#031 Huggy Bear McNiff | The Navy SEAL who doesn't believe in motivation

Huggy Bear McNiff is head coach at Trevor Kashey Nutrition and he's the Navy SEAL Michael Easter writes about in The Comfort Crisis. Kashey finished his undergraduate degree while he was still in high school and earned a PhD in biochemistry from the University of Arizona at twenty-three. Much of Easter's book revolves around his work, and Huggy has worked alongside him for more than ten years. He got there for a decidedly unscientific reason: he watched another strongman competitor show up looking spectacular out of nowhere and assumed the guy was on drugs. He asked. It wasn't drugs. His starting point is that most nutrition problems aren't nutrition problems at all. They're problems of autonomy, of environment, and of missing skills. From there the conversation stops being about food and becomes about how behavior actually changes. In this episode he explains why he doesn't believe in motivation or willpower, why he argues that punishment produces better criminals rather than fewer of them, what separates confidence from efficacy, and why he says things are only hard because you lack a skill that would make them easy. He also talks about telling loneliness apart from being alone by choice, why reading without a specific problem to solve is wasted time, and the question he returns to all episode and learned from Kashey: what problem are you trying to solve? Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices