutely. That's the big thing that I think that we have come to study and to realize is that resistance training or some weight training is, you know, really important. When I talk about 150 minutes of exercise, that doesn't mean I have to be walking around a treadmill. Absolutely, you know, doing some resistance training and lifting, is going to be important. And that's vital. So it improves our— you're going to have less arthritis from doing those. We're going to be stronger. We're going to have better maintenance. So we'll have more, you know, fewer injuries. But resistance training is vital. And it's kind of an interesting thing that we always think about lifting weights. And when we're young, we lift weights. But it actually becomes more and more important as we age to be able to do those things. Not lifting heavy necessarily.

But going with, you know, higher reps, smaller weights, but going through those range of motions. And that's what's gonna, you know, get us prepared. But you're right, lifting, you know, we become accustomed to lifting whatever we're gonna lift. So if you're out doing your chores, if you're doing whatever, it's one thing. But being able to importantly, you know, lift contralateral muscles that you might be using when you're exercise or when you're doing your chores, those things, you will absolutely feel better and it's vital to do.

Chris: Talk about like, you know, my dad always used to say, well, like when he was 70, he's like, I'm not doing that shit. I never did do that stuff before. Why would I start it now? It's never too late to start weight training, is it? I don't care if you're 14 or if you're 74 or 84 for that matter.

Dr.

Kurt

House: Well, certainly if you're, if you're, if you learn to do it with correct technique, You're not going to have the injuries as long as, you know, we do it with correct technique. You know, you start slow and you're absolutely going to gain benefit. Yeah, we'll go light, right? I mean, I don't know about you, but I mean, I certainly don't lift like I used to in the numbers. And you know what? I don't care, quite frankly. When I look back at how I used to do it, I think, my gosh, I wasted a lot of time on some moving some heavy weight that wasn't necessarily beneficial. That, that now as we look and we, you know, are much better with those things, the functional lifting is so much better.

Chris: So, right. One thing, and I'll bring this up in a couple of these other categories as we wrap up exercise here and go the next category, but I always think to myself, you know, how do I want my last decade of my life to be? Do I want to be able to get up? You know, if I lay down on the floor, can I get back up off the floor easily? Or if my grandkids run in, can I grab them and pick them up and throw them around? You know, can I, can I lay in a chair and get back out easily? You know, yeah, those basic functions that we think, you know, well, we'll do that later, we'll do that later. And you keep putting that stuff off, and it's like, good luck in your last decade then, you know, if you're not paying attention. Comments on that?

Dr.

Kurt

House: 100%. I think it's— if you're— if we're aware of it, you know, I do some, you know, some— I always think, well, my office is, you know, is on the second floor. So I think, okay, every day I take the steps up and down and little things like that. But even things like when I look around, if I'm in church and I'm amazed at, you know, standing and sitting and lots of things, how many people have to grab the pew in front of them to be able to stand up. And you know, that's just, that's a strength issue, that's a balance issue. So you've gotta do that, but I don't have a pew in front of me to do that. That's a, there's some issues. So it definitely adds up. And you know, I think one of the things is, one of the people, what they're gonna say is, well gosh, you know, I don't have any time to do that.

You know, and I think, you know, and— you know as much as anybody, Chris, that you can't— we can't make more time. So you have to make the priority is the key. Exactly. Got to be a priority.

Chris: Yeah, yeah. It's never too late. It's always priority. And I love the comment on balance too, because, you know, it's not always about how much you lift or what you do, but it, you know, stand on one foot for a little bit. And, you know, there's a lot of different things you can look up on YouTube. It doesn't have to— you don't have to spend a lot of money to, to be healthy. So The next category is sleep. You know, personally, I like to get about 8 hours of sleep. A lot of times I don't get that, but I feel 1,000 times better if I get 8. Supposedly, from the things I've read, 6 is sufficient for a lot of people. But I think, you know, when you think of repair, you know, your body's repairing itself at night when you're sleeping. It's recharging your brain and flushing things out. Talk a little bit about sleep. What should we be doing there when we're busy as hell?

