Today, Commander Divine talks to Brett Miller about his research on Parkinson’s Disease, and his holistic approach to treatment of the disease at his gym 110 Fitness.
Brett (@millerpdwellness) is a U.S. Army veteran. He served as a combat medic trainer for special operations and oversaw the construction and development of the DEPMEDS for the United States Army. Brett is passionate about adaptive fitness and inspiring the best in everyone he meets. The mission of his practice is to set a new standard for the world in the “fight back” against Parkinson’s Disease through holistic and fitness based approaches. He also is determined to break down all barriers for adults and children limited by disease or disability by sharing his exceptional mental and physical training and conditioning experience.
Key Takeaways:
- We can learn a lot about who we are when we face a life-threatening experience and endure trauma—Brett’s early childhood experiences compelled him to become an Army medic and continue a life dedicated to helping others.
Warning signs of intense PTSD are often first picked up by friends and family. Brett encourages those close to veterans to be vigilant about watching for those signs including withdrawing from socialization, acting more closed off than usual and uncharacteristically quiet. - Over 6 million people worldwide are affected by Parkinson’s disease. Parkinson’s research is advancing understanding of the disease. Early detection is key, and with most types of Parkinson’s, severe symptoms can be staved off and minimized with the proper treatment. Researchers are still searching for a cure.
- The OODA loop (Observe, Orient, Decide, Act), a four-step approach to decision-making that has the ability to improve decisiveness, time management and overall organization. It focuses on filtering available information, putting it in context and quickly making the most appropriate decision while also understanding that changes can be made as more data becomes available.
- A holistic, varied approach to wellness is key to managing, and in some cases overcoming, any type of physical or mental illness—Brett’s work with patients includes the basic cornerstones of health: nutrition, exercise, sleep, and hydration. His patients practice movement and mindfulness in numerous ways, including shadow boxing, HIIT workouts, water training, rope climbing, tai chi, qigong, yoga, art therapy, drumming, and ballroom dancing.
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Brett Miller 0:02
Albania was ramping up, they rebelled against their government. When we were heading out to the capital of Tirana, when we then were being pursued by what I can only assume as rebels. And for those you out there all you military folks and stuff, you know, the only thing that’s going to happen there is you’re either going to be executed, put up for ransom, or you’re going to be tortured.
Mark Divine 0:26
And decided today to have Brett Miller as my guest on the unbeatable mind podcast. Brett is a fellow veteran like me, US Army,
I use medic there. He’s owner of 110 fitness, which is the largest wellness center in the world for people with Parkinson’s disease, which is near and dear to my heart, because my father in law suffer from that. And I saw the devastating effects of that. He’s an author of a terrific book called, it’s a beautiful day to save lives. But he partnered with Michael J. Fox Foundation and a bunch of universities really trying to figure out how to heal Parkinson’s and to delay the onset as well as to mitigate the symptoms. So ordinary interview, anyone who’s dealing with that, or Has anyone in the family, then you’re going to want to listen to this podcast. That’s the guy also talks about his experiences in Macedonia, at the height of the ethnic cleansing over there in Bosnia 9697, you basically got chased and hunted. So at any rate, check out the podcast. It’s definitely worth your time. And thank you for listening to my pockets.
Brett so stoked to have you here. And thanks for coming on the podcast twice.
Brett Miller 1:36
Yeah, thank you so much for having me again, humbled and stoked to myself to be a part of this. I got to double dip here.
Mark Divine 1:44
Yeah, no, it was a perfect. So that first conversation was a warm up. Absolutely. Yes. Yeah. So how things going back here in the East Coast, you’re in Boston, right?
Brett Miller 1:53
Good. Yeah, we’re just outside Boston, about 2025 miles south heading towards Cape Cod, and Plymouth, most people familiar with that geography, we’re busier than ever, you know, we’re just starting to come out of the smoke from COVID-19. And we’re grinding and we’re back at it. You know, we consider ourselves the special operations of Parkinson’s wellness here. Any programming that you can ever think of any research program, any of the giant foundations that you think of like the Michael J. Fox Foundation, that Davis Finney Foundation, we do research for all those folks, as well as some of the big hospitals here in Boston, as well as some of the hospitals all across the country. So we’re jammin and we like it like that?
