[00:57]

[Luke] Right, Andy. How the hell did you get into the insurance game? I know what you do is not exactly insurance, but the institutional aspect of our society is something I just am completely oblivious to. Mm-hmm. Even if I saw a really big problem like health insurance, a guy like me would have zero idea how to even begin to envision something different

[Andy] Yeah, I mean, this was my, this is my second healthcare company actually. Okay. And I swore after my first one I wasn't gonna do this again 'cause it's just so much government intervention, so much regulatory intervention, so many perverse incentives from the players within healthcare, and we can talk more about that. But I was like, "Man, I'm never gonna do this again. This is terrible." But I sold my last company, and I, you know, didn't have health insurance 'cause most of us get health insurance through our employer. And so I went to the Affordable Care Act, which I thought was my only option at that time, and I got a plan for me, my wife, and my two girls. And I think it was e- 11 or 1200 bucks a month, something like that. And I was like, "All right. Well, I guess this is my only option." and I joke it worked until I had to use it. my little one Of course.... was one at the time, and she was having recurring ear infections, and so we finally... You know, she was screaming bloody murder day and night, so we went to the ear, nose, and throat doctor. He's like, "She's got a hole in her eardrum." So the fluid in her ears was building up, and it was bursting her eardrum over and over and over again. And we're like, "All right, so what do we do?" And he's like, "No big deal. We can do this procedure. It's 15 minutes. Let's get it scheduled." Great. So we got it scheduled. We did everything right. We went in-network. We did everything we're supposed to do with the health insurance plan, and so we got out of that and, you know, it was 15 minutes. we were, I think, in and out of the hospital in 45 minutes or an hour or something like that, and we got the bill, and it was $8,000 for a 15-minute procedure. And I was just like, "Holy crap." Wow. Like, wouldn't we love that hourly rate? Like, that's crazy to me. And I was like, "But this is what health insurance is for." Like, this is... I hadn't really used health insurance ever before, so I didn't really know how it all worked. And then I got a note from my insurance plan, I think it was, like, three or four weeks later, and it says, "Medically unnecessary," so they weren't gonna pay the bill. I'm like, "Hold on a second. We have an ear, nose, and throat doctor who said she's got a hole in her eardrum, and you're saying this is not medically necessary? Like, that's crazy to me." And so we went through two rounds of appeals, and they were like, "Nope, we're not paying for it." So I had to stroke an $8,000 check for this procedure. And at that point I was like, "This system is busted." So I called my health insurance plan. I said, "Look, if you're not gonna pay my bills, I'm not paying your bills. I refuse." and so I quit health insurance. And I looked at my wife and I said, "Hey, honey, we're uninsured." And she kinda looked at me quizzically like, "Okay?" Her, like many of us, are just conditioned to think like, "Oh, you have to have health insurance." And so we started paying directly. And what we found is when we started paying directly, we were getting way better prices than if we had health insurance. So the pediatrician, we'd show up, and we're like, "We're just gonna pay you direct. We're cash pay." And they're like, "Oh, great. We'll take 40 or 50% off of your bill." And I was like, "Well, hold on a second. Like, what? I thought these big health insurance plans are some of the biggest companies in the world, were supposed to be negotiating for me to get me really good rates." But what I found out is that, no, we-- that's not actually the case. And so, man, I just started looking around, and what I found out was that two hundred and fifty thousand families go bankrupt every year due to a medical event, even though they have health insurance, which is totally crazy to me. Oh. and thirty percent of the population, sometimes higher, you know, depending on what the data, has medical debt, even though they have health insurance. And so, man, when I see a problem, I wanna go and try to solve it. And so I went through this kind of exploratory period of figuring out, you know, I can pay for a pediatric visit, but what happens if I have cancer? So it was a personal problem. I was like, "Man, what if I get Andy and Luke and all these people together in a community, and if somebody in that community have a, has a big health problem, then we can fund each other?" And so that was kind of the genesis of the idea. Like many entrepreneurs, you know, it's, you have a problem, nobody else is trying to solve it, and so you're like, "Man, I'm gonna go and try to solve it." And oftentimes it's as a, as a result of some, you know, pain or affliction of some kind that it finally, you know, starts that flame to say, "I'm gonna go and figure out this problem." So that was the origin story of CrowdHealth.

[05:27]

[Luke] I mean, it just seems, uh... I mean, I can definitely understand the pain to purpose aspect of it. It just, you know, doing something like that, to me, of course, I always think, "Well, could I do that?" It just seems so daunting because you have this system that is so I don't know. It's like we're all so indoctrinated into Mm-hmm... and at least believe we're dependent upon it, but it's got some inertia, you know what I mean? Yeah. It's like the way things are have been that way for a long time, and they're only getting worse, so it's like, it just seems like it's like, it's like if you were trying to reinvent the computer or something, you know? It's just like, well, they're already kind of doing it. It's Yeah... you know, but it sounds like, and we're gonna cover what you've done with CrowdHealth obviously, but it sounds like you know, rather than trying to compete, you just went, "Cool. You guys keep your little scam going over here, and we're just gonna build something totally different."

[Andy] Yeah. I think I've always had that contrarian type of personality. We can probably psychoanalyze it if we want. Yeah. But it's always like if there's a system that is going directionally the wrong way, I think people have almost a moral obligation to step up and say, "If I think I potentially have the skill set to go and try to change that, then man, let's go and try to change it," especially when, you know, human suffering is involved. You know, I think our healthcare system right now is built upon human suffering and not healthcare. I mean, the Yeah... in healthcare has really been, you know, has exited stage left many times in our system, and so I felt much of a moral obligation to go and do this. And so, you know, we've been able to build a company that's more missional as opposed to profit focused. Yeah. I did great on my first one. I could be, you know, swimming in Lake Travis or, you know, playing golf every day, but this is one where I felt just like deep in my soul of being like, "Somebody's gotta change this," 'cause so many people are suffering as a result of this system. And so I thought, "Hey, I'm in a position now where I can take a swing at it, and if it fails, that's okay," you know, but at least I tried. Yeah. and so that's kind of the impetus for going and at least giving this a shot.

[Luke] So cool, man. Well, when I found out what you guys were doing, I was really, was and am really excited to share with people. I mean, a lot of what we talk about on this show is alternative health and healing, right? Yeah. It's like, I mean, I have doctors and scientists and things like that on, but they're typically skewed more toward natural approaches and solutions rather than, you know, the allopathic system of treating symptoms and oftentimes having those treatments make the underlying cause worse

[Andy] Yeah

[Luke] And ignored, you know?

[Andy] Yeah. Well, within our system, we're forced into that allopathic system.

[Luke] Exactly.

[Andy] Right? And so it's like, can you provide a service that allows you to exit the allopathic system into a much more natural-based... And you have the choice. Like, you can go the allopathic route, or you can go a bit more of a natural route, and we allow our members to do that, which is another really important thing for me, 'cause what I was finding with the allopathic system, and it's much, it's driven from the top, the insurance system, is you go to a doctor, the doctor is now spending about 10 minutes with you, I think is the last number that I saw. It's eight to 10 minutes with you. There's no way I can get to talking to you, Luke, about, you know, what are you eating? What are you... How are you sleeping? how... Are you working out? Are you treating your body right? Like, you just don't have that opportunity within an eight to 10-minute period. And so they come in with a symptom, and so they want you to leave without symptoms, and so they give you a medication, a drug, a prescription to do that. And so they don't have the time to get deep into the root cause of what we're doing, and so we're letting these chronic conditions being literally just medicated as opposed to solved, and that's another part of the system where I was just like, "This just isn't right. we need to give people other options to go and get treatment in whatever way they and their doctor wanna go and get that treatment without a government or insurance or your corporation or whatever getting in the middle of that." And so that's a super important part of what we built at CrowdHealth as well.

[09:39]

[Luke] Yeah. Well, you know, you mentioned The human suffering element of it and that being a huge motivator, and thinking about just the suffering, the financial suffering. Yeah. You mentioned this stat of people going bankrupt. I mean, I've never filed for bankruptcy. I'm sure I've been in places where I could have or should have, you know, various times in life. But my understanding of bankruptcy, for example, is like you're now at ground zero, and you have to basically rebuild your entire financial and, in some cases, professional life. It's not just like you got out of jail free card. Yeah. It's like you're nuking your whole credit profile, and then you can't get a loan on a house, and so on and so on, you know. So it's like apart from just people not getting the care they need when you're trying to stay alive or keep someone you love alive and you're decimated financially, that's also not good for your health. You know what I mean?

[Andy] Yeah.

[Luke] It's like if you have someone who has a chronic disease and now all of a sudden they're flattened by, you know, a financial burden because they had no other choice, it's like how can you ever expect to get well? I mean, it seems like an endless pit that someone would be kind of digging that's gnarly.

[Andy] Yeah, and I think the other part of that too is the example you gave is more of an acute example, but I think that what we've seen in the middle class over the last 40 years is that they have not, if you adjust for healthcare costs, they haven't gotten a pay raise in 40 years. And so these healthcare costs, increasing healthcare costs, I think driven by the payer of healthcare, which is insurance generally, are keeping people from being able to move up the ladder. So they're stuck in this middle class, and that's a tragedy to me that people... I mean, that's anti-American dream, right? Like Yeah... should be able to, you know, make your way up in-into the upper echelons of society. You can't do that because you're stuck with health insurance. You know, the other crazy stat that I saw, you know, six months ago or so was somewhere between two and four million people would go and do something entrepreneurial if it weren't for health insurance And Oh, wow That's limiting people's ability to go and innovate. Again, that's the American spirit. Let's go and give the people the ability to innovate, and, you know, we've heard hundreds of times with CrowdHealth of people being like, "Man, I can go and do something entrepreneurial now that I'm not having to rely upon my corporate health insurance 'cause I have a, actually have something that's, you know, affordable." Yeah... the other thing we're hearing is moms who wanna stay home with their kids, but they have to work because of health insurance, are now able to say, "you know what? I'm gonna do what I think is God's work, which is be home with my kids and raise my kids." And so they're able to do that as well. so there's so many limitations put on our life because of health insurance, which is just a crazy thing to think about.

[Luke] Yeah. It's I mean, it's just such a, it's such a scam is what it is. Let me just call it what it is.

[Andy] I have no problem using that word.

[Luke] I Definitely a scam... I was telling you earlier, you know, when I was, when I learned how to start adulting I used to work in the entertainment industry, and we had really great insurance in in Hollywood. You know, it's part of the unions Yeah... whatnot. And then when I left that career, I was like, "Oh, shit, I don't have that great insurance." I mean, it covered, like, acupuncture and chiropractic- Yeah... and all kinds of cool stuff, right? So I would, I would actually use it a lot and really have very little out-of-pocket expense. But when I left that industry, and thus left that insurance behind, I was like, "Oh, cool. I'll just go get my own insurance," and then was shocked and dismayed not only at the cost and the fact that it wouldn't cover the things that a guy like me goes and Mm-hmm... like acupuncture, chiropractic, or whatever, or working with a functional medicine practitioner, but it was also this... It's so confusing to even get it. There's a whole other kind of layer to the scam, which is, like, insurance brokers.

[13:26]

[Andy] Yeah.

[Luke] Like, I can't just call Blue Cross and be like, "Yeah, this is my agent name, and it's me and my wife. We want insurance. What do you got?" It's like I gotta go through this broker thing. I'm like, "What are we doing here?" You know? Then they send me these pamphlets that I can't read, then, like, now I'm on the phone with a broker just going, "Make this make sense." You know? It's just, like, so it's so confusing, and it seems to be, I mean not to spin everything negative, but if they wanted it to be more simplified, I believe they could. You know, the day. It seems like the whole thing is just, like, overwhelming and time-consuming, so consumers like us just go, "Ah, I guess this is the way it is." And Yeah... we just pay, and we pay the broker and however. I guess they get paid by the insurance company. But when I finally did that, it was like 1,400 bucks a month or something, and I go to the doctor every 10 years. You know what I mean? Yeah. But then you think about- And they're

[Andy] Not paying for the stuff that you want.