Dr.

Kurt

House: Well, again, working on— you hit it right— getting sleep, but importantly, quality sleep. Quality sleep would be meaning that there's stage 4 or REM sleep involved, and that's the restful sleep. And if we're not getting quality sleep, we can sleep all day. But that gets back to things like sleep apnea, for example. And you know, if someone's waking up and you're not feeling refreshed, then those are things that we always wanna look into. But by not sleeping, you know, we're not getting that reparative time. And you know, we see people who have, you know, lack, even lack sleep or poor sleep hygiene, you know, have, you know, our, you know, blood pressure is elevated, we have, you know, more heart disease, the dementia rates are higher, inability to focus is so hard.

And when you don't get enough sleep and you're tired all the time, we have a tendency to then overindulge in things like caffeine, which, hey, don't get me wrong, I love some coffee in the morning, but by taking in too much caffeine, it isn't helpful for us either. So sleep is vital.

Chris: Yeah, and I like the idea, like you said, the quality of sleep. I mean, a lot of times people have— I mean, I, we took our TV out of our bedroom. I, I intentionally rarely will ever have my cell phone in our bedroom at night. I, I read a great book called, uh, Sleep— what was it called? Sleep, uh, I can't remember now, Sleep Healthy or something like that. Anyway, it basically talked about keeping the room black. It needs to be dark when you sleep. And, you know, and that kind of changed my, my sleep quality. I don't— I can get by with a little less sleep. So I think your quality thing is really hitting that, hitting that.

Dr.

Kurt

House: It certainly is. We— I talk to people about— and there's a lot of people who have insomnia, and you can have insomnia for many reasons. And, and, you know, farming, just the stress alone can be causing some insomnia. Uh, but, uh, you know, same thing, reduce, you know, caffeine intake, prior to having your bedroom cooler versus hotter back to being— don't have a TV on. Don't have those things which are really taking away from your sleep. Having it dark in there. And a lot of people will like supplements when they sleep. And I'm open to— certain medications really will just sedate us more than they give us good quality sleep. And so, I mean, we have to be careful of those things. A lot of people will utilize some melatonin and I think small doses of melatonin occasionally can be, you know, okay. I'm not big into giving kids melatonin. It's a different hormone issue.

But, you know, so, you know, I think again, you know, setting yourself up right, you know, doing some decaffeinated tea or something warm before bed, that can be, you know, helpful. You know, if you're someone who, you know, does exercise, and if you exercise in the evening and then you can't sleep, then, you know, try to work it so you can exercise in the morning, get that cortisol level up. So just those types of things.

Chris: Yeah, that's a good, excellent point, 'cause that's very true on the exercise, having experienced that firsthand. The other— I think too, you, you mentioned, uh, what was the term you used? I think it was like, uh, sedating yourself. I think sometimes people sedate themselves with alcohol at night. Yeah, or a ring. You can see it here on, on my hand, and that measures, you know, sleep and your walking and all that kind of stuff. I know some people have the Apple thing or whatever, but it's interesting, like, if I drink alcohol or I don't drink alcohol And it doesn't matter when I drink it during the day, from any— anywhere from noon on anyway, because it's not like I get up in the morning and drink it.

But, you know, if I have a beer at 4, 4 o'clock in the afternoon, or I don't have one, I recognize, you know, my heart rate's different, my sleep quality is better, my deep sleep is significantly more if I don't have the alcohol. Talk a little bit about measuring. I always tell people, like, we do tons of financial stuff, and I just tell people you can't improve what you don't measure. What do you think about, you know, what's your thought about like measuring like with an Oura Ring or any of these kind of things to measure your sleep so that you can improve it? Because it's hard to improve what you don't measure.

Dr.