Mark Divine 2:32
Yeah, I’m sure you do. I want to come back to that and learn more about the work you’re doing there. But let’s get into Brad a little bit. First, let’s talk about kind of your early influences and what led you into the army and what that experience is like, and how did you get so passionate about wellness and all that? So let’s go backwards?
Brett Miller 2:49
Sure, yeah. You know, I brought up by a single mom for part of my life, you know, my mom worked. My brother and I were home alone, for most of the time, we were not with my grandfather. And, you know, we had a pretty simple childhood. And, you know, I was an overweight kid, really not into fitness not doing much. I used to fight a lot. When I was in school. I protected the kids from the bullies. And that was kind of my mantra when I was in elementary school and into junior high. And then I recognized the fact that I had to buckle down and get some good grades if I wanted to go anywhere in my life. And, you know, my mom was remarried to my dad, who I consider my dad, who was a First Marine Division Marine, he ran a tight ship. And he whipped us into shape and made us respectful young men. And I had a grandfather also who was in the same PT boat as John Kennedy. They were great friends. They lived in Nantasket, which is over here in the Boston area. They were very good friends for many years. And so we had a really great military background in history and my family. My brother then went on, he’s four years older than me to be a lifer in the 10th Mountain Division. Who are, you know, from there it was, you know, what did I want to do? When I graduated from high school, and I joined the army, I wanted to be a medic. And I knew that right out of the gate, from some experiences that I have that you’ll read about in my book that led me up until that time, and I wanted to be a soldier. But I also wanted to help people. And that was a perfect combination for me. Four days later of graduating high school, I found myself in boot camp in Fort Dix, New Jersey, as you know, you know, the struggle is real at that point in time. It’s quite a reality shock. And, you know, I just, you know, moved up through the ranks, I knew that I wanted to continue this process
Mark Divine 4:35
that, you know, I don’t want to just gloss over the experiences that showed you that you were meant to be or you perceived, you’re meant to be in the healing, you know, medical profession. So you were part of an opportunity to save someone’s life, if I recall, right. Yes, as many times, so let’s talk about those. And why do you think that was? What happened from when
Brett Miller 4:56
I was young? Yeah. So my whole book is based on situations where I’m finding myself or the universe is finding for me places to be to rescue people or to save people’s lives. And as a young man starting out at the age of six, my brother fell through the ice and the cranberry bogs that we lived in. And he went under, but he went through and he was floating across. So I was unable to pull him through the ice right back out, and is what seemed a very long period of time, you know, he was under and coming up and hitting his head up against the ice, and I was trying to reach down, I thought I was going in the drink, too. Clearly, I’m still here. So we were able to get out. That was the first situation where I was presented with that type of sort of emergency care,
Unknown Speaker 5:43
if you will. Did he like come upon an opening? Or how did you get him out?
Unknown Speaker 5:48
He came back into the opening that he originally had gone into. And again, we had no business being there. We were throwing rocks into the ice, and he slipped and went in the drink. But fortunately, like I said, we’re still Well, both of us, it sort of rolled into that for me, you know, at the age of seven, I was caught in an undertow with a young friend of mine who didn’t know how to swim well. And he was drugged into the ocean, I couldn’t find him. And then I finally found them and pulling them out of the water. I mean, and these situations kept happening for me as a young person, as you’ll read in my book. And that’s sort of, you know, the gateway, I think, for me to recognize that my destiny was to be a medic and to help people.
Mark Divine 6:28
So you, you went in the Army with that intention? Got through boot camp, and infantry school, right. And then you went to did you go right to medic school after that?
Brett Miller 6:36
Correct? Yes. Specialty school for medic. Yeah, San Antonio Fort Sam Houston.
Mark Divine 6:40
Okay. And tell us about some of the experiences you had in the army. Did you go to war? What was that like?