[Luke] Yeah, totally. Yeah. Yeah. And then, you know, of course, you have that thing in the back of your mind, well, if I get hit by a bus or-

[Andy] Yeah...

[Luke] Something like that, I don't wanna be out of pocket or in debt for a couple hundred grand with a, you know, hospital. So, oh, I better have it. But at a certain point, I was just thinking, you know, I was looking at my bookkeeping going, "How much a year?" It's like, "Nah, I'd... I'll take my chances," you know? Yeah. Which probably isn't smart. I mean, I don't have kids, so it's, you know, it's just, like, us fending for ourselves. I think I'd probably be a little more concerned if you had little ones, you know. They're prone to accidents and stuff like that. But what I'd like to do if you're willing and able, I'd like to kinda open the curtain and have you explain to the people watching and listening, like, how the system actually works. Yeah. I'm sure I'm not the only guy that's went and got an MRI and then had an issue with my insurance company and say it was eight grand or something, right? And I'm like, "Ah, the co-pay is really high." Then I call the MRI clinic and I'm like, "Yeah, can I just pay?" And they're like, "Sure, it's 200 bucks." You know? It's like, what is happening here? Amazing. You know? It's just, it's so convoluted and confusing. So can you give us kind of a bird's eye view reality check of what is happening with the health insurance, which is even a weird term for it because they're not insuring your health, right? It's more like medical insurance maybe.

[Andy] Yeah.

[Luke] So give us kinda the overview of what we're dealing with right now, and then we can talk about, you know, solutions that you've created.

[Andy] Yeah. I mean, I hear it a lot. Healthcare is really complex, and I think I can simplify it for people that they understand why it is going the way it's going. You know, since you have the buyer and seller of healthcare, you know, the seller of healthcare is big hospital systems typically. They're the ones that are providing the services, and they want the price to be as high as possible. You know, they're a service provider. I mean, that makes sense. They want the price to go up. That's great. But the buyer of healthcare is health insurance. The... And so they, what people don't understand is that they actually want the price to go up as well. And so the way that this works is the government has basically said, "Look, health insurance plans, we don't want you to, you know, profit from this too much." And so they limit your profit to 15% of your premiums So if you're paying, just for easy math, $1,000 a month, the health insurance plans can make $150 a month. And so how do they increase their profits from 150 to, say, 10%, to 165? Well, your premium has to go from 1,000 to 1,100. So in essence, what you have is the seller of healthcare hospital systems, they want the price to go up. The buyer of healthcare, insurance companies, they want the price to go up. And so any good or service in which the buyer and the seller have incentives to see the price go up The price is going up, right? Right. So there's no market forces-... that are trying to drive these prices down. And so it's oligopoly against oligopoly. And so in economic terms, basically what they do is wink at each other. You know, as long as you don't get in trouble with the regulators, you can just see prices go up 5, 6, 7, 8%, and the regulators won't push back on you. And so they just keep allowing it to happen. And anybody who understands compounding, 5, 6, 7, 8% year over year, over year, over year, gets us to this place today, which many people like you say, "I'm not doing this anymore. Like, this is crazy." And so they, the healthy ones, are coming out of the system. And since the healthy ones are subsidizing the unhealthy ones, the pool that you have left is becoming more unhealthy. And so Right... prices are going up significantly because it's mostly unhealthy people now in the system. And so that's the way that the system is happening, and it's all because of these perverse incentives that keeps market forces from driving down the price. You had a perfect example where if you go in and you say, "Hey, can I just pay in cash?" They'll be like, "Oh yeah, we'll drop your price a ton." Well, why do they do that? It's because the doctor is spending somewhere between 12 and 16 hours a week fighting to get paid. So, you know, anybody who's listening who has an employer, imagine five days of your week, two of them, you're fighting with your employer just to get paid, which means you're not working, you're not generating revenue, you're not being productive. And so when you go into a doctor and say, "I'll pay you now," he or she doesn't have to go through that battle. They don't have to pay for the billers. They're paying a percent or 2% on your credit card when you give them your credit card, and so they're willing to give you a significantly lower rate because they don't have to go through all the burea- bureaucratic paperwork on the back end. I have a similar example to you where I was having chest pain, so I went to the... I thought I was, I was having a heart attack or something. I was like... went to the cardiologist and he's like, "I think you just have a pinched nerve, but why don't you just do like a stress echo test?" And he's like, "You know, insurance, you, insurance will pay for it." I'm like, "Uh, no, I don't have insurance. I'm paying cash." And he looked at me and he's like, "Really?" I was like, "Yeah." And he's like, "Oh, great. Well, then you can get this for like 200 or 225 bucks." And I was like, "Great." So I went it, got it, 225 bucks. I put this on social media and somebody reached out to me and said, "I had that exact same procedure, same CPT code," which is the codes that the healthcare use, and his health insurance plan cost it it cost to his health insurance plan $5,000.

[19:52]

[Luke] Oh my God.

[Andy] So went from 5,000 to 250 or 225, whatever it was, just because I was paying them directly Like, that's the craziness of our system, but that's what makes our model work is because we enable everybody to go and just pay them directly so the doctor doesn't have to do all this bureaucratic nonsense to get paid.

[Luke] Right.

[Andy] That is the crux of what makes this kind of community-based- Yeah. Mm... cash pay system work.

[Luke] Well, that's a really good explanation. I was actually able to follow you through that. Yeah. I think, I think the big piece there for me is as a consumer, I always felt like I was the buyer of the services, so your framing of it that it's like you have two entities, the buyer and the seller, are kind of in cahoots, the wink-wink agreement that they have and the way the system is set up, I just never looked at it like that way. Yeah. But you can see it's incentivized for those two parties, not the third party, which is I guess you're the customer of the insurance company, and they're the intermediary between you and said service provider- Exactly... at the top, the hospital at the top.

[Andy] So I always say, like, patients aren't the consumers. The consumers are the ones paying for it. You're... That's the, that's the insurance company. And so when you're not paying for a product, you are the product. We are products of the health insurance system or the healthcare system.

[Luke] Oh, right.

[Andy] Right? Right. I mean, in reality, Yeah... you know, I go, I go to, you know, Instagram and it's free, right? I am now the product 'cause they're selling stuff to me, like advertising and marketing and all that kind of stuff. I'm not actually the consumer. I'm the product of that system. And so we as patients are the product of the healthcare system if you're allowing insurance to pay.

[Luke] Right.

[Andy] That totally changes when you go to the doctor and say, "I'm paying you directly." You now answer to me, not the insurance company.

[Luke] Right.

[Andy] And now we do what I want you to do as opposed to what the insurance company says that you can do. And to me, that's healthcare freedom because it's now me and the doctor as opposed to a third party dictating what they can and cannot do to get paid, and that's a pretty big, pretty significant change between a health insurance being the payer versus you being the payer.

[Luke] Right.

[Andy] And I will tell you, when I told the doctor that, his whole demeanor changed. He's like, "Oh, we can do what we wanna do." Like, "Yeah, let's do what we wanna do."

[Luke] All right. Most of us know we should be eating more nutrient-dense plants, but getting enough of them in your diet to make a dent, that's where things tend to fall apart for me, and I'm guessing for some of you, too. You might think, "Well, just use a green powder, right?" Okay, but if you can't trace the ingredients back to their source, how do you know what you're actually getting? Urban Roots Farms grows their plants in Scottsdale, Arizona, then harvests, freeze-dries, and powders them all under the same roof. Their products start with seven organic microgreens. You got broccoli, kale, red cabbage, radish, arugula, pea tendrils, and beets harvested at peak nutrient density. That's their True Micro blend. It's those seven greens and nothing else, just a potent whole food powder that's super easy to work into your daily routine, and trust me, if I can do it, so can you. Then they've got True Micro. It starts with those same ingredients and adds three functional mushrooms: lion's mane, cordyceps, and chaga. Same greens foundation, plus the shroom stack for focus, energy, and recovery. To get your hands on some real food, go to lukestory.com/urbanroots, and if you use the code Luke, you're gonna save 15% off your first jar. Or even better, get 25% off your first month when you subscribe. I love the transparency and quality of Urban Roots. They let you trace your nutrition back to a real organic farm in a real American city. So again, hit up lukestory.com/urbanroots and save up to 25% when you use the code Luke. are there situations in which, and I'm asking this because I don't have a concrete memory of this, but I feel like there are times wherein you are insured, you go get some type of service, you run it through your insurance, then realize it didn't cover what you hoped it would.

[24:12]

[Andy] Yeah. Yeah.

[Luke] Then you go back and say, "Ah, never mind the insurance. Can I just pay?" And they're like, "Ah, too late, you already routed it through that." Am I imagining that or is that something that happens?

[Andy] No, that's true. And a lot of times these insurance companies have these agreements with their network providers that says if you have insurance, you have to pay with insurance. And so you can't... Once you tell them you have health insurance, you can't then go and pay in cash generally. Right. So if you have, if you have health insurance, anybody, listeners who have health insurance, what I would what I would do is I would say ask them what the cash pay rate is first and see if you wanna just pay it out of pocket. Because if you have a big deductible, let's just say you have a 5 or $8,000 deductible, and that MRI is gonna be 5 or $8,000, that's gonna cost you 5 or $8,000. But if you go in and say, "Hey, what is an MRI if I do cash pay?" We're seeing MRIs for 350 to 500, depending upon what it is. You may just wanna be like, "I'm just gonna pay in cash," and just don't tell them about your insurance.

[Luke] Right.

[Andy] That may be the better way to go.

[Luke] Right. Yeah. I feel like I've been in that scenario before. Yeah. 'Cause the other confusing thing about being insured is that you don't really know what's going to be... I mean, it's just so confusing, right? All the paperwork and stuff. Yeah. You don't really know what's going to be covered, and even if you're in network, yada, it's so common, like you explained that situation with your daughter. It's so common that they're like, "Psych, there's a, there's some fine print you didn't see." Yeah. Right? And all of a sudden you're getting a bill. Like this happened actually to us recently with with my wife. She went and had something done, and I think we tried to we ran it through our insurance, and I don't know what happened, but all of a sudden, like we got a... There's like the collection agencies. There's real collection agencies, but then there's kind of the fake ones in between. Yeah, yep. Right? And I was like, "Collections? Oh my God." I'm like, "Wait, that was like two months ago. They can't be in like real collections at this point." It was like $47 or something, right? And sometimes those kind of things too, I'll run it through AI and be like, "Is this letter even real?" You know? Vet this against the receipt from the service and our insurance, but it just gets so confusing. You

[Andy] Know? Yeah, 20% of claims, almost 20% of claims are denied by health insurance. So you've got a one out of five chance that your bill is gonna get denied. I unfortunately was the one out of the five. And oftentimes they just deny in hopes that you don't go back and, you know, try and fight it. Right... because a lot of times if you go and fight it, they'll reverse it. But they put so much paperwork in between, then people just kind of give up and say, "Ah, screw it. I'm

[Luke] Just gonna-" I would be, I would be one of that ilk, yeah.

[Andy] I'm just, I'm just gonna pay it, you know? And so that's what they're relying upon to maximize that 15% in the year. So if let's just say your medical claims started eating into that, your 15%, like it's 86% or 87%, so their profit goes from 15 to 14 to 13 to 12, they start denying bills to get them back to that 15% to maximize their profit. Oh, right. So you're screwed in the year, you know, because they're trying to maximize the profit, and then you're screwed over time because they're trying to see your insurance you know, your premiums go up. and so it's like a double whammy. and Man, it's

[27:24]

[Luke] Broken I mean, that, I think that's one of the challenging things too, is it all seems very arbitrary, right? Nothing is really set in stone and black and white, so you, as a consumer, you can't really make an informed decision. It's kind of like, "Oh, I'll just run it through the insurance and hope for the best." Yeah.

[Andy] Yep. And

[Luke] Every once in a while they surprise you and, "Oh, your portion is 25 bucks," or whatever, right?

[Andy] Yeah.