Kurt

House: You're absolutely right. And there are getting to be a lot of studies now which will bring into and talk about, you know, is there, you know, can we do quantitative and qualitative measures of, you know, our heart rate, you know, sleep and all those things? How well does that really play out And it turns out whether it's your watch or your ring, they're pretty accurate in their ability to follow and see how well you sleep. And I think most people can wake up in the morning and look at their watch or their ring and go, well, gee, how did I sleep? Gee, I felt like I slept lousy last night. And you know it. Your body hurts and you feel awful, or when you wake up and say, my goodness, I slept great last night. And then I like what you were talking about, which is really then going back and thinking, okay, what did I do last night? Or what didn't I do that helped me sleep?

Chris: Yeah, that's awesome. I kind of joke with Alyssa sometimes. It's like I get up in the morning and I'll turn my phone on and I'll be like, I'm going to look and see how I slept last night. You know, it's exactly like you said, you know, you kind of can tell when you wake up either you slept well or you didn't. So let's keep moving. Let's hit nutrition. We'll throw water underneath that one or in that one because it's really critical. And maybe we want to start with water in nutrition. Talk about, you know, what, what does not enough water do? Because I guarantee a lot of us, some of, some of the guys are pretty good. They'll take a water jug with them, quote unquote, and drink that, but a lot of people don't.

Dr.

Kurt

House: Well, I mean, unfortunately, if, if we're not getting enough water, then that puts us into what, a state of, you know, dehydration. And I say, you know, what's not enough oil do to your, your motor? You know, it's the same sort of thing. And so the perpetual state of dehydration is, you know, it, you know, eventually it affects— well, event— if we're not getting enough water, then we have tendencies to our body will try to retain the water that we are getting because it doesn't want to let go of it. And so then people who have, you know, you'll have more edema, obviously, you know, through, you know, renal functions, you know, can suffer. But it, you know, your soft tissue, we're just not lubricating all of the things that we need to. So you have more aches, more pains, you know, on it.

You know, sometimes people say, well, you know, if I 'If I drink more, then I gotta pee more.' Well, yes. Weird. Weird. It turns out that's of vital importance to kind of keep that all going as well. But what'll happen is, yeah, your body won't retain the water after a while when it realizes it's gonna get enough water. So how much water is always the question people say, 'Well, how much water should I drink?' And of course it depends on your size, but you know, I think the very least amount anybody is, you should be getting at least 80 ounces, you know, and I think anything under that, and what is a hydrating fluid, right? I mean, that's sort of the old thing. And then, you know, and obviously I'm, you know, kind of old and, you know, they used to say, well, if you can read a newspaper through it, that was, you know, the hydrating fluid. Nobody reads a newspaper anymore.

But, but, you know, so water, you know, is the best. There's a lot of sports drinks which can be hydrating. But for most of us, we don't need electrolytes that much or perpetually. You're having one of those a day is fine. You know, juice is hydrating, but you do get the extra sugars and calories for which we don't necessarily need. But having a little bit of that is okay. Other people will tell me, gee, I think I can read my newspaper through my, you know, through my, you know, Bush Light. But, you know, we know that's, you know, if it's caffeine or alcohol, it's not going to be hydrating. So the best is just, you know, simply, you know, water. And there's so many options now of water. It's, it's crazy.

Chris: So yeah, and, you know, and I think a lot of these energy drinks, you know, not to say any names, Gatorade or whatever, but you know how it is. I mean, that I think it's just if there's some flavor or taste to it, then it's more people will reach for it more. But I, you know, water is definitely the best. I mean, I did 75 Hard. We've, we've done some podcasts on that activity. The only thing is I almost think though you can drink too much water because like in that program you're supposed to drink a gallon a day. And when I, when I started doing that, I mean, it was, my body was like, you know, you have way too much water here, dude, you know? And, and I think you kind of got to work up to what is the right amount because it's probably different for everybody a little bit, isn't it?

Dr.

Kurt

House: Well, absolutely. And that's the challenge. I would say a gallon is quite a bit. Not just, I mean, that most of us, we can do that. Some people who would have some health issues, that might be too much. But for the most part, I said, I mean, if we listen to ourselves and we do have, you know, really taking in water, you know, our kidneys are pretty smart. It'll let us know, you know, okay, we're thirsty, we're gonna take in more water. You know, we're pretty good at that. Yeah, you can get in too much though. I would say that's a pretty rare event compared to the people who don't get in enough.

Chris: Yeah. Let's keep rolling here on nutrition. I want to hit a couple other things real quick in nutrition, protein, carbs, and fats. And then, you know, sugar is in, in that carb category and it's in every frickin thing. You go to the grocery store, and it says fat-free. In other words, it's full of sugar. It should just say full of sugar instead of fat-free. And I think a lot of times people are still confused, and the grocery store is the most terrible place for confusing people. Um, talk a little bit about, you know, the protein-carb-fat relationship and what people need to be thinking about, as simply as you can. Like, for the farmer going to the field, what's some of the things that maybe you put in the cooler that you don't put in the cooler going to the field?

Dr.

Kurt

House: Well, I think, I think you hit the big points right there, which, you know, carbohydrates, yeah, it really comes into— you have, you know, like I said, fats, carbohydrates, and proteins. Sugars are a carbohydrate, uh, and so all carbohydrates eventually get broken down into sugar. And, you know, the sugar itself is, you know, very instant energy, but, uh, you know, it's You know, they had a, an endocrinologist used to say that sugar is poison. And you know, sugar is, it is highly addicting. I think when you're going out, things that we wanna concentrate on are proteins, I think are really good things to have with you. I think that, you know, the proteins will be broken down a little slower than the carbohydrates. It takes a few more water molecules to break down a protein. So that's why it's important to be hydrated taking in those proteins.

But it won't spike our insulin levels as much. It doesn't get absorbed and, you know, and spike up insulin levels because the sugars went up high. And so then if we cannot spike those insulins, we're going to have a more consistent, you know, blood sugar. We're gonna feel better. We're not gonna drop off because our insulin suddenly spikes and our sugars go down. So you won't have that yo-yoing. Things that are great proteins, of course, you know, are animal proteins, you know, and, you know, from the usual of, you know, beef, pork, chicken, you know, turkey, all, you know, great. But, you know, you have fish, other, you know, sorts of proteins. We can get dairy proteins. And of course, the dairy proteins will contain some fat sometimes you're gonna have, you know, but, you know, milk, cheese, Eggs are great protein. So all of those things are going to be good to have.

I mean, there's some other caveats in there of, you know, we have to watch some sodium with some of those things or, you know, some of the meats may have some sodium. So you have to watch some of those things. But in general, that's gonna be better. So it's gonna be some fats and gets back to that, you know, what was it, you know, 20 years ago, you know, fat was the enemy. And now we realize, well, it's not entirely true. Not all fats are created equal. And you can have— I mean, I think we have to use some common sense. If you have a bag of orange slices, the little jelly things, right? They're fat-free. Now we know they can't be good for us, right? So it's kind of, okay, this isn't good for us. So fat isn't always the problem. There are great fats to have.

And so having that, but again, it doesn't mean that we, and some people will go with purely a carnivore type of diet, but I think most people feel best on a Mediterranean style diet where we do utilize some sugars. So fruits will have some sugars in them. Certain fruits are going to be better than others if it's a Typically, if it's a tropical fruit, that gets broken down into a fructose sugar much quicker. And so it's not quite as good as, say, berries or apples, those kind of things. Those are much better fruit snacks to have. Nuts are particularly good for snacks when we're out into the field. And I think that's the key is planning when you go out into the field. Know that you're gonna have— you do need to eat, we gotta hydrate, we got to do all these things.

And if you want to be healthy, you're going to try to, you know, have that planned ahead so that you can, you know, take in those things as you're, you're out, you know, working those longer hours.

Chris: One of the secrets I learned, um, quite a while ago, kind of doing more of a higher protein diet, was that I felt better. Like you said, you're— you don't have that insulin spike. So you're not tired at 2 o'clock in the afternoon and you got to stop on the end with the tractor and sleep for an hour and all of a sudden you've slept for an hour and a half and then you wake up and like, holy shit, I, I slept for an hour and over an hour here, you know?