Brett Miller 6:45
So I write in my book about two chapters. I’m very humble and who I was as a soldier. But, you know, I talked about a couple, a couple of things that I thought the world should know about. And one of those things was, I was split from my team and was actually picked up by what’s called the European Command, or what we call EUCOM for the joint contact team program, when the whole Bosnian conflict had occurred. And I was really high speed. And like I said, I thrived on being a really great medic. And I was pulled out of my team and brought out there and sort of pretty much just kind of put into this gigantic mess for those of you out there that are unaware of the massacre of sub Bronica that occurred in 1995. There were 8000 children and men who were chased into the woods and murdered in two days, the whole form of ethnic cleansing in Bosnia was real and alive, there were about 1.3 million refugees, that all military branches from different parts of the world, were trying to move all these people to Tuzla airport and to different places where there were refugee camps to get them to places of safety. So Sweden, Germany, Albania, all these other countries were participating. And my job was in Macedonia, I was sent to scope J, Macedonia, and I was put in charge of trying to triage injured and people who had been displaced from their families with the military in scope J. And they live in very archaic, comparative to the United States, their hospitals are stainless steel bowls with not the cleanest type of atmosphere, a lot of homeless children, people still with, you know, amputations from other landmine issues. And so it was just this giant, chaotic situation where it started weighing itself pretty heavy for me, where I was, you know, striving to take all of this in while I was trying to work and be the best medic, I could, you know, thank God for the Dayton piece of code that sort of slowed that down, but postwar Macedonia was a disaster. So I write about that in my book leading up to one of my next missions, again, I was by myself and was trying to be a part of a humanitarian operation through NATO. You know, I was in a NATO Humvee being escorted across the borders into Albania, where we were tracked down by some rebels. For those you again, historically, in 1997, you know, Albania was ramping up, they rebelled against their government, there was a lot of tumultuous sensation there already, when we were heading out to the Capitol a Tarana. When we then were being pursued by what I can only assume as rebels. And for those of you out there, all you military folks and stuff, you know, the only thing that’s going to happen there is you’re either going to be executed, put up for ransom, or you’re going to be tortured. And I knew that was a fact and again, on these humanitarian missions, you know, no weapons, you’re not allowed to carry those things. Again, I was a combat medic,
Mark Divine 9:38
they didn’t care that you are un at this point, you’re just summon an opportunity for them to extract either Revengeance or get some money.
Brett Miller 9:46
Yeah. And, you know, for all you out there, you know, the Geneva Convention is an interesting convention. You know, the United States adheres to that, but that’s not true in other countries, and that’s real. Luckily for me, I’m going to leave it to the book because, uh, you know, I’m alive and I’m here and I am well But that was probably the tipping point for me, that kind of led into my discharge from the military and then also into a lot of human issues that, you know, PTSD and things of that nature. Okay,
Unknown Speaker 10:12
So let’s talk about that you transition. That was a fairly traumatic event, you escaped with your life, obviously. And let’s talk about your journey back home reintegration into, you know, civil life and dealing with like a lot of vets do most vets the trauma of that reintegration and posttraumatic stress, and how did you handle that? What were some of the key inflection points that would be interesting and valuable for the listeners?
Unknown Speaker 10:37
Yeah, one of them was, you know, actually talking to some of my team members about the guilt that I was experiencing about leaving, because I just couldn’t get my act together. When I got home, you know, I had a lot of busyness in my head, if you will. And I was stuffing it down, I think, for years at that point. But I had a lot of fear that I was unaware of a lot of guilt of leaving, because I had been with these six men, you know, who are the finest men I know, in my life. So there was a lot of guilt. When I left, I went into my civilian world, I was able to go to college and finish up my degree and become a physical therapist. And life was good for me for a very long time until I got married, and started having children. And then I always tell people, I was like a lion in a cage. One day I woke up and I was pacing back and forth, thinking that it was going to be better than this. I was angry, I was isolating myself, there was all kinds of turbulence in my body. I just, I knew something was wrong. And I was thinking at the same time, I should be grateful for everything that I have. And so I was test that went down a very slippery slope, very quick mark for me, and like a lot of soldiers, you know, now they’re doing such a better job at transitioning people with liaisons and such. But you know, in 1998, that wasn’t really the case. And so I found myself using alcohol, to control my emotions and using anxiety medication, to control my emotions, and spiraling, spiraling, spiraling. I was working, I had money, I own two homes, I had cars, but I had nothing. You know, I was just not identifying with myself to the point where, you know, everybody has a turn back point right? Where you’re feel that sensation of wanting to quit, I’m sure you have that probably in buds and you know, a lot of other people in this world where you get the turning point where you know that if you stop at that point, there is no guarantee that nothing will ever come for me. It was a pistol down my throat was sitting in a car on the side of the road, getting ready to blow my brains out. Wow. That’s where it took me and a couple of years really quick.