[Luke] But it seems in my experience, and again, I'm not someone that has gone to the doctor a lot, thankfully, knock on wood, but it's kind of a gamble, right? It's like you give them your little insurance card and they go, "Oh, okay, cool. We'll talk to you later." And then all of a sudden you start getting bills or not, but you have no way of really predicting that. There's

[Andy] No transparency-

[Luke] There you go...

[Andy] Within the system.

[Luke] Yeah.

[Andy] You know, I, another part of this is something called pre-authorizations. So if you have a big procedure, oftentimes the doctor has to go and get it pre-authorized by the insurance plan before they can actually offer you the service. And so there's a lawsuit going on right now that allegedly some of these health insurance plans, when they're seeing a lot of claims come in, they actually just turn the dial and make it harder to get a pre-authorization. And so, you know, then you're left being like, "Man, I need knee surgery or whatever," and you can't get it pre-authorized by the health insurance plan for, again, a reason you have no idea. No clue. no transparency- Right... around that at all. Right... and so yeah, it's a tragedy.

[Luke] What happens if somebody gets a procedure They have insurance, their insurance won't cover it. It's 10 grand, and they're just like, "F you, hospital, I'm not paying it." Like, is there... Does that go into real collections eventually that can damage your credit and things like that? Can they start coming after you or garnishing your wages? Like, what if you just ghost and just don't pay?

[Andy] Yeah, it depends upon the hospital, but most hospitals have this fake collection agency to scare- So you know what I'm

[Luke] Talking

[Andy] About, right? Yeah. They have their own collections agency.

[Luke] Okay.

[Andy] And it makes it look like, you know, super scary, and they call you, and they'll text you, and they'll say, "You better, you know, do this." And if they can't get that, then they send it to a real collections agency, which then, you know, continues to do that. But at that point, the hospital has basically waved the white flag, knowing that they're not gonna get paid 10,000. The other thing we tell our members is like, "Look, if... We have to rethink collections agencies 'cause we think we're in trouble, right?" But in reality, what's going on is they are finally saying, "You're right. Like, we're not gonna collect all of this." And so we tell our members, like, "If you go into collections, that's actually great. Like, that's a great thing. Reframe this. They have acknowledged that they're not gonna get paid this egregious price, and they're willing to negotiate." So consider collections as, "Okay, we're willing to negotiate," as opposed to like, "I'm in trouble." they can't put anything on your credit score for a year from the date that they bill you. Oh, interesting. So you've got a year before they'll do it, and most people, most hospitals don't do it. They'll just have collections agencies continue to call you, call you, call you. and so it's very rare that they'll send you to the, to the credit agencies. But even if they do, and you can negotiate a deal after that, then by law they have to take it off of your credit report so it doesn't sit there forever. The other thing is if it's under $500 and it's healthcare related, they can't report it to your credit agency. So I will be honest. Once I went to urgent care for something, and they said, "All in, it's like..." I think it was like 250 bucks or something like that. I was like, "Great, I'll pay your 250 bucks, no problem." Well, then I got a bill later for an additional $250, and I called them, and they're like, "Oh, well, that was for, you know, X, Y, and Z." I was like, "No. You told me that was 250 bucks when I came in, and that's it." And they're like, "Oh, well, you know, da." I ghosted them I didn't pay it. It's under 500 bucks. You know, I was like, "I'm not gonna pay for something that you guys told me was X price, and then you come back and tell me it's X times two." Like, I have no moral obligation to pay you for something that you told me wasn't going to come. And so I think people need to, you know, just evaluate that. If it's under 500 bucks and, like, they are rightfully, you know, paid that, owed that, I was like, "Oh, yeah, pay it for sure." But, like, if they're not rightfully owed Yeah... I have no problem with ghosting them. Yeah... I have no moral obligation to pay for something that they sold me that I didn't know about.

[31:43]

[Luke] Well, you just added a lot of value to listeners.

[Andy] Yeah. Yeah.

[Luke] I mean, not that I'm recommending that everyone goes and defaults on agreements you made, right? But it's, if a shenanigan like that's going on, it kind of changes the moral equation.

[Andy] I think it does.

[Luke] You know? I

[Andy] Think it does.

[Luke] Yeah, I mean, you can be, you can remain in your integrity, and if someone that you're dealing with is out of integrity, kind of that's their problem.

[Andy] I have no problem with that.

[Luke] Yeah.

[Andy] Yeah.

[Luke] Let's talk about the relationship between medical freedom and economic freedom. You know? Sure. You kind of opened with worst case scenarios where medical bills can really wreck someone's life. what other than availing ourselves to entrepreneurial ventures and things like that, what's available to us if we weren't being siphoned of our resources by this corrupt and confusing system?

[Andy] Yeah, I mean, I think it's rooted in economic freedom. if you are struggling to pay the bills because your health insurance is so much You don't have the healthcare freedom. You don't have the freedom to go whatever doctors that you wanna go to. You are, you are stuck within a system that says these are the only types of doctors that you can go and see. And so ultimately, what we'd like you to have is healthcare freedom, which means that, hey, let's get these monthly payments down significantly so that you do have the extra money to go and do the things that you wanna do that may not be within, you know, the healthcare system as we've kind of defined it.

[Luke] Yeah.

[Andy] You know, I'd love for you to have an extra $1,000 a month so you can get the healthy food that you want as opposed to the, you know, middle of the middle of the grocery store type of stuff. Like, I wanna be able... You to be able to get your fruits and vegetables, and if you wanna get them organic, I want you to be able to do that. If you wanna go and eat, you know, meat that's grass-fed, I want you to be able to go and do that. And so, but people can't do that because they don't have the money to do that because it's being siphoned Right... from the insurance system. And so if you wanna go and get acupuncture, go get acupuncture. Like, you or, you know, if you wanna go get a massage, go get a massage. Like, if these, those are things that you need to do, I wanna give you the money back to go and do some of those things. That, to me, is healthcare freedom as opposed to sticking in a very defined narrow lane of this is the only thing that you can do, which is typically allopathic.

[Luke] Yeah.

[Andy] And which typically, from what we've seen with chronic diseases, just leads to chronic disease. I think the person entering Medicare, which is 65, the last stat I saw was, like, they have 2.6 chronic diseases on average Like, the average 65-year-old has 2.6 chronic diseases. Like, clearly they have not had the healthcare freedom to go and take care of that, right? And so I think it's rooted in economic freedom, which then gives you healthcare freedom if you can drop those prices significantly to give people extra cash to go and do what they want to do.

[Luke] That's a really good point. I didn't think about that. I mean, I get feedback from time to time from people who follow this podcast and you know, aren't financially stable enough to do a lot of the things Mm-hmm We talk about. I have people on that have these crazy really expensive devices and supplements, and I'm always like, "Ah, this sucks," 'cause I used to be one of those people, you Mm-hmm... that would be in the health food store going, "Oh, I wish I could try all this stuff," but I couldn't, you know. Or go to healing clinics, and they'd have some amazing technology in there, and I would just have to pay a little bit to go use it when I could afford it. But that's a really good point. It's, when you said the grocery store, I started laughing because I don't go to, like, any grocery store on a regular basis 'cause I just don't like the lighting. But if I go into you know, I go to Randall's or whatever down the road, H-E-B, and walk in there every few months, every couple years, and I'm just like, "Wait, what? People are still eating this stuff?" It's like every aisle is just... It might as well just be, like, cans of glyphosate everywhere. It's-

[35:37]

[Andy] Yeah...

[Luke] So shocking. I understand, though, because grass-fed meat and organic produce and things like that are exponentially more expensive. But what you just described is such a vicious cycle, right? If somebody's, say, paying 12 grand a year for health insurance they could be spending on gym membership health- healthier food, whatever, it's like because they're not doing that, now they're gonna start to degrade in health. What are they gonna do? Well, their insurance covers only this class of treatment in the allopathic system. They're gonna go in there and get in that rinse and repeat cycle of more medication, and then the medication has side effects that causes this other thing, and next thing you know, you have someone on Medicare with, you know, multiple comorbidities, right? And then now how are you gonna have the money to do it, right? 'Cause you're not, you don't have the vitality to generate more revenue that would help you get healthy.

[Andy] Absolutely.

[Luke] Wow. That's deep. I never thought about it that way.

[Andy] Yeah. I mean, our families of four are saving somewhere between $10,000 and $11,000 a year By using, you know, CrowdHealth versus health insurance, $10,000, $11,000 a year can buy a lot of, you know, grass-fed meat or organic vegetables or, or things like that. And so gym memberships and so man, I wanna put more money back into your pocket so that you have the freedom to use that money in whatever way that you please, and we hope it's for better food and things like that. but you also have the freedom Not like a gambling ti-

[Luke] Gambling habit or

[Andy] Go to Cabo if you want to as well. Right. Like, you know, it's up to you. Um-

[Luke] You can buy vodka with it if you want.

[Andy] Yeah.

[Luke] What about medical debt and the emotional and nervous system toll of people digging themselves into that hole, right? So obviously, if you have less money to spend on your health and healthy food is one thing, but I know from periods in which I was under a lot of self-imposed debt, admittedly it's very stressful. You know, I mean, Yeah... if you're not consciously thinking about it or you're just stretched really thin and having a difficult time paying your bills, there's a kind of a energy drain percolating in the background, right? Of just whether it's conscious or subconscious worry, but living in fear is also really unhealthy, you know, physically, right? Sure. Sure. What do you think about that aspect of it? I mean, I

[Andy] Think it's pretty clear at this point that what goes on in your brain impacts your body. you know, just the cortisol impact of having, you know, debt sitting there that you're worrying about every single day, again, is a part of this healthcare death spiral that we're talking about. You get into medical debt because of the insurance system. You then therefore are fearful and worryful and anxious, and that creates cortisol, which then has a pretty severe impact on your body. And so that leads you into probably more medical debt because you have these huge deductibles that you have to pay and that's one of the things in the insurance system that I don't think people, like, really realize is that, you know, for a family of four, the average deductible is $16,000. 16 grand. If you don't have 16 grand in your bank account and you have a big health event that comes up, you're in deep trouble. You're going to go into medical debt, and that makes the healing of whatever happened much more difficult. Right. And so one of the things that we talk about is like, man, for us, it's you pay the first 500 bucks of any health event, and people can figure out how to come up with 500 bucks, so that if they are in the hospital, they can focus on healing as opposed to worrying about the money. We just had a woman literally this week reach out to us, and she... her baby wasn't breathing when the baby was born. She had to be resuscitated twice. Went into NICU, had to get life-flighted to, you know, Johns Hopkins, you know, NICU unit. And one of the things she wrote us, which was very powerful to me, she's like, "The coolest thing about this is that I didn't have to worry about the bills afterwards. I could focus on my baby. And so when I called into CrowdHealth, I was like, I was worried because I thought it was gonna be like the insurance system, like, 'What do I have to do? What bills...'" And what our care advocate is, our internal customer service people said to her is like, "Do whatever you need to do to save your baby girl." You don't have to go through the insurance system of figuring out like, "Can I do this? Can I do this? Can I do this?" Like, no. You need to be in a place of saying, "Do what you need to do to save your baby girl." Right?

[40:12]

[Luke] Right. It's like allocation of resources.

[Andy] Yeah.

[Luke] Yeah.

[Andy] Exactly. And so that's the difference, I think, between the system that we're trying to build and the insurance system is I wanna take cost component, that money, that economic component out of the equation because you're gonna be financially better off, and I think your healthcare, your health, the health of your body is going to be better off as well because you don't have all these physiological things going on as a result of having medical debt. So I think it's an important part of the, of the equation.

[Luke] Absolutely. What about the preexisting conditions? How does that work? Say you've been diagnosed with cancer- Sure... or you're already pregnant and you go through traditional insurance. I haven't had this happen, but I don't know, I just... when I've filled out the paperwork, I see those things, and I'm imagining if youMm Not honest, that there could be repercussions for that at some point. Or like, I, actually I do remember one insurance situation wherein I was reading some of the fine print and it was like the the birth care would only kick in after a certain Mm... after you signed up. So it's like if you were already pregnant, you wouldn't be covered. You know, there was kind of this window.