Dr.

Kurt

House: Yeah.

Chris: And, and it's probably a combination of all the things we talked about. But what I, what I try to throw in my cooler is I grill some steaks like on a Sunday night or Sunday afternoon or whatever. I'll, I'll get 4, 4 or 5 steaks and Alyssa would be like, what the hell are you cooking all that steak for? I'm like, uh, because this is what I'm gonna eat this week, you know? Right. Well, I want to be healthy, so I'm going to, I'm going to cook these steaks. And what I do is I slice them into bite-sized little, little triangles, like little, like the little cheese triangles you get. And then I'm going to get cheese triangles too. And I'll do some, some whole milk cheese. I'm big on whole milk just because I think the, the fat, that's a, that's to me, or at least for me anyway, it works for me as a healthy fat. And that satisfies you too. So you're not hungry every fricking 10 minutes.

And so I'll eat that. I'll eat like, I'll take like 4 to 10 ounces of steak depending on how long I'm going to be gone, of those little slices that you see to just like finger food while you're going across the field. I'll do some yogurt. I'll put blueberries, strawberries, and raspberries in with the yogurt, and then I'll put just a little bit of local honey on it. Just, yeah, I like it. Gives it a little bit of sweetness, but you don't put— get too crazy with the honey. You don't let it float in the honey. And then, you know, like you said, an apple once in a while or whatever. And I stay away from bread and all that crap when I'm busy, and then I'm not tired. I mean, even a whole— like, people make sandwiches. That's the number one thing I think guys take to the field.

And if you can take just the meat, but even instead of that deli meat, like steak and like you said, chicken— what'd you say? Chicken, beef, and pork. I mean, take a pork loin and cut that sucker up and cut it in those pieces too. I mean, just some ideas, you know.

Dr.

Kurt

House: Well, and you're right. I mean, and, and that's in the idea— the whole idea of that was you're prepping ahead of time and you're going to make better choices. They are going to be better choices. You're going to feel better. And, and with it— well, and what happens with that if I'm feeling better? You're going to be more productive. And gets back to the title of this: if you're more productive, you're going to get— you think you're going to make more money.

Chris: Yeah, it does. And, and I find that I eat healthier when I'm busy because of cooler. If you lock yourself in a tractor for 14 hours and you only eat what's in the cooler, and then you go home and drink some more water and stay clean, you know, shower, a hot shower, and then go to a cold bed that's dark room, you know, you get— you, you complete that full cycle that we've been talking about. So what I want to wrap up with is a couple of key things here. I think we've hit enough on nutrition. We could talk about that all day long. Um, mental health, I just want to ask you like one kind of key question there.

How often do you see people come to you that are stressed because of work life or inappropriate life balance and all that kind of stuff that, you know, they leave and you're like, this is kind of a mental health thing, maybe almost more so than a physical thing, and then the mental health is what starts to screw up your physical health? Talk a little bit about that. I mean, what are you seeing in society, like from when you started to where we're at now as a society? Are you seeing a big change? No change? What are you seeing?

Dr.

Kurt

House: Well, there's an enormous change. The prevalence is monumental. In a day, if I, you know, seeing my typical 25 or 26 patients, I would say half of those have some component of mental health. And that's really difficult. You know, in the emergency departments, we look through those, you know, about 75% will have some mental health issues. And again, that doesn't mean they came in, you know, for some breakdown or anything like that, but a component of this, you know, with anxiety. Right now we know through some studies that like adolescent females This is the— we've never seen numbers of anxiety and stress that we see now. I mean, it's just, it's remarkable. I think there's so many things that are probably contributing into that, but it is, you know, it's certainly a pandemic, much more of a pandemic than in our previous pandemic, which contributed into the mental health.

But that's right.