Mark Divine 12:45
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I think well let’s just talk about this in the broader context. Now that you know and we know a little bit more about what happens in to veterans and others who are exposing themselves to TBI and to that kind of trauma. It doesn’t always show up. You know right away you would think it does, but it’s often You know, insidiously slow. And from what I’ve learned a lot of it has to do with massive hormonal imbalances, right? You’re just not producing the right happy hormones, which means you’re producing the stress hormones. And you know, the relentlessness of that day in and day out suddenly is sending more and more out of balance, that your moods, your attitude, your optimism, your whole world starts to close in, right?
Brett Miller 15:24
You’re overdosed on cortisol. I mean, the cortisol levels are probably through the roof, right? Your adrenaline, you’re thinking you’re still somewhere, but you’re not there. And, you know, you’re looking for the exits in church, you’re looking for the exits and buildings, you’re looking at humans and judging them based on how they look, you know, it’s character assassination, I call it, it’s a scary place to be
Unknown Speaker 15:43
And so what can we say to vets or anybody especially, this is not just vets like, people suffering from the trauma COVID can have this kind of imbalance and start to creep up on and that’s one of the reasons we’re seeing the great resignation. What are the warning signs? And what can we do to really interrupt this earlier than putting a frickin gun in your mouth? And asking yourself the question?
Brett Miller 16:05
Well, one of the things is, you know, if you are a friend, or you’re a family member of a veteran, or somebody who you know, that may have had some issues with PTSD, or like you said, traumatic brain injury, concussion, you want to watch for obviously, you know, isolation techniques, where people start to move themselves away from socialization crowds, and also just watching their behavior when you’re with them. Are they quiet? Are they not really open about their feelings? You know, those are the some of the things that I noticed, primarily is that people start to isolate and withdraw from society. And it’s hard with COVID, right, because people are withdrawing from society, because it COVID At this point. So again, I go back to the buddy checks, you know, I still call my team members, you know, how you doing every couple months, you know, and we get together every once in a while, but we’re kind of spread across the country. But you know, it’s, you really got to be keen about that. And if you’re somebody who’s actually suffering, and I know this is hard, but it saved my life, and I waited 40 some odd years to do it was you got to ask for help. And it can be a friend, it can be a family member, you’ve got to ask for help. Because like you said, it’s so insidious, and occurs so quickly, that you find yourself standing on top of the bridge faster than you ever thought you would, thinking that you don’t have a purpose, and you have a huge purpose, you know? So that’s my biggest thing. I always tell people, you got to ask for help. Don’t wait, ask for help.
Mark Divine 17:27
So how did you find out, we left us for you, you know, pointing a gun down your throat, what happened next, to suddenly change?
Brett Miller 17:34
So my phone rang.
Unknown Speaker 17:36
Thank God, divine intervention there.
Unknown Speaker 17:39
I talk about my faith and about divine intervention and universal given gifts. And we can talk about that. But my phone rang. And it was my friend Paul, who was at an AA meeting, looking for me, his words to me, and I’ll never forget them was you never have to do this again. And you never have to be alone again. Just walk through the door and come have a cup of coffee is what he said to me. And supernatural selection. I don’t know. But it was enough from that day, February 10. That I never picked up a drink again in my life. And it’s been over 12 years for me.
Mark Divine 18:16
Was that an instantaneous thing? Or was it the 12 step process itself and the whole kind of community of a that really cemented?
Brett Miller 18:24
It was a process and it’s a lot of work, you know, hitting your knees every day when you wake up, doing the work, journaling, meditating, exercising, hydrating, eating? Well, I mean, the whole gamut, Mark, you know, and I still follow that to this day, because I also can still see when I start to veer off a little bit from who Bret Miller is. And the other thing that I always like to tell people is, if you don’t know what to do, and you can’t ask for help, go help somebody else. And that is huge. And that’s part of that a vertical to Yeah, reaching out and Exactly. Call stepping. Sure. So it’s a huge process. It doesn’t happen like that, you know, is it a, you know, a spiritual awakening? I’m sure it is. But then there’s work to be done just like anything in life.