[Andy] Yeah.

[Luke] And I'm assuming it's the same way with some other preexisting conditions where you'll either get denied or, you know, the game changes a little bit. What's the deal with that?

[Andy] I think one of the things that people need to think about is just kind of the moral hazard around this, because oftentimes what will happen is that people will not have health insurance, not wanna pay for it, and then if something happens and pops up, then they're like, "Okay, well, now I'm gonna have health insurance."

[Luke] Right.

[Andy] And so they don't use it until they actually need it. And so there are some kind of laws around, hey, like, you can't do that, you know, because that totally messes up the system completely 'cause you don't have anybody paying in and only wanting to get paid out. Clearly, that system, that system fails. You know, the Affordable Care Act back in 2009, 2010 basically said that you all health plans have to include people who have preexisting conditions, which I think, you know, at a high level makes tons of sense. But they have this open enrollment period, so you can't enroll in June.

[Luke] Right.

[Andy] And so Right You have to enroll in November, December, January. And so that keeps that from happening in many cases. The other thing they said, though one other part of that, and this is gonna be controversial I think. Great. I don't like that rule because the payer no longer has the incentive to care for you. Meaning, you know, if I'm part of Let's just say Blue Cross Blue Shield or whatever it is, and I get sick th-there's now an incentive for Blue Cross Blue Shield, I'm not saying they do this, don't sue me, but, like, they don't have an incentive to see you healthy for a long period of time knowing that they're just gonna... You're gonna jump off of their program next year and go to Aetna or Cigna or United or whatever. If I was stuck with Aetna and Aetna was stuck with me, or Blue Cross Blue Shield or whoever it is, then there's actually an incentive to see me get healthy because they know I'm gonna be with them for a long time. But right now, the incentive is actually to treat you very poorly so that you're fed up with us, so that your bills and your expenses get, you know, go to the next guy. and so there's this incredible churn. I think the churn with insurance is, like, 30 or 40% a year, which means they lose 30 or 40% of their customers every year, and so they have no incentive to take care of you over the long term. Yeah. And so while it makes sense- Wow... that, you know, health insurance plans should be able to take people with pre-existing conditions, the way they set it up was that those people with pre-existing conditions or existing conditions, once they're in a health plan, the health plan has no incentive to take care of them over a long period of time. No incentive to say yes to some of these pre-authorizations. No incentive to pay their claims. And so it's a really screwed up system where the incentives are totally misaligned for health and care.

[44:24]

[Luke] Yeah.

[Andy] And that's one of the problems with that, so.

[Luke] I forgot about that open enrollment thing. There's, with the insurance agents, there's this pressure cooker, right? It's like I remember getting emails, "Hey, you need to let me know." Mm-hmm. "You're gonna miss the thing, and then you won't be insured." And just like, "Well, I'm not ready." Like Right... haven't had time to read the 40 documents you sent me, and even if I could, I wouldn't understand what they say anyway.

[Andy] I'm in healthcare, and I've looked at these documents, and they are about 120 pages long. I read them, and I'm-major-majority of the time I l-- I'm like, "I don't even know what that means." Like, and I'm in this space. I have no idea what that means. And so they are dense, and they are clearly written by attorneys, and they are created, I think, to create an, you know, a sense of being opaque, you know? Yeah. Like, not super clear. And when there's not clarity, there's opportunity for profit in that, unfortunately. And so I don't like to assume intentions, but i-the intent feels like to me that they're making this very complex for a reason and then just saying, "Just trust us, you know, we'll take care of you." Trust me. And on the other Trust

[Luke] Me, bro.

[Andy] Trust me, bro. you know, and on the other end, they don't. so this kind of opacity in the way that this s-system is set up benefits the insurance companies and the hospital systems as opposed to you, who's the patient.

[Luke] Now, I'll admit magnesium's not the sexiest supplement in the world, but it is one of the most important. I've relied on Magnesium Breakthrough from BiOptimizers for years, and it's one of the few supplements I actually notice when I stop taking. Now, everyone knows magnesium's great for sleep, but beyond that, it helps you wake up more recovered and handle everyday stress with a little more grace. But as I've learned over the past couple years, some chapters of life are more demanding than others. More travel, bigger projects, less downtime, and so on. And that's exactly where the new Magnesium Breakthrough Advanced 10 comes in. Advanced 10 is designed for those times when life asks more of you. And here's how these guys crushed it. They built on the original with 10 bioavailable forms of magnesium, then added vitamin B6 and ionic trace minerals to help your body absorb and use it more effectively. Now, the original Magnesium Breakthrough is still my foundation, but now BiOptimizers has truly taken that formula even further for the times when life goes to 11. So this is probably a fit for you whether you're traveling more, working longer hours, or just under more stress. Advanced 10 gives your body the support it needs when it matters most. To get yourself stocked up, here's what you do. Go to bi optimizers.com/luke and use the code LUKE15 to save guess how much? 15%. 'Cause when life levels up, your recovery has gotta level up with it. So hit up bi optimizers.com/luke, and you can also find that link in the podcast show notes. And why do costs vary so dramatically from hospital to hospital? Like, you can get a procedure in one hospital, it's X amount of dollars, and then it's four X at this other one, and they're not necessarily higher quality care or, you know, a newer, more beautiful building. Yeah. It's like, what's up with that? It seems to be very arbitrary.

[47:46]

[Andy] And it, and it is. And the reason it's arbitrary is because hospital systems have no idea what it actually costs them to provide a service. There was a an article, I think in the Wall Street Journal a couple years ago, where they asked a hospital administrator, I think it was a knee replacement surgery, "How much does this cost you?" And he came up with an answer. And it was, like, 30 or 40% lower than that because somebody actually, like, walked through the entire... I think they had somebody from McKinsey or somebody, like, walk through- Oh, God... the, all of the steps to go and get this knee procedure. And they just have no kind of cost-based accounting. And so they kind of are just like, "You know, see where the wind's blowing and make Wow... make a decision on what it costs for that." And then once you've made a call on what that costs, then you can't increase that more than a certain, you know, percentage over, you know, a period of time. So, you know, if you think a knee procedure is 10,000 and it's actually 30,000, they can't increase that 10,000 by more than 6 or 7% a year to catch up to what it is, because then regulators look at you, health insurance plans look at you, and be like, "Dude, you're trying to increase this by 20%?" And so that's how you have these funky things where if you go to one hospital, a baby, a baby, pregnancy, or give birth is $12,000, and literally a hospital three miles away can be $6,000. And nobody's really shopping for that because I'm, I just lay down a card. I don't really care what the price is. You know, imagining going and buying a new car, and there is a $5,000 or $6,000 difference within three miles, you would know it because you're the one paying the bill. And so once you remove somebody from actually paying the bill, they don't shop, they don't try to find the best price, and so they just lay down their card and be like, "Eh, we'll let the health insurance plan deal with it."

[Luke] Right. Right.

[Andy] So that's one of the problems of our system, too, is the actual person who's getting the service isn't the one paying for it, and therefore you have no incentive to shop for it. And, you know you rely upon the insurance companies with their weird algorithms to come up with what it, what it should cost.

[Luke] How much of a dollar spent for a medical procedure actually goes to the provider?

[Andy] 8%. What? Doctors get 8%. Oh my God. So you think doctors are overpaid and all these Yeah Of things, you know, people will say. It's like, no, like 92% is being eaten up by the system. Bureaucracy. I Right... there's this crazy graph, and if you go and look on social media you can find it, but it looks at the number of doctors over the last I think it's 30 years, and the doctors are basically increasing with population. So, you know, what is it? 1% a year or something like that. The administrators are up about 50, 50x what doctors are. So the system is, you know, this much doctors and this much administrators, which are just bureaucracy in the middle of you and your doctor, and that's where the costs are, is all that bureaucracy and paperwork.

[50:49]

[Luke] Got it. Yeah, it definitely seems that way. I mean, even if you just walk into a medical clinic or hospital and just start counting heads of who's doing what, there's a lot of busy bees running around. A lot of busy bees. And only a couple of doctors. And not a lot

[Andy] Of doctors actually providing care.

[Luke] Yeah, totally. Nurses,

[Andy] You know?

[Luke] Totally. something just came to mind back to what we were talking about earlier, where if someone is able to save money on their health insurance or healthcare, that they're going to be able to devote resources to a healthier lifestyle, right? Mm-hmm. But I just thought of another thing. Because so many of the, in my opinion, more effective models of care outside of traditional allopathic are, you know, they're out of network, and they're also much more expensive. So going back to you say you pay 1,000 bucks a month, that's $12,000 a year. Like, if you devoted that $12,000 to a practitioner that can actually help you heal something, not just treat the symptoms of something, I mean, that's also a long-term life investment as well.

[Andy] 100%.

[Luke] Which is why, I mean, if I ever have anything going on, I mean, there's no way I'm going to the local GP and trying to get in under my insurance. I just bite the bullet and know that if I go to a, you know, really good functional or integrative Yeah... medicine doctor, that I'm probably gonna walk out having spent a lot of money and they're gonna give me, you know, a huge bag of supplements that's $1,000 or whatever. But I'm probably gonna feel better, and my thing is at least not going to get worse, you know. It's probably gonna get better. So it's like there's more, I think more of an incentive there to kind of invest in yourself, too.

[Andy] Yeah. Take, taking on the personal responsibility of saying, "Hey," you know, what we said, say to our members is like, "I want you to be 80 or 90 years old playing soccer in the backyard with your grandkids." Like, that's thriving to me.

[Luke] Yeah.

[Andy] And in this allopathic system, we're just not seeing that. And so, yes, you may be paying a little bit more, but they're spending a lot more time with you, too. I go to an integrative doc, it's not 10 minutes, it's more like a 45 minutes or an Yeah... you know, depending upon what's going on. And yes, I'm paying a little bit more, but on like a minute to minute basis or, you know, a dollar per minute basis, I'm probably paying less but I'm getting- Right... a lot more care that I think is going to cost me less in 10 or 20 or 30 years even though I'm saving, you know, saving today.

[Luke] Yeah.

[Andy] Right? And that's where people have a really hard time, and we've become so shortsighted in our society you know, that we're not willing to spend the money now as an investment for 10 or 20 or 30 years from now. Because I always say, like, what we're doing in our 30s, 40s, and 50s are dictating what's happening in our 60s, 70s, 80s, and 90s. And so are you willing to make that investment for your 70s, 80s, and 90s? And I think people should be. but the current system is let's take care of it now and I think it's very, you know, short- shortsighted. You know, in economics they call that high time preference, which it means I'm going to... If you give a kid a marshmallow now or two marshmallows in, Right... you know, in 30 minutes- Right... they want the one marshmallow now. Yeah. You know, we're that kind of society where it's Yeah... I want it now, I want to take care of it now, as opposed to being like, "No, let's have some patience. Let's have low time preference to say I'm willing to make the investment now for 10 or 20 or 30 years from now." Like, that's ultimately where we have to go, and I think a lot of our members and a lot of your listeners, I think, are thinking in decades- For sure... as opposed to days. For sure. And that's where we need to get as a, as a society, especially around healthcare. You just can't do that within this current system, unfortunately.

[54:24]

[Luke] Yeah. you know, I do all kinds of stuff for my health. I'm pretty obsessed with it. It's like a hobby to see how good I can possibly feel, right? Yeah. And I'm gonna turn 56 next month, and like on many levels I'm healthier than I've ever been. Sleep, cognition. Yeah, there's like a tinnitus. I gotta wear glasses sometimes to see far. I mean, there's a couple signs of aging. The hair's getting, you Right... creeping back a little bit. Yours creep back all the way. you know, so it's not like I'm not aging, but Aside from just wanting to feel good now, I'm not I've never been someone who's interested in, like, how long I live, but I don't wanna be that guy who's, like, walking across the crosswa- walk with Totally I don't even know what it's called, a hunchback and a cane, and I'm just like, "That does not look fun." I would actually rather not be here probably if I didn't have the physical capacity to live my life and enjoy my life and have this human experience, you know? Well,

[Andy] They say 80 to 80%, 80 to 88% of chronic conditions are lifestyle related conditions. So there's 12 to 20% that is just like, man, you gotta, you got the wrong end of the stick, right? Like, there's, there are things that happen, clearly, like oftentimes, you know, cancer may or may not be, you know, something that was in the environment or whatever. It might be genetic, and so it just like, that stuff, bad stuff happens. But to the extent that we can live lifestyles, you know, for that middle 30 or 40 or 50 years of our lives that can lead to thriving in the old age. I always like, I wanna, I wanna live hard and die fast. Right? Like, ultimately, Totally... I don't know about you, but, like, I don't wanna die in a nursing home.