Chris: No, it's very true. And then, you know, some of the things that we've seen, even just in our— the work we do with family businesses trying to transition to the next generation and trying to hold things together and trying to grow the business. And then sometimes you, you know, my wife always says I'm like super guilty of saying yes to everything. It's like, you know, if there's an opportunity to do this, an opportunity to do that, you say yes. To— I think we say yes to too many things. And I think one of the things that, you know, from a mental health standpoint is we— some of us need to learn how to say no more often. And I'm guilty, so I'm like— I'm—

Dr.

Kurt

House: no, I understand, same.

Chris: Yeah. I— and Alyssa always tells me, she's like, just recognize if you say yes to something, you're saying no to something else. And it's so true. And I think, you know, sometimes stress is self-induced by a lot of us because everybody listening to this are entrepreneurial, executive-minded, growth-oriented, successful business people. And I think we are in control of our own destiny even when we think we aren't. Any comments on that? And then we'll switch to the last thing.

Dr.

Kurt

House: Well, you're 100% right. I mean, I think that one, recognizing, you know, what the stress is doing to us and then, you know, appreciating how, you know, how powerful stress stress and anxiety can be into making us feel, you know, poorly, uh, and what it really does to our physical health is, is vital. Uh, working on a plan to, to do something about that, you're 100% right. It's constantly saying yes to people. You build up this, this farm and do anything, so you, you want to, you know, you really want that to continue to be a success, and you do, but you, you eventually find you can't do everything.. And that's stressful. You know, I say I have, you know, I think a little, you know, OCD. I mean, I just like things the way they are. But when I can't do the things that I can exactly, it's just part of it. But what happens when you can't do those things?

That's when I know that's the most stressful time because I want to control all those things. And it's the control that can be the real challenge there. And I like to control things and it's just I can't control everything. But I think appreciating it, knowing where we're at, and then doing things to, uh, to help that along, you know, eating clean, exercising, the sleep, hydrating, all of the things we talk about will help with, with stress.

Chris: I always talk about 3 mental health things that we— that exist in all of us, and I've done a couple of podcasts on 19 Minutes, our subscriber podcast, that if people haven't listened to it, I recommend you go back and listen to it because I did a lot of research on these three basic components that we all have, and it's called insecurity. Uh, it's, it's insecurity, control, and ego. Or I actually say it the other way around: ego, insecurity, and control. And we all have an ego to varying degrees, and we all have insecurities, and we all want control. And I think it just seems like, you know, for a lot of us, when, when any of those things are out of compliance with what we feel they need to be, it definitely kind of throws us out of kilter. But that's why I was asking you that, because it just— I was suspicious that it probably led into some physical problems.

And too, you know, the mental stuff leads to that tremendous amounts.

Dr.

Kurt

House: And, uh, and it's, it's tough. I, I feel for people because these are difficult things. Anytime that we're— you're struggling with depression or anxiety and, you know, you're having feelings that are hard to that you really can't articulate or even control. You think, why am I feeling so nervous and anxious? I shouldn't be feeling that way. And you are. That's, that's hard. I, you know, so it's, you know, finding a way to mitigate that is, is really important. They're talking to somebody or, you know, you know, finding what works for you, which is important.

Chris: Yeah. The help is out there. And I think the stress level is, you know, with where commodity prices are as we record this and in March of 2024. You know, commodity prices have really come down, margins are tight, stress is there. And you know, that's kind of why I wanted to do this today. So the last, last component, safety. Every spring and fall, we, we do ourselves, and I'll provide this to anybody listening, we put together a pre-spring and a pre-harvest meeting, and the first probably 40% of the meeting is around safety. We bring our insurance agents in and stuff, and we talk about safety things.

My question to you is, what are some of the things that you've seen in your career that if safety would have been implemented in the business— and it doesn't have to be just farming, it can be construction or whatever— but it's in— if, if a safety thing would have been elemented or into would have been— what's the word? I'm like, implemented. Yeah, implemented into the system, it would have prevented that. Because a lot of times when we do safety stuff, you can't measure that, right? It's like we have a safety meeting and you prevented a, uh, you know, somebody from either being hurt real bad or killed, and you'll never know that because, you know. But so my question to you is, what things have you seen and any comments on that thought process?