Mark Divine 19:10
It’s a practice, it’s a daily practice. I want to ask you something, because I’ve been studying and reading a lot about how research on psychedelics is really, and I’ve had a lot of experience with that. And SEALs who have experience complete transformation, the cyber silan and other remedies, let’s say natural. And I also think there’s research around the benefit for Parkinson’s and other mental disease. So have you ever experienced that or is it something that you’ve researched or have an article?
Brett Miller 19:41
Yes, clearly, you know, the world is, most people know about the use of CBD. And we use something that’s a little bit different than that here at one time fitness. It’s called CBG Canada journal, and that’s an extract that’s a little bit different than your CBD. And we use it for sleep, and we use it for pain management. So why do people with Parkinson’s disease have terrible, terrible time sleeping. And so we use that product, we also use some of the Rabban SOPs and things of that nature. But again, I use a straight up organic form of all of those things that I get from a guy up in Oregon over your way, who has a veteran run organic hemp farm, because there’s a lot of chemicals in those products if you’re buying them off the shelf. The other thing that we have, which is an actual FDA approved medication mark is there was a PhD guy up in Vermont, who was using LSD, and looking at the extracts from that and which neurotransmitters that the LSD was affecting. And he was able to, instead of sort of the technique that most people use is kind of like a spray and pray you hit all the neurotransmitters in hopes that your tremor goes away or your dyskinesia goes away, they were able to use the LSD and find out the exact receptors that cause some of these things in Parkinson’s, and they made a medication to then just address the Wonder receptor. That is the cause for the dopamine cells to utilize for different parts of Parkinson’s.
Unknown Speaker 21:08
Has there been any work with psilocybin and micro dosing? In terms of its impact on Parkinson’s? I know that they’re doing that with regards to posttraumatic stress. And yes, and so this has been shown to have a really positive impact on addiction, especially smoking and alcohol. But I imagine it has an effect on Parkinson’s as well. I mean, it will be shown to
Brett Miller 21:25
you would think so at this point, right now, they are not a lot of the technology. And the science right now is leading to genetic issues. And so they’re doing a lot with the CRISPR techniques with gene editing, and things of that nature. I just came off of a huge research roundtable in New York City with the Fox Foundation, and a lot of it is we know that there’s three genes that are responsible for Parkinson’s, we think there’s about 52. So the scientists are looking for that and ways to figure out how they can either interrupt genetic protein folding or what we call genetic editing, we can actually change the DNA structure. So how do you get
Mark Divine 22:01
interested in Well, first you started your gym, but did you start to focus on Parkinson patients or did that just kind of evolved? And how did that evolve?
Unknown Speaker 22:07
So I started it for Parkinson’s and then it evolved into an all inclusive, our primary purpose is Parkinson’s. We’re the largest in the world, but we actually do programming for disabled vets, disabled youth, disabled adults, people with TBI concussion. I have all kinds of neuro technology programs that I use here. We also do programming for women who’ve been affected by domestic violence. So it’s kind of like a niche program for very specific disorders, diseases, abilities, disabilities. So I was working in the boxing world, professional boxing, I’ve trained professional fighters, Olympic fighters. And one of the things that came out of ironically from boxing was that if you train someone without the contact as a professional fighter, they found that Parkinson’s symptoms started to decrease. And this happened about 12 years ago. A lot of people jumped on them,
Mark Divine 22:57
training them for boxing but training a Parkinson’s patient with a kind of bilateral visit for boxing shadowbox.
Brett Miller 23:04
Yeah, yeah, as if they’re boxing. So network battle ropes, speed bag, heavy bag, double index, anything, you would train like a professional fighter, minus the contact clearly. Yeah, in any event, I jumped on that bandwagon because I was a physical therapist working in professional fighting. So I had like the best of both worlds. I started a very, very small program as an aside from my other business five years ago, and we moved within a year we started out with two people, we had about 50 people in about three months, and I needed a bigger space. And nowadays, we see about 200 people a week that come through our facility here with Parkinson’s disease,
Unknown Speaker 23:40
pre pandemic, so you get a protocol of exercise, you know, this boxing protocols, nutrition CBG, the whole work right by it.