[Luke] Oh my God,

[Andy] No. Like, I wanna die, you know, out there, you know, playing soccer with my grandkids. Yeah. Like, that would be the way to go. Yeah... and so, and fortunately, we have this system that gets us to a place of dying slowly, which is really expensive and heartbreaking, and you see pain and suffering, like, just go into a nursing home.

[Luke] Totally, man.

[Andy] Right?

[Luke] Yeah.

[Andy] And I was in-... let's, so let's invest now...

[Luke] Yeah, I was in a nursing home in Indiana a few years ago with my wife's grandmother, and it was a very depressing place to say the least. But also, there was a massive cell tower like right on top of the nursing home. You know, I'm just like, "I'm not gonna be that guy," you know? We were, you know, a newer couple at that time. Yeah. Even if I had said anything, they probably wouldn't have listened, but I'm just sitting there going, "Oh my God," you know? You have these people who are, like, hanging on for dear life, and God knows what they're eating, and they're probably drinking tap water. Oh,

[Andy] It's terrible.

[Luke] You know what I mean? Yeah. But the cell tower really got me 'cause I'm just an EMF nut. and I was just like, "Oh my God," you know? Just think about how much more quickly their demise is going to be met as a result of just environmental impacts, you know? 100%. going back to kind of investing in yourself, I don't know if I've ever thought of it this way, but now I am, so I'll share it. So I'm someone who spends a lot of my resources on supplements and healthy Mm... and health gadgets and all this kind of stuff, and doesn't like spending it on insurance. But let's just say I spend the same amount of money on my health than I would on a traditional insurance plan I'm gonna ultimately end up spending way less money than I would, you know, if I ended up with a chronic disease or unable to work before retirement or something like that, right?

[57:54]

[Andy] Yeah.

[Luke] I think that's kind of encouraging for myself, 'cause sometimes I look at my credit card statement, I'm just like, "What are you doing, dude?" Like, you know.

[Andy] Yeah.

[Luke] Go buy a Jeep or something, you know? It's like I spend a lot of money, and I also give a lot

[Andy] You can reframe it, though. It's a perfect reframing of like, I would've spent this on health insurance instead, so-

[Luke] Totally. Totally... I'm doing- I think that's what I'm starting to put together now, you know, is like not paying my old premium. It's like, oh, cool, well, I'll just put that towards things that are actually gonna- Yeah, amen... improve my, you know, health span.

[Andy] Yeah. Yeah.

[Luke] All right, so tell me a little bit about how CrowdHealth works. I have not signed up for it yet, but I've done some deep dives on the website and kind of gotten an idea of it. but I'm really interested in what you're doing because, as I said earlier, you're not trying to attack the existing system, which I think is very counterproductive, but many freedom-minded people are really geared that way, right? We gotta tear down the system- Yeah... and build something new. And to me, it sounds like you're just going, how about another vertical altogether, right? And How about

[Andy] A parallel system?

[Luke] They're parallel. There you go. Yeah. Yeah. So tell me, you know, the basics of how it works, 'cause I think it's really interesting in that, People are actually supporting one another. There's an altruistic element to Sure... that I think is really cool.

[Andy] Yeah, I mean, ultimately what we're trying to do is get your monthly spend on healthcare for the big stuff that could happen in life as low as possible, so you can spend all the money that you want, like we just talked about, on things that are really important to you. I don't think things that are important to you, other people should be forced to pay for. so let's just, like, get the minimum, the big stuff, like the big stuff, the bad stuff that can happen in life. 'Cause, you know, we've got a group now of 35,000 people in our community who are funding each other's healthcare expenses. Wow.

[Luke] How long have you guys been going?

[Andy] About five and a half years.

[Luke] That's amazing.

[Andy] Yeah, so we've, we were about 12,000 this time last year, and so, and we're at 35. We think we'll end the year with about 50. so growing really fast because we've been able to drive these prices down. I think

[Luke] That's more people than live in my town.

[Andy] Maybe. Maybe. Yeah. You could

[Luke] Have the whole town on this thing.

[Andy] Yeah. We'd love it. Let's sign 'em up. so anyway, let's get the price down as low as possible so you can have as much money as you want to go and do the things that you wanna do, just in case something big happens. You know, God forbid, like, we have a super active community, you know, who are out mountain biking and running and working out and being outdoors, and shit happens, right? Like, we have a guy who mountain biked and he, you know, fell off his mountain bike and smashed his head open, and, you know, I think it was $100,000 worth of, uh... He had to get air flighted out and all this kind of stuff. So it was a huge bill. But he was being active. He's living the lifestyle I think many of your listeners are living, and just shit happens when you're out there doing stuff. And so our number one expense is active injuries.

[Luke] Oh, really?

[Andy] Yeah. It's people- That's

[Luke] Pretty cool.

[Andy] It's pretty cool. We've got an active group.

[Luke] Versus lifestyle diseases.

[1:00:55]

[Andy] Well, yeah.

[Luke] These are, like, lifestyle injuries.

[Andy] Yeah, I mean, I, it's-

[Luke] I'd much rather have a lifestyle injury than a lifestyle disease...

[Andy] It's somewhere between 40 and 45% of the funds requested are for active injuries, and that's playing basketball and you tear your ACL or whatever. Mm-hmm. Which is like, I love paying for that stuff. Like, yeah, you were out living life and something happened. you know, 30 to 40%, depending upon the month, is for babies. It's just people pregnant and they're having babies, and that's a part of life, too, and I'm, I love paying for that stuff. And it's like 8% on illnesses. And so-

[Luke] Wow...

[Andy] It's super low, and as a result of that, we can keep these bills really low. But the mechanics of how this work, which I love because I just love community. I think community, we've lost community in many ways Yeah... in the world with the growth of the internet, and I think government intervention and some of the things that communities should be responsible for, the government has kind of taken over, and so we've lost that sense of community. And in fact, my kids took you may not like this or your listeners may not like this, but, like, my daughter loves to bake, and so she baked, you know, the next door neighbor cookies when they moved in, and she brought them over there, and they kind of looked at her like, "What is this?" Like-... and I was like, I remember growing up and it was just Yeah Whenever you moved into a community, like, they embraced you, and it was like, they brought you stuff and what do you need? And we've lost that community, and so it's

[Luke] Cool I'm so glad you mentioned that, dude. When we moved into this house, this is the first house I've ever owned, and I lived in LA, and people aren't particularly open or friendly to their neighbors there, right? But when we moved in, we went and brought, like, cookies or something to all of our neighbors here. Yeah. You know? Not like we became best buddies or something, but it was a good way to establish a rapport- Yeah... and just say, "Hey, if you ever need anything, we're here." To that point, our neighbors behind us, God bless them have had very early morning dog barking things going Oh, boy For quite some time, and I just, I'm very conflict averse, you know? I'm just like, "Eh, I'll get used to it." I couldn't get used to it. Today it was 5:35 in the morning. I was like, okay. I had the text preloaded. Sent it to them, and I'm being polite and respectful, just like, "Hey," you know, a lot of little prayer sign emojis, trying to be super chill. He's like, "Oh my God, I'm so sorry. We'll take care of it right away." You know? So it's like, I don't know if that's 'cause we brought him cookies or whatever, but-... you know, there is a general like, cohesion and just, I don't know, old school Texas manners, right? Kind of love your neighbor type thing. Yeah. So even with a light touch and not really going too far out of our way, we did set the stage for, you know, a symbiotic relationship with the people in our immediate surroundings.

[Andy] So when, you Luke is out on his bike and he falls and it's a $10,000 deal the way that we work is we say, "Hey, Luke is responsible for that first 500 bucks. We want you to have some skin in the game, so it's 500 bucks. And then we'll take that $9,500 and we'll send it to 95 people in the community and say, 'Hey, we have this guy in Austin, Texas, who, you know, fell off his bike and needs some help. Would you give him 100 bucks?'" And you can say yes or no, but you say yes, that $100 goes to Luke, and at the end of the day, we just keep asking until you have your 9,500 bucks. You have your 500 and your 9,500. You pay the hospital directly. You're getting 50% better rates than health insurance plans. That's what we've seen over 60,000 bills. And as a- 'Cause you're

[1:04:16]

[Luke] Telling them upfront you're cash pay.

[Andy] Cash pay.

[Luke] Yeah, okay.

[Andy] And so your price comes down dramatically.

[Luke] Right.

[Andy] And what's super cool about it is those 95 people that I ask know that they're helping a guy in Austin, Texas, I don't say Luke for HIPAA reasons, but they know that their money is going directly to this guy in Austin, Texas, who fell off his bike, or this woman in Indiana who's pregnant, or this woman in Colorado who has cancer. And so you know exactly where your money is going. You're helping another individual directly, as opposed to sending it to a health insurance company where you have no idea where that money's going. Is that going to profit? Is it going to the CEO's, you know, plane? Yeah. You know, where is it going?

[Luke] Shareholders.

[Andy] Shareholders, you know, wherever. And so it does create some intimacy in the community to know that your money is going directly to help another human being.

[Luke] That's

[Andy] So cool. Which is super cool. I was with a guy at dinner, not last night, the night before, who was a... He came up to me and he's like, "Hey, I'm a CrowdHealth member." I'm like, "That's so cool." And he's like, "Man, the coolest thing about this is before when I had health insurance, I would hate seeing that on my bank statement every month. And now I'm actually happy To know that I'm helping somebody else out. Like, that feels good to me. And I'm like, "Man, that's awesome."

[Luke] 100%.

[Andy] And we have, you know, we, I said we have a lot of babies, and so unfortunately with babies there's also miscarriages associated with that. So we send miscarriages out, and we have women all the time come back to us and be like, "I know what this woman's going through. I've been through that pain. I know that hurt. You know, instead of $100, can I send her $200 this month?" You know, you never in a million years call UnitedHealthcare and be like, "Can I pay you more this month for my health insurance?" Like, that's just never gonna happen. Totally. And so there's this altruism that I think is in us, is in our souls, that we want to help other people given the opportunity, and that's what we do, is we help other people in the community, and we've done this 60,000 times. 99.9% of the time that we send it to the community, it's gotten funded, and the only time it hasn't gotten funded is, like I said, I send you a request. You can say no if you want to, but with any community, if you are a taker and not a giver, there are ramifications of that, right?

[Luke] Yeah,

[Andy] Yeah. So if I send something to Mary and Mary says no, when Mary submits a bill to the community, the community says, "Oh, Mary said no a bunch of times to other community members."

[Luke] Oh, interesting. So there's full transparency. Full

[Andy] Transparency.

[Luke] That's epic. And You have, like, a 35,000-person tribe.

[Andy] It's a tribe.

[Luke] You know what I mean? Yeah. 'Cause that's what would happen if we were still in small groups, right? Yeah. I mean, if you're a dick, then you're probably not gonna be first in line to be helped by the other members of the tribe.

[Andy] Well, we totally have a tribe. Earlier this week, I think it was Monday night, I was in Denver, and I invited 60 of our CrowdHealth members to go out to dinner. I paid for dinner. And so imagine UnitedHealthcare calling you and say, "Hey, do you wanna come out to dinner with us?" You'd be like, "Dude, what?" You know. We had 60 people show up.

[Luke] Really?