Dr.

Kurt

House: Yeah, I think over the years, I mean, obviously it's changed. I mean, we can all remember, you know, when we were young, seeing, you know, some guy who only had, you know, one arm because, you know, of a two-row picker that he had his arm, you know, taken off, you know, something along that line. But I think to a certain degree, a lot of the machinery, you know, there's been a lot of safety that's put into that. One of the problems that we run into is through time, or we kind of bypass some of the safety features of the very machinery we're working with, which is a real problem, obviously. And I think, you know, so there's the machinery issues with injuries. We're also in now, you know, a lot of the Farmers, you don't just have one farm you're at, right? You're going from one farm to the next.

And so we have equipment we're getting to and from and we're out into traffic and we know how, you know, how patient people are now. And of course you get people on their cell phone and they're hungry. They get in. So that is a huge issue is, you know, I wonder how many injuries or accidents occur, you know, through farm equipment that are on the road. Versus on, you know, in the field. And I think that it's almost sometimes safer in the field than it is on the road. But it is. Yeah. You know, and then there's the other safety issues, which, you know, probably, you know, we don't think about as much. But, you know, it's, you know, the air quality. And I contend that the air quality is, you know, I think we do a really good job of, you know, I think the air quality has improved. But, you know, you get air quality issues where, you know, somebody who's got some lung issues.

So, you know, being smart and saying, okay, if I need to wear I wear a mask, you know, keep this dust particles out, I, you know, will, or, uh, or things like it, you're wearing sunscreen, you know, which is, you know, important. We don't think of that like, oh, I'll just get going. Well, you know, in 20 years when we're, you know, digging a, you know, a basal cell carcinoma out of your scalp, it's probably not as good. So, uh, I think injuries, uh, are, you know, let's face it, it's, you know, farming is is as dangerous of an occupation as there is. I don't know. We see a lot of injuries. But thankfully different than what we saw 20 years ago.

Chris: Yeah. I still think one of the big ones that we still have today yet that we've had, it seems like almost forever, is the noise level. So in the fall, I load the trucks and stuff and If you take your phone, you know, you can measure like the decibel level or whatever. And it's like in the danger zone and it's like I'm doing that and I'm like, I don't even think it's that loud. And then, you know, my wife will say something to me and I say, what? Every single time she's like, do you ever say anything except for what? You know, I'm like, I can't hear you, you know? And so I know for a fact I have hearing damage and I guarantee you a high percentage of the people listening to this probably need to have the volume higher, you know? Because just because of the hearing loss.

And, and it's pretty easy to buy a package of earplugs and stuff, you know, you can buy a thousand of them for not very much money. And, and I think it's just having that stuff available for employees and stuff too, and having that safety meeting and talking about those things. And just weird things too, like, you know, like if you, you mentioned the highway, like going down the highway. One thing I learned a couple years ago, if you're going down the highway with a tractor that that can get off the road. In other words, most of the stuff anymore is too freaking wide for the road. You gotta get way the hell off just, just to not cross the center line, because that is one thing you're not supposed to do is cross the center line.

However, if you're going down the road with something that does fit on, on there, like a standard tractor with no duals or anything on it, a lot of times if you watch guys, they'll get off the road a little bit to let somebody pass or whatever. If you get hit doing that in the process of that, you are at fault. I never realized that. And the other reason for that is, is the expectation is that you stay on the highway and then people are supposed to slow down to the pace of the machine. That's, that's another law which people never do, but you're supposed to slow down to the pace of the machine that's in front of you regardless of what it is— car, machine, truck, whatever, tractor, whatever— and then proceed with the pass. And that's a law. I mean, we had a DOT officer come and do a safety training for us a couple falls ago and It was just phenomenal, the things that we learned.

And so I think that's something to throw out there too, is, you know, having people like yourself come and sit in on a safety meeting and just talk about some of these things. You know, I mean, I need to hire you to come to our safety meeting this spring. I mean, literally, because I think, you know, just having these conversations, if it prevents somebody from having a major hearing loss or an eye injury or something, what's that worth?