Brett Miller 23:49
Yeah, you know, I preach a lot that you talk about, you know, this total health. So it’s nutrition, hydration, unfortunately, there is some medication that people have to take. But then we do anything from yoga, mindful meditation. So we encompass the mental, spiritual, physical components. So all three of those things, and we find the speaking of I know, you’re familiar with the OODA Loop, I use the OODA loop for Parkinson’s folks. In other words, they look at what works for them, and they document all this stuff, so that if something else happens, they can then loop back and say, oh, yeah, back in June of 2018. This is what worked for that. And I need to go back to that. So that’s what we do here. We try to get people on a recipe for themselves, because they’re all snowflakes. Every single one of them has something that just tweaks out a little bit different. And so we put that all together and figure out you know, what is it going to be that works for you. So, I mean, we do drumming, ballroom dancing. I do boxing, underwater. So I do a program on the wall in the water. So anything you could ever think of. We do all that at the gym or do you just prescribe it? No, everything is done here in the facility. We have Reiki massage. We have a full art workshop we paint, we sculpt We all pottery Yeah, so much
Mark Divine 25:01
more than the gym? Why do you still call it 110 Fitness when it’s so much more?
Brett Miller 25:05
So 110 Fitness actually has a military reference to it. So my team we used to use the word 110 is like a verb you like, can you 110 That? Or? Hey, 110 you want to get that for me? And so this space is actually dedicated to my military team.
Mark Divine 25:18
Got it makes a lot of sense. Yeah. Do you have any idea what causes Parkinson’s? I mean, I hear that as they use this set, it was genetic. What’s the background of Parkinson’s? And is there hope to cure it?
Brett Miller 25:29
Yes, there is a lot of hope to cure it. And again, let me just step back mark, and just tell you this. So there’s about 3% of the people in our country, are veterans with Parkinson’s disease, which the economic burden is about $1.6 billion for the VA to care for these people a year. So there is a drive for a cure at this point in time, obviously, that’s very, very big. The biggest Foundation, like I talked about Michael J. Fox Foundation, you know, their drive, they’ve raised a billion dollars in 20 years, and their focus is cure cure cure. What they’re finding is that there is we never thought it was a genetic issue. But now we know that it’s a large genetic issue, probably like 90% genetics. The other issue that we know about, especially because of veterans is that there’s some environmental exposure component, that is the trigger that then put somebody into that movement disorder, Parkinson’s, agent, orange burn pits, in the case of Cherry Hill, the dry cleaning vents, that were venting into the barracks, the water issue they had there. So some sort of like pesticide or some sort of like fertilizer. So there’s about three, like I said, there’s three genes that we know of like gap one, and lurk two, they call it L, rk to gene that. If you have that, and you have that activity that’s increased, again, everything goes back to the gut, right? So we’re finding it in the gut, and then it goes through the blood brain barrier via the vagus nerve or through your blood, what we’re trying to do is to figure out how many other genes are responsible? And is there a way that we can stop the gene from transferring up? So we’re doing genetic testing now with families of people with Parkinson’s, so that we can kind of include them in the studies to then see if, if I have that gene? What if I don’t get Parkinson’s? Or will I always so there’s a lot of questions out there, but a lot of it’s headed in the direction of genetics, and autoimmune or immunology disorders. It’s fascinating. I could go on.
Mark Divine 27:29
Yeah, no, it’s best. So the CRISPR stuff is basically gene editing or trying to change the expression of the genes correct. And then the rest of the work is really about slowing down and tamping the side effects right of Parkinson’s.
Brett Miller 27:41
The best thing we can do right now is manage the symptoms but we know with high intensity interval training exercise, that we’re able to do that along with a some people are on medication, some people are not, but with the right medications, we can almost make you appear as if you don’t have Parkinson’s disease.
Mark Divine 28:00
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Now with Michael Fox, is he doing those types of therapies or is it you know, you have to be kind of Yong, when you get into this, like, is he doing high intensity training and all that kind of stuff?