[Andy] And like we're super excited, and we shut down the restaurant 'cause people stayed so long 'cause they wanted to talk with our other CrowdHealth members. I had to debrief my wife the next morning because it was so late. and what I told her was like, "Man, it felt like going out with, like, family and friends." And so it's just a totally different way of operating. You feel, even though we have 35,000 people, you feel like you're a part of this kind of community that's bucking the trend and building a parallel system, but we're in it together. and so it's just a totally different feel to the way you get healthcare as opposed to this kind of like nameless, you Absolutely Faceless, you know, health insurance company or the person you're dealing with at the health insurance company. It doesn't feel like they actually care for you.

[1:08:04]

[Luke] Yeah. That's so cool, Andy. I love this. And also it's like the community, I'm assuming, is almost there's a pre-selection process in a sense, because people who are going to gravitate toward the model that you've created are going to share at least a similar value system, right? They're people that are like-

[Andy] Yeah. Similar worldviews for

[Luke] Sure. Yeah, you know, like, "Eh, we're not really interested in the way the system is. Wow, cool. There's something different."

[Andy] Yeah.

[Luke] It's like people are gonna be kind of generally geared toward the same lifestyle and goals and just kind of a mutual understanding, right?

[Andy] I'll give you a perfect stat that I think highlights it. do you have any idea how many babies are born outside the hospital, what percentage are born outside the hospital in the United States?

[Luke] No.

[Andy] Any guess?

[Luke] 5%?

[Andy] 1.6%.

[Luke] Oh my God. I was I thought I was going low with five.

[Andy] In

[Luke] CrowdHealth- But I, you know, I live in, I live in Austin, and but many people at least plan home births here. Yeah. You know, they're not

[Andy] Always- In CrowdHealth, it's 60. 60% are having babies outside the hospital, 40% at home, 20% in birthing centers- Wow... and then 40% in hospitals.

[Luke] So my theory is correct.

[Andy] Your theory is correct. Wow. People self-select in because they have a worldview of, "Hey, these existing systems are not built to benefit us. We are a product of that system, and so I'm going to exit that." And a lot of these people have exited other systems. Like, you know, we got a lot of Bitcoiners who are like, "I'm exiting the money system." We have a lot of, you know, carnivore people who are exiting the food system. We have a lot of, like, homeschool people who are like, "I'm exiting the education system." And so we have a lot of people who are like, "I'm exiting this system because it's not built for my wellbeing."

[Luke] Yeah.

[Andy] And so people do self-select in, for sure. Wow. That's just our group, and we have a lot of people who are doing... You know, if you go to CrowdHealth and you have a health event, if you wanna go do acupuncture, go do acupuncture. If you wanna do chiropractic, go do chiropractic. If you wanna do functional or integrative or holistic or naturopathic or whatever it ends up being, go and do that Um-

[Luke] Really?

[Andy] Yeah. We have a guy who has... Man, it's been-

[Luke] So there, so there's no scrutiny in terms of the type of treatment you elect to get

[Andy] The only scrutiny- Or less scrutiny That we have is there has to be some kind of clinical background that says that this works.

[Luke] Oh, okay. Okay.

[Andy] It can't be magic pixie dust, because there's also people out there who are trying to tell you, like, "Oh, this magic da is gonna cure your cancer," and they're gonna charge you $100,000 for it. Oh, okay. Yeah. And it's like, look, like, there's gotta be some kind of clinical background. Yeah. And if you wanna do something that's not clinically based, even if it's, you know, natural, like, you know, you gotta show us something, then you now have the money to go and do that if you wanna go and do that. Right. Because you have $1,000 extra in your pocket every month to go and do those things. So you have the freedom to go and do that, which I think- Right... is kind of an important part of the equation. Right. So that helps you as an individual, but it also helps the community not pay for stuff that, you know, just doesn't have any kind of clinical basis whatsoever.

[1:11:07]

[Luke] In terms of the customer service model, I think I heard you explaining something, and don't, you know, forgive me if I get this wrong, but rather than just calling a random, like, person- Yeah... in another country that speaks broken English, and you know, the struggle of trying to communicate things, especially if they involve finances and health, right? It's really important. Details matter. I think I heard you say something about, like, almost like a concierge, like you have a customer service or staff member kind of assigned to Yeah... that you can sort of build a rapport with, and I'm assuming, you know, are able to speak the native language and all that stuff.

[Andy] Yeah. It's my favorite part of CrowdHealth where when you sign up, you are assigned what we call care advocates. Okay. So they are somebody internally that are, is advocating for you. So anytime you call or you text or you email, it goes to the same person, and so they get to know you get to know them. They're walking with you along this journey, as opposed to, you know, a random person at a call center. You know, and I hated it when I was going through with my daughter. I'd call a call, you know, call center. I'd wait on the line for 20 or 30 minutes.

[Luke] Yeah.

[Andy] They were like, "Oh, I can't help you. you know, you need to talk to this person." So you call a number and you... Like, dude, like this is so impersonal. With, like, terrible,

[Luke] Terrible hold music. Terrible

[Andy] Hold

[Luke] Music. And you can't mute it because you wanna hear when they pick up.

[Andy] No, and so we were like, "Hey, we want a, we want accountability for that person internally," 'cause if you have a call center, there's no accountability. And so we built these care advocacy kind of group, and then we also have another group that's-- we call delight coordinators. So anything, any, if you're going through something big in life, their full job is to make you feel loved during the time in which you are going through something big in life, you know? And so that's their full job, which is one of the best jobs in the world, I think. Totally. and so I'll give you just one example, one story where we had this little kid in Colorado who was hiking with his dad, and he tripped and he fell and he whacked his face on a rock. And so, you know, he had a big gash and so we went to the hospital, he got it all stitched up. Bill was, you know, funded and all that. He was good on that. And so we, our care advocate called his mom and was like, "Hey, how's the little guy doing?" And I try not to get emotional talking about it. He-- His mom was like, "Well, he's, you know, he's doing fine physically, but emotionally, he doesn't wanna go on hikes with his dad anymore." And that was like their thing to do, you know, father-son. And so our care advocate sent this little kid a little climbing kit that was... He could put it in his living room, and so he could kinda get back into climbing. And his mom called us and is sobbing, being like, "You won't believe it. He's back out with his dad hiking." You know, it's just like that little $50 gift that we gave him through a really hard time for that little guy got him back to doing what he and his dad love. And so that's what we actually tell our care advocates. He's like, "You have a certain amount of money you have to spend on your members so that they feel loved." And it's truly kind of like a love your neighbor approach to healthcare as opposed to being some random number on a spreadsheet.

[1:14:15]

[Luke] Wow.

[Andy] Like, that's ultimately, you know, what the core of our company is. Our mission as a company, it might sound cheesy to people, but it's legit love our members. If we can legit love our members, then the rest is gonna figure itself out. But, like, we want you to feel loved while going through really hard stuff in life. If you never wanna talk to us, that's fine. But, like, if you do wanna talk to us, we hope that you feel, you know, loved by the company who's trying to serve you in healthcare as, you know, a total contradiction to, you know, the current system is set up.

[Luke] Your body has somehow been managing to heal cuts and scrapes your entire life, but somehow we got duped into thinking we need disinfectants that sting or burn to make the process work better. It's crazy, especially when you find out the body already produces one of the most powerful tools for supporting damaged skin. It's called hypochlorous acid, and it's what your white blood cells make as part of your natural immune response. It fights pathogens, calms inflammation, and supports tissue repair. So I'm thinking, why not put that same biology to work on the outside? And that's the whole idea behind Active Skin Repair. Their medical-grade formula helps cleanse, soothe, and support healing without discomfort or disrupting healthy tissue. And this stuff is ridiculously versatile. I'm talking cuts, scrapes, burns, breakouts, bug bites, rashes, irritated skin. You just spray it on and let your body do what it already knows how to do. So to get your skin issues fixed up, here's what you do. Go to lukestory.com/skinrepair and use the code Luke at checkout to save 20% off your order. 'Cause sometimes the smartest health technology isn't about overriding your biology. It's about working with the intelligence that's already built in. So again, hit up lukestory.com/skinrepair, and don't forget the code Luke to save that 20%. In terms of the people that work in your organization Are they often people that worked in traditional insurance or medical system before this and are coming in like, "Oh my God, what a relief," like, this is cool and new? Or are they people just from different walks of life and professional

[Andy] Backgrounds? It's different walks of life. I mean, all of them, or most of them on the that care advocacy team are just super high empathy, you know, type of people.

[Luke] Yeah.

[Andy] So we've got a lot of former, like, teachers and nurses and things like that just have that, like, empathetic spirit about Yeah And can, like, feel with you as you're going through that. You know, all of our pregnant moms, one of the things that my wife told me when she went into the hospital for the birth of our kids, was like, "Those socks are terrible, that robe is terrible, the snacks they give us are awful." You know, "I feel like my skin is like, you know, super dry in this hospital." And so every pregnant mom who goes into the hospital gets really good socks, a really nice robe, snacks that are healthy and nutritious, and you know, moisturizer cream that's, you know, all natural- Yeah... and things like that. So it's like, we just wanna give you, like, a little something so that little stay is a part of that. And that was an idea from one of our care advocates. I was like, "Dude, I love that. Let's do it," you know? And so those are the types of things that we'll do and the care advocates will do on your, on your behalf.

[1:17:40]

[Luke] That's epic. I ask that question just 'cause I, you know, I imagine there are a lot of people who are working within the existing system that are also not satisfied on the, on the provider side, right? Yeah. It's like, "Well, this is my gig," but it can't feel that good to be dealing with disgruntled, ill people all the time, right?

[Andy] Yeah.

[Luke] Who just got that bill and are now coming in or calling to talk about it. It's just Yeah... oh, God, I wouldn't want that job.

[Andy] Well, funny enough, the number two category, occupation category for members of CrowdHealth are clinicians.

[Luke] Really?

[Andy] Yeah. So it's doctors and nurses- Huh... who are like, "I'm tired of this system. I do wanna-- not wanna be any part of it." And funny enough, hospitals have terrible health insurance. They provide their people with terrible health insurance.

[Luke] Really?

[Andy] Yeah. Like, you'd think they'd get a discount or something. Yeah,

[Luke] You'd think it'd just be carte blanche. No. You know, you work here every day.

[Andy] They're terrible.

[Luke] Come in on Friday and get treated.

[Andy] So it's number one is entrepreneurs, because they wanna go and do their thing. They're out there. A lot of podcasters, a lot of freelancers and gig workers and small business owners and things like that. But yeah, number two is clinicians.

[Luke] And what do doctors and providers, clinicians, et cetera, think about what you're doing? Like, what's the response when one of your members goes in and gets whatever kind of treatment?

[Andy] Yeah. Overwhelmingly positive. Oftentimes they'll call us after our member has been there. They're like, "Hey, can I get on, like... Do you have a list or something, like, I can get on? Can you send me more people?"

[Luke] Oh, right.

[Andy] You know, because if you think about it, a lot of these places, their, like, 60% of their revenue is coming from United or Cigna or Aetna or whatever. and they're like, "Man, I would really like to Get away from that and get, you know, direct pay. And so, and I... We're actually seeing some doctors who are saying no to health insurance altogether. And they're like, "I'm not taking any health insurance." And so, you know, my theory is that in the next 10 years, the best doctors on the planet are gonna be only cash doctors, 'cause they're so good, they can be like, "Look, if you wanna come to me, you have to pay in cash." Yeah. "I'm not taking health insurance." Yeah. "Forget it." And we're already seeing it, seeing it in the primary care space. The primary care doctors are tired of spending two days a week fighting health insurance plans. They say, "I just wanna take care of people. Like, that's why I got into medicine originally." And so they've started this thing called direct primary care, which is you pay your doctor on just a monthly basis, and you have unlimited access to him or her. And so they're like, "Yeah, pay me in cash and I'll take care, really good care of you." And so they significantly decrease their kind of census within their- Mm-hmm Practice. You pay, you know, 50 bucks a month or something to have unlimited access to them, and that's what the kind of the best primary care doctors are doing.