Dr.

Kurt

House: You're absolutely right. You know, I love the idea, you know, you talked about having, you know, a bunch of, uh, you know, earplugs to get in. So, you know, and the key to that is I gotta have the earplugs, but then have them within reach, you know, because what happens, you get going, I'm gonna get on the tractor, I should get out and grab some earplugs, I guess you don't do it. So if you have, all right, I'm gonna have, you know, uh, with them because nobody should be smoking in them damn things anyway. Yeah. Exactly. Exactly. So doing those things, you go, okay, I've got them. Yeah, they're here. I'll put them in. And it is, you know, and, you know, we've gone a long way, you know, when, you know, before, before we had cabs on everything and everybody, all the farmers would always lose their hearing more in their left ear as they turned.

They're looking back all the time, you know, and that left ear was towards the, towards the muffler. Well, now we're inside, but the machinery is just bigger. And, you know, it's, it's, it's large machinery. It's going to, it's going to be noisy. And so even during this—

Chris: yeah, I mean, most guys have semis anymore, and most of the semis, you know, and some of these, you know, we have one too that's got straight pipes on it. Like, what the hell do you have that on there for? I mean, it just makes it loud in the cabin if you measure the, the noise level, and then you're in that stuff for 10 hours or even, you know, combines and tractors and stuff. It's the, it's not just the amount of volume, probably it's also the duration of it too, right? It's like how long are you exposed to it?

Dr.

Kurt

House: Well, and it's the, it's that decibel, but it's the pitch. Is it a high pitch? Is it, you know, is it a low rumble? And so you start to lose, you know, different hearing levels depending on the exposure to how much you've seen, you know, and some of these things are, a high-pitched whine that you may not appreciate, like, ah, it's not too bad, or this low rumble, that doesn't bother me too much. But, you know, over time it all, uh, is, is a problem.

Chris: Yeah. What was that? No, I'm just kidding. So hey, this has been a phenomenal conversation. I'm, I'm super glad we finally got connected. I apologize, I was trying to get hooked up with you a couple of times and my schedule gets a little crazy.

Dr.

Kurt

House: This time that works great tonight, so it's good.

Chris: Yeah, I think you're still in the doctor's office, it looks like, aren't you? Yeah, that's like your home, like your home away from home.

Dr.

Kurt

House: You know how that goes.

Chris: Yeah, exactly.

Dr.

Kurt

House: Yeah. Well, we got to work on that.

Chris: We need to get you out here for our safety meeting. And then after that, we got to put you in the tractor and get to let you have some fun, bring the kids out and we'll have some fun.

Dr.

Kurt

House: Yeah, I, you know, my, my, my days of being all that helpful in the tractor are pretty limited. You know, I'm I haven't had to do anything on the farm for quite a few years, but I do enjoy it. I enjoy, you know, the agribusiness, and I enjoy when I get to talk with you. Simply, it's fun to— I like to see what's kind of going on in the ag world. I enjoy it.

Chris: Oh, we definitely need to get you out here. You don't even have to steer anymore. You just ride along all the way from the end rows to everything. Everything's kind of automated. So Again, Kurt, Dr. House, we sincerely appreciate your contribution. This helps a lot of people. And, you know, and the reason we do this podcast on, you know, whether it's on the markets or business development, whatever, it's truly to help people. I mean, we love our clients, we love our customers, we love the, the agricultural community, and that's why we do what we do, is we want to, we want to be out there with things to help people. And again, really appreciate your contribution. Thanks a lot.

Dr.

Kurt

House: You're welcome.

Chris: Be safe. Yeah, will do. Yeah, everybody be safe out there, and hopefully this was helpful. And again, you know, it's, it's all about, um, figuring out how you take your health and turn it into wealth. And that's really kind of the whole objective of this conversation. And we appreciate everybody, and we will catch you again next time on the Ag View Pitch.