Brett Miller 30:04
He is yes, as best he can. He’s had some recent medical things that have set him back. He had a terrible fall. And he also had a cancerous tumor in his spinal canal. So he’s been setback. I saw him two weeks ago. He’s doing phenomenal. Outside of his speech, his walking is much better than when I last saw him, really. But I also know that he is also using I do research for companies all over the world that use different wearable devices that help with like tremor. And so I know that he’s been playing around with some of those as well. You know, he’s got first dibs at everything. Right. And of course, he’s a great guy.
Mark Divine 30:38
I think he’s my age, right? Gotta be like, 58 or 60. Yeah,
Brett Miller 30:41
yeah, he’s had Parkinson’s for like, almost 30 years.
Mark Divine 30:44
And what’s the prognosis for longevity for someone that’s advanced Parkinson’s,
Brett Miller 30:49
it depends when you’re diagnosed. Yeah, if you’re a young onset, and you walk through my doors, I am very grateful to have you because early and often is the key. You got to get diagnosed early. And then you have to exercise often. And if we do that, some people have withheld or kept themselves at the same level that they had 10 years ago, through high intensity exercise and medication. So it really depends. And then there’s without getting into detail, there are also multiple different atypical forms of Parkinson’s. Some of them are extremely aggressive. And your prognosis from diagnosis is five to eight years and you’re dead. Oh, Ma. So there’s other forms of extremely aggressive types of Parkinson’s called PSP, or MSA, multiple systems atrophy, progressive Supranuclear palsy. So there’s these other forms that are just if you’re diagnosed? It’s a death sentence. Yeah, scary.
Mark Divine 31:39
It’s such valuable work. I mean, I really honor that you’re doing that I wish I had known about it when my father in law was going through these issues of quality of life for them. We tried to get them to do stuff, but like Tai Chi and Qigong, you might when you really needed to do more burpees and
Brett Miller 31:53
boxing, absolutely. Well, we do both. So you know, we do Qigong, and we do Tai Chi, but then you’re doing burpees. And we have our, the Fenway Spartan, which is coming up this week, on Sunday, we have 30, people with Parkinson’s doing the Fenway sprint with us, we have you know, climbing ropes here, you name it, we have a spear throwing, we have a climbing walls for people to jump over. So we swim, you know, we train as we fight, like I said, with the special operations here, we train as we fight, and we climb walls, and we climb ropes, and this is what’s expected of you. And just because you have Parkinson’s disease does not mean that you cannot do this, get back up and try again, let’s go. There’s a lot of tough love here. But there’s a reason why we are who we are, and why we’re doing what we’re doing.
Mark Divine 32:33
So as you look forward, what’s right, like in 10 years, what’s your future,
Brett Miller 32:39
Brett’s future is to keep doing what he’s doing, I am in the process of developing multiple other sites across the country, that’s my goal is to have a 110 fitness that’s available to someone like your father in law that’s available to somebody who’s out in the outskirts of Arkansas, so that they have ability, we created an app, it’s the first ever wellness app for Parkinson’s during COVID. So we have 18 categories, similar to what we do here. And so we’re offering that out to people as well, we gave it out free for a year during the COVID. And now we’re charging for it just to make back some of the money that it costs. They’re very expensive. So we’re hoping to do that. I want to still dig into the research and continue to do more and more research here, we’re already doing a lot, the biggest thing I want to do is, you know, my biggest thing that I always preach to people and, you know, comes from the Bible, and you know, too much is given much is required. And for me it’s to continue, from my own health, from what I came from, is to continue to give back on a daily basis in the truest form of humanity, which is helping other people. And in order for me to stay where I am with my own mental health. That’s what I have to do. And so that’s what I’m going to try to do for the next 10 years. What’s your vision for the future of this country and
Mark Divine 33:54
What’s your vision for the future of this country and of humanity?