[Luke] That's very cool. I've seen models similar to that pop up over the years in the functional medicine space. Mm-hmm. A kind of a membership program, right? Yeah. And you get a certain number of visits or hours and lab work and things like that. I always thought that was a much better direction.

[Andy] Yeah.

[Luke] What so...

[Andy] So by the way, in that scenario- Yeah... too, is what's great is it's no longer fee for service. You know, meaning, like, if you go to a doctor, there's an incentive to generate revenue off of you, and so they're gonna give you X, Y, and Z when you may only need X, right? In these situations, they're actually incentivized 'cause you're paying them on a monthly basis as opposed to, like, you know, I'm paying for a, an X-ray and a lab visit and all these kinds of things. You're just paying them one flat rate, and so they actually have an incentive to reduce utilization of healthcare- Oh, right Because they're not making money off of that anymore. Right... and so it's much more aligned with the patient and the cost, and so it's a great model.

[1:21:21]

[Luke] So as you describe this and your 35,000 members you know, in comparison to Goliath, you know, the system- Yeah... and God knows how many millions of people are in that cycle, unfortunately. So relatively speaking, you're newer- Thank you... and smaller, right? That said are you getting any kind of, you know, threatening messages from the men in black or, you know, what kind of pushback are you getting? Did you have, did you have or are you having difficulty in terms of regulatory agencies and this kind of thing?

[Andy] Yeah. '

[Luke] Cause, you know.

[Andy] It's coming from multiple different-

[Luke] The bee systems doesn't want people like you to innovate, right?

[Andy] Yeah. Yeah. yeah, we're seeing it from multiple different angles unfortunately, and I knew this was going in. and like I told a guy who was in kind of the system that I was gonna do this, and he looked at me, he's like, "You understand you're entering into a war. Like this is warfare." And I'm like, "I get it." I get it. And in fact, we unfortunately, we had a guy who stopped outside of our house five or six times in a blacked-out car. and then ultimately I got a message that says, "I'm going to f-ing kill you all." and so we had to have, you know, Austin Police Department, you know, surround our house for a period of time because we thought this guy was gonna come and, you know, and take us out. You can imagine, like, I can take that, but my wife and kids were there, and my kids are like, who at the time were probably six and eight, are freaked out, right? Yeah. And so you know, we have to just go through that. and so that's one way in which we're seeing this. I had to increase security and all that kind of stuff, which is terrible, especially after, you know, the UnitedHealthcare guy you Oh, yeah Got gunned down a couple of years ago.

[Luke] Right.

[Andy] And, you know, we... Ultimately, the police caught this guy thankfully, and so, you know, he's been taken care of. And I don't know if-- He wasn't a customer, but he was from somebody, someone else that had philosophical differences with what I was doing, which is what the cops told us. So anyway, you know, that's one way. But yeah, the regulatory agencies are calling and saying, "Hey, you know, you're breaking the health insurance laws." And I say, "Hey, we're not health insurance." "Yes, you are." "No, I'm not." "Yes, you are." "No, I'm not." And it takes six or nine months and costs me $100,000 every time they reach out in attorney's fees. And so we just have to go through the battle, go through the war of this. And so, I mean, I think that, you know, ultimately You have to go through some of that conflict to get out onto the other side. And, you know, for some reason, the higher being created me in a way that I'm like, "I'm gonna go to war on this," 'cause I think the outcome is worthwhile. So yeah, there's significant- Yeah... significant pushback.

[Luke] I suspected that was a possibility. Yeah. You know, I mean, even though relatively speaking, as I said, you're kind of under the radar, but what you're doing is so radically different and cool that of course they don't want cool things happening.

[1:24:26]

[Andy] Yeah.

[Luke] But I, you And,

[Andy] And even Yeah... like specifically, we just hit the $100 million mark of savings from our members, so our members now have $100 million that are in their pockets not going to the medical industrial complex, not going to the pharmaceutical companies and the hospitals and the health insurance companies. And $100 million within a $5 trillion or $6 trillion industry is tiny, but once you start hitting those levels, people are like, "Wow, you're actually taking money out of my pocket," meaning I'm the hospital system or the pharmaceutical company or whatever. And yeah, as we get bigger and bigger and bigger, I think those kind of dark forces will increase, so.

[Luke] Yeah.

[Andy] I'm, I know it's gonna happen. I'm prepped for it, and my wife is still on board so far. you know, so-... you know, we're ready to fight it.

[Luke] That's so cool, man. I really, I really commend you for that, and it's exciting because it's not only what you're doing in this sector, right, but you're a way shower for people who want to disrupt other dysfunctional- Yeah Antiquated systems that are rapacious and unfair and parasitic, right? It's like someone could have an idea for a bank or whatever, like fill in the blank of any of these kinda, these sort of corrosive institutions- Yeah... where everyone just kinda goes along 'cause there's no other options. You're clearly going, "Hey, there wasn't an option here, and I just invented one." That's super inspiring.

[Andy] Well, I mean, you word, you used the word, and it's parasite, which I think we have many parasitic industries, and so, you know, how do you kill a parasite? Really the only way of doing that is to starve it. You know, and so what I'm saying to people is like, "Look, if you think health insurance is a problem, if you think these big hospital systems are a problem, then we need to starve it," right? Like we, you need to take your money away from the parasite and put it in, back into your own pocket so that you can start feeding, you know, the naturopathic folks and the holistic folks and the integrative folks because they're not the parasite. They're the, they're the ones that are helping us to thrive. And so it's like, let's take money away from the parasites and give it to people to, that are trying to actually help us. Yeah. And as a result of that, we're living longer, more thriving, fruitful lives. Like, man, that's a beautiful thing from my perspective.

[Luke] Yeah.

[Andy] And that's worth the battle. Direct

[Luke] Your resources toward the benef- beneficial flora.

[Andy] Yeah. It's like Way more eloquent than the way I said it, for sure.

[Luke] That's very cool. well, dude, I'm like, I know you're, you know, you're not giving a sales pitch. I just wanted to talk to you 'cause you're doing something very interesting. But I'm like, "I need to sign up for this shit," which I will. So for those that are interested, you can go to lukestory.com/joincrowdhealth, and if you use the code Lukestory, you can join for $99 per member, per month for the first three months. That's cool.

[Andy] Yeah.

[Luke] I didn't even know that was in my notes. That's awesome. What would it look like for someone who does not use that link and just, you know, someday goes to your site and signs up? Like, what are we talking about monthly? Do we even call it a premium?

[Andy] Yeah, I mean, it's your, we call it your monthly contribution- Contribution, okay... because you're contributing to somebody else Right... in the community. obviously

[1:27:30]

[Luke] We So does that, does that kind of go into a pool that is then used? No,

[Andy] It goes directly to you

[Luke] Oh, wow

[Andy] We've got a pretty cool backend fintech system where, hey, you just give us your payment information, and you say yes, and that money goes directly from you to me if I need help, and that then aggregates in my bank account, so then I have the money to go and pay. Oh, wow. So it's super easy. I mean, it's so different than health insurance, but-

[Luke] Yeah...

[Andy] Super easy.

[Luke] I can't, I almost can't get my head around it Yeah... 'cause it's so different.

[Andy] Yeah,

[Luke] Yeah. I was like, "Wait, what?" That sounds too transparent and fair.

[Andy] Yeah. Well, and go... what I would say if you're kind of questioning this or you wanna, like, go and do some more research, go and just go on Google or whatever and say CrowdHealth reviews, and we've got now thousands of reviews out there, and everybody that, like, goes and reads them, like, people are leaving, like, paragraphs and paragraphs in these reviews. You know how you go through reviews, it's like, "Great service." You know? Yeah. People are telling their stories about how they went through this and how different it was going through this scenario, you know, going through a bad scenario with CrowdHealth versus going it, through it with health insurance. And the thing that you'll see is, like, anytime we have a big health event, what do we say? Now we have to go fight with the health insurance company to get it paid. Whereas people, I think, feel like, "Man, CrowdHealth is on my side, and we're fighting the system together as opposed to in opposition." And so people just feel like they have, you know, an ally for their, for their healthcare, and they feel loved. They feel loved through that process, so.

[Luke] I'm getting that.

[Andy] Yeah.

[Luke] So what, uh... So it's called a contribution, not a premium. Yeah. What... Are there, are there tiers to it, or is it the same for everyone? What does it look like if you have, you know, a number of kids and so on?

[Andy] Yeah. So I'll just give you my family's example. Okay... we are... We, I went to the Affordable Care Act this year just to see what it was gonna be, and it was 1,400 bucks a month, and I think it was a 16 or $18,000 deductible, which means, like, I'm in $30,000 before the health insurance plan pays a dime. And so I was just curious what it was gonna be. My family this month is paying 500 bucks, under 500 bucks, 490 bucks. Wow. So I'm saving $1,000 a month. And then if I have something big, I just pay 500 bucks for that entire health event. So we actually had a webinar last night for people who are interested in CrowdHealth, and a guy who has brain cancer a glioblastoma, which is a bad one. And he, you know, got the cancer diagnosis on a Friday. He was in surgery on a Monday. he had to go back into surgery a month and a half later. He's had a bunch of different things go on. He's going to Germany to have some genome therapy done for this. That's all one health event, so you're just paying the first 500 bucks of that. Whoa. And then all of those services after that are eligible for funding from the community, and all of his bills have gotten, has have gotten paid. And so you're just paying 500 bucks for that entire health event. It doesn't matter if it takes three months or three years, you're just paying the first 500 bucks.

[1:30:38]

[Luke] What?

[Andy] And that keeps people- That's insane... from having to do these big deductibles that are putting them into medical debt and bankruptcy. and that's kind of the core of this, is we've not had one person go into medical bankruptcy in the last five and a half years that we've been around, and we have 35,000 people as a part of the community. So it really does solve this issue That's incredible... medical debt.

[Luke] That's incredible, dude. How cool. I love this. are there any... We've talked about all of the positive attributes of what you're doing. Are there any legitimate downsides to someone going the CrowdHealth route?

[Andy] Yeah, I mean, I think the one thing that people are really concerned about is, you know, ultimately instead of a health insurance plan being responsible for that payment, I'm now responsible for that payment, and so that's on me. This is kind of in our personal responsibility worldview. Like, if I'm responsible for the bill, then I treat the community a little bit different than if the community is responsible for the bill. With that said, they say, well, health insurance guarantees, you know, payment. Well, if they decline 20% of them, that's not a guarantee. You know, whereas we're getting 99.9%-

[Luke] Facts.

[Andy] Facts. Yeah... you know, Yeah... you know, funded. And so people The downside, at least perceived downside, is I'm now responsible for my, for my health bill. But you have an ally to walk you along through this. And the cool thing is if you do have a health event, God forbid you have to go to the ER, you know, one of the things I hated was you get these bills and you have no idea what they mean. They are from 14 different places and you're like, "Wait, I was at one hospital. Why am I getting 14?" All you have to do is just take a picture of the bill, you upload it. We do all of the work on the back end to make sure that the bills are right, they're fairly priced, you're not getting double charged, all that stuff, so we take that headache away from you on the back end so you don't have to deal with it. Like, that's the beauty of this. And so I think it's great that you're responsible for your own healthcare bills as opposed to a health insurance plan. But a lot of people, that's the number one reason why people don't join is they're like, "Oh, wait, I don't wanna be responsibility for the bill."

[Luke] Right.

[Andy] So that's kind of the downside, and it's perceived. I don't think it's reality, but it's at least perceived.

[Luke] Yeah, but going back to what we were talking about earlier of just like-minded people finding resonance around an idea.

[Andy] Mm-hmm.

[Luke] I'm guessing many of the people that join CrowdHealth are probably sovereign people, right? Yeah. That are invested in themselves and their family and their life, and actually want to be accountable for their debt Sure... you know, things like that.

[Andy] Yeah. I mean, the only other downsides if you're a smoker, you're not, you're not allowed to join the crowd. Oh, okay If you're, if you're destroying your body, then-

[Luke] What if you do oral nicotine?