Brett Miller 33:56
Well, I’m an optimist mark. My vision for the future. I would also say my hope for the future as well is and I believe that hope has a lot of strength is that as you know, the energy, and I know you feel this, I’m very much like you you’re very much like me, but this energy that you feel this chaos every day when you get up and you know, I don’t watch TV. I don’t listen to the news, but I feel energy from the earth. I have to process that because I’m an empath, right. And so, I know that better days are coming for all of us. And I feel like that that people are going to start to come down from this COVID craziness that we’re going to start to get reorganized and reengaged and refocused in our communities. But again, we need people like you and people like myself, we’re making differences within ourselves to then offer that to other people. And one by one, right. We become a circle of compassion. Right? And so there’s no exclusion there. I truly believe that’s where we’re headed. Because I think we’ve tipped so far. That It’s time to come back. And I think the younger generations, you know, I have a daughter who’s 16. And she’s amazing. And she has great focus on where she thinks this world should be. And I believe that there are a lot of people like her that are 16, looking at all the different problems that we have, whether it’s economical, or whether it’s racial injustice, or whether it’s the planet, you know,
Mark Divine 35:23
awesome, thanks for sharing that. And I really your vision, our vision, and and your mind is 100 million people in that circle of compassion or vibrating, universal love level, that are all vibrating right off of each other. Yeah, optimizing the sameness and so the separation, meeting with pieces of violence, the earth and healing the earth and all their actions, you know, so there’s basic expressions of that. Absolutely squeal that when we scale that, then.
Brett Miller 35:48
Yeah, just as an aside, one of the things that we do, we do drumming circles here, which I’m sure you’ve probably experienced, are extremely powerful. And we have a labyrinth that we put out on the floor, that’s gigantic, it covers our entire floor, and we walk the labyrinth while we drum. And one of the things I do is I use tuning forks, to the universal parts of the ohm, and bang them off. And then we actually run up to the top and down along people’s heads to try to bring them back to that. I’m a big vibration guy, that neutral position of the universal arm to kind of neutralize your brain.
Mark Divine 36:22
And it works, because that’s cool. Yeah, yeah,
Brett Miller 36:26
it’s awesome. Yeah, yeah, try it. It’s like 750 hertz.
Mark Divine 36:31
So how do people find you and what’s the name of your app, so people can search for that?
Brett Miller 36:35
Sure, the app is 110 Fitness. So the number 110 Fitness just like you see behind me here, you can find me multiple ways on the web at 110 fitness.org. Obviously, email B. Miller at 110 fitness.org. Nice. And my book is available on Amazon. It’s a beautiful day to save lives. And also, you can actually go to it’s a beautiful day to save lives.com and you can order the book direct.
Mark Divine 37:00
I love that title, by the way. Smile, and you got some great stories in there. So thanks for doing that.
Brett Miller 37:07
Yeah, thank you for reading it. Have to get into Boston someday and come see our facility.
Mark Divine 37:12
I would love to do that. When I’m out there be fantastic. Yeah, when flights are a little cheaper. And you know, this is kind of funny aside, but I was reading about a new concept. Executive Jet. That is like, one quarter of the cost of the current way to travel privately, is like $320 An hour versus while the $1,400 an hour. Wow. It’s shaped like a cylinder more like a cigar and super like. That’s the way I’m going to get back east in the future. Because I am so tired of commercial travel is literally one of the most negative experiences you know, and I feel completely drained when I do it.
Brett Miller 37:48
It is it’s draining. It’s exhausting. Yeah,
Mark Divine 37:50
I guess the best thing would be to beat me up but always soon, a little bit before somebody material I step into a box. Get me a tightness here at GM. Dr.
Unknown Speaker 38:05
Brett, thanks so much for your time. Thanks for your service. And all you do for those who are suffering with Parkinson’s. And that’s you know, because medic stress and Parkinson’s is really important work.
Brett Miller 38:14
Thank you for having me. It’s been an honor. Thanks for doing this podcast.
Thank you for having me again. Super. Appreciate it. Yeah. All right, my friend.
Mark Divine 38:26
All right. That’s the end of my podcast, folks.
I’m always humbled when I meet someone like Brett, who has dedicated his life to serving the underserved, disadvantaged in this case, people who are suffering from Parkinson’s, debilitating issue. So you can learn about him at 110 fitness.org. His book is great, beautiful day to save lives. Great title. If you have someone in your family, who is suffering, then get his app, small price to pay to take some of the daily actions that can really help moderate and reverse some of the symptoms too much is given much is required. So take that to heart because everyone listening to this much has been given. No question. So much is going to be required to us as this world transforms from our positive, abundant, authentic and compassionate world. So next time, this is Mark.