[Andy] I was gonna say, I didn't bring mine with me, but I have one too. That's totally fine. you know, so if you're a smoker, we think, you know, you're making decisions that is destroying your body, that's going to lead to a health outcome. If you smoke a cigar once in a while, who cares? I don't really care. Yeah. But if like you smoke on a daily basis, you're not allowed into the community. if you are over if you're significantly obese you're not and you can't join the community. and so, you know, that's a, the couple more downsides, but I would say, and I have, you know, real life examples of people who were significantly obese, they wanted to join CrowdHealth. They were really mad about it. They took personal responsibility, and just a few months ago, I got a direct message on X from a guy who was overweight, lost the pound- the weight, and it was a picture of him and his wife at the end of a triathlon that they had just ran or that, you know, just had completed. And the message was literally, "I would not be here unless CrowdHealth gave me the incentive to lose all of this weight." And he's like, "Now I'm on a total health journey 'cause I know what it feels Wow... to be of, you know, good weight as opposed to, you know, obesity."

[1:34:32]

[Luke] Did you ever think about that? I mean, obviously it makes sense that you don't want the members who have taken care of themselves to be burdened by people that haven't, right? I mean, thatYeah... kind of like common sense, but did you foresee that kind of incentive where somebody could be like, "Oh, I want to join, but I can't. I'm gonna quit smoking or lose weight or whatever"?

[Andy] I had a theoretical idea, but I didn't know if practically it was going to be there. One of the things that we do that I had a little bit more substantial kind of conviction in was, you know, with like drivers drive- car insurance?

[Luke] Mm-hmm.

[Andy] You know, if you're a good driver, you get good rates. If you're a bad driver, you get bad rates. that makes total sense, right?

[Luke] Yeah.

[Andy] But you can't do that with health insurance, so it's illegal.

[Luke] Right.

[Andy] So what we're able to do, interestingly, is if you show us that you're metabolically healthy, all the rates that I've been talking about drop by 20%.

[Luke] Really?

[Andy] Because you're metabolically healthy.

[Luke] Oh my God, I bet I'm gonna get a killer rate.

[Andy] So you... So during October, November, or December, if you want to go get your fasting insulin, your DEXA scan to get visceral fat or a high sensitivity C-reactive protein, and you show us that you're metabolically healthy, you get a 20% discount on CrowdHealth, which incenti- for the people who don't Make it to, like, the standards that we set, they at least now have, like, a baseline. Yeah. And so we've had so many people who now have the baseline. They're like, "Okay, next year I'm gonna make it," right? "And so here are the things that I have to do between next, now and next year to make it." So it does incentivize That's amazing... to get that baseline, 'cause without a baseline, you just... Nobody knows, right? Like-

[Luke] Yeah,

[Andy] Yeah... you know, you don't know what your fasting insulin Yeah... which we think is a pretty good predictor of metabolic health. Not perfect, but pretty good. you don't know what your visceral fat is. I mean, you can be you know, fat along the waist but have low visceral fat, or skinny along the waist and have high visceral fat. Visceral fat, for people watching, is the fat that hangs out around your organs, which you can get a pretty good sense of with using a DEXA scan. So I don't know, you know, what the inflammation is in my body. HSCRP tells me pretty close what the inflammation is in my body. So then we give you steps along the way to say, "Here's how you improve these things, that next year you can get it." And so that's just a cool part of what it is. That's incredible. And that went from theory to practicality really quickly. Like, as soon as we started that, we Yeah... people taking actions to improve. And like, man, what if, what if you had a health system that actually incentivized you to

[Luke] Get better? I'm so glad you brought that up, because I forgot about that. At times I have had that thought. I'm like, "Man, I really spend a lot of time and energy to stay healthy. Why am I paying the same health insurance premium as someone who-

[Andy] Yeah...

[Luke] Doesn't give a shit and just, you know?"

[Andy] He shouldn't. Yeah. From my perspective, and again, that's controversial in many places, but I don't think your viewers find that very controversial. Makes tons of logical sense that if you're spending the money to stay healthy, you shouldn't be penny... paying for the people who aren't doing the right things lifestyle who aren't spending the money who are, you know, eating the cookie dough ice cream on the couch every night. Like, that's just not fair. Well,

[1:37:35]

[Luke] I do that, to be fair.

[Andy] Well, I engage a little bit once in a while. Yeah. I've got kids. my wife's birthday is tomorrow so I'm sure I'll have, you know, a little bit of something. But yeah. I mean, doing that every single day is clearly terrible for your body.

[Luke] Yeah. Here's what's up. The longer I've been in the health space, the more I've realized that the environment around your body is just as important, if not more important in some cases, as the things you put into it. You can eat clean, sleep eight hours, take all the right supplements, but if your body's swimming in a sea of wireless signals 24 hours a day, that stress can sabotage a lot of that hard work. And that is why my Quantum Upgrade subscription is still active after all these years. It's pretty incredible. It creates a coherent quantum field around my home that harmonizes EMF so it's less disruptive to my biology, and I can even take it with me when I travel. There's no pills to take, nothing to track, no devices, nothing to remember. It just runs in the background while I get on with living my best life. And what I love about these guys is that they're always innovating. They recently added a growing library of boosters that let you personalize your experience, from recovery and deep sleep to creativity, travel, and even meditation. So you can log into your account, set your booster, and run. So to upgrade your life, get over to lukestory.com/quantumupgrade and use the code Luke15 to start your 15-day free trial. 'Cause if you're gonna invest in your health, don't ignore the environment in which you live. That's lukestory.com/quantumupgrade. Tell me about the Bitcoin experiment

[Andy] Oh, yeah

[Luke] Yeah, and the idea of moving healthcare payments toward peer-to-peer money. I don't know a lot about crypto. I Yeah... I have a little bit of Bitcoin. Yeah. I bought when it was really cheap, so I'm glad I got... I think I bought one full coin, you Right And it was like 7,400 bucks, which I thought I was insane to do looking back. It might work out well. Ah, yeah. Could have bought a few more if I really put my nose to the grindstone. But, Yeah... so I don't know a lot about it. But I do like the basic premise of it in terms of privacy and just something that is you know, a parallel kind of system and idea in a similar way to what you're doing, right? Yeah. It's like you have more capacity for privacy and-

[Andy] Mm...

[Luke] Things like that. So I'm interested in kind of the intersection of that world and what you're doing. Is there going to be, or is that a possible intersection- Yeah... that makes sense for everyone?

[Andy] So companies tend to take the personality of the founders in many ways. And so I am a Bitcoiner myself. Like, I truly believe, back to incentives, that the government is gonna continue to print money and has no incentive to actually get the budget under control. I'd

[Luke] Say there's lots of evidence to support that

[1:40:36]

[Andy] Pattern Yeah. And people can say, "Oh, well, you know, there are, there are countries in the past that have had debt levels as high as ours," but the difference is that was either during war or during a recession, and they self-corrected after the war or the recession ended. The problem is us is we are neither, I guess we're in a war, but not a big enough war to suck down, you know, resources. We're not in a recession, and we're still $2 trillion a year or something like that now in budget deficits, and I do not see a mechanism for us to getting that under control. Politicians are... go to Washington, DC, and they wanna give their constituents something. So once you give something to somebody, you can't take it back or it's very difficult. And so I do not see a mechanism in which the United States gets their budget under control, which means that we have to print money to pay for this stuff, and as more money enters the system, inflation goes up. And so we've seen that over the last five or six years as we've put trillions and trillions of dollars into the economy. That's why our food's getting so expensive. That's why our gas is so expensive. Houses are so expensive. It's the first generation to people that can't go out and buy, you know, a house, Yeah Like our previous generations, our generation and the generation before us. Totally, man. And so I think that's a problem, and so I truly believe that Bitcoin is different. There is no inflation with Bitcoin, meaning you have 21 million Bitcoin out there. It will never change. and so I wanna put my money into an asset that you can't, a government official can't just add more to it all the Right Therefore depreciating my asset. and so when we started As you can probably imagine, Bitcoiners have a worldview of the financial system is not built for our benefit. It's built for the benefit of the people in DC and these massive corporations. and therefore, we're going to exit that, and we're gonna go into the, to the kinda the Bitcoin standard as opposed to the monetary standard. And so as you can imagine, those people have a similar worldview as us, a decentralized system- Totally... as opposed to a DC centralized system.

[Luke] Totally, and I'm thinking about the communal aspect of what you're doing Oh,

[Andy] Man...

[Luke] That is the definition of decentralized, right?

[Andy] If you see somebody, you know, if you're a Bitcoiner, and you see somebody with a Bitcoin T-shirt on in the airport, you'll give them a high five or a fist bump or whatever, as there's a community component to that.

[Luke] Yeah.

[Andy] And so as we started the healthcare journey the CrowdHealth journey we went after that community specifically because they had such a similar worldview to us. And so we've got, you know, I think 20% of our customers are Bitcoiners. Maybe it's 25%, something like that. but we do allow them in some ways to transact in Bitcoin if they want to, as opposed to dollars. Oh, really? If they, if they want to. And you know, one of the cool things that we didn't really talk about is the way that we work is we only ask you on a monthly basis for how much the community needs. so for an individual, for example, it's 200 bucks a month max. This month, we're only asking for, I think, 140 of the 200. We allow our Bitcoiners to actually put in all 200, but that $60 that's not being used to help the community is automatically converted into Bitcoin, and is their, almost like their little Bitcoin HSA-like thing. So it, Whoa... it allows them to stack in Bitcoin, No way... anonymously. Yeah, and That's cool That's a cool thing for a lot of the Bitcoiners. And so it's just a, it's just a community that has a very similar worldview as us. And so yeah, most of the, like, big Bitcoin podcasters end up being CrowdHealth members 'cause they're so aligned with kind of our worldview.

[1:44:17]

[Luke] Totally. Wow, that's amazing, dude. I'm so glad we met today.

[Andy] Yeah, this was fun. I

[Luke] Feel like it's a really great resource for the listeners. I mean, I cannot, you know, I only meet so many of them, right? But I mean, this whole health insurance thing, the medical system, all of it is just such a scam, and it's-- and we're on the losing end of that Yeah You know, every time, and it seems to only get worse. Not to be pessimistic, but it's kinda like as you're describing our monetary system and the fake fiat currency that's not even money legally, right? I'm sure you know that, right? Won't get into that, but it's like there's no fixing that. We need a new thing.

[Andy] Yeah.

[Luke] You know? And so many of these institutions that are just running our civilization are broken beyond repair, A. B, the people who created those systems are not incentivized whatsoever to fix them or build something new.

[Andy] Exactly.

[Luke] You know? So I really- Yeah... I just applaud you, man, for doing something very cool and and useful, not only to, you know, the average person, but especially people who are into podcasts like this and are like-minded and want to find a way to become more financially free and also take care of themselves.

[Andy] Yeah. Amen.

[Luke] Yeah. Super cool. All right, so you guys, we'll put the all the show notes for anything that is relevant that we can link to at lukestory.com/crowdhealth. And again if you guys are as interested in this as I am, go to lukestory.com/crowdhealth, and the code Lukestory gets you a $99 three-month membership. Well, $99 per month for the first three months

[Andy] And a lot of people- I have that right? Oh, yeah, will use that code and just, like, try it out because, you know clearly this is different. And so it takes you a minute to really, like, get comfortable with it. So, you know, look, it's 99 bucks a month, and if your family can save $10,000 a year, it's a cool little mini investment to just see if you like it. And I would say vast majority of people love it and sign up for, you know, longer term and stay with us for a long time. so yeah, join crowdhealth.com or Luke Story and see that. The other thing I would only mention is if you still have questions about this, great. You know, sign up and book a call with one of our people. They're not salespeople. They don't get commission. They're just, like, educators. Like, if you have questions about how this works, like, there's some awesome people, I talk to them every day, that are willing to answer your questions and give you it straight. Cool... you know, definitely reach out to them if you have any

[Luke] Questions. Being decentralized, do your like members... I don't know, are they employees? Like, I don't know what you call it. Seems like a, the wrong term for sounds like very heart-centered people- Yeah... that you work with. Is your team, let me put it that way, is your team kind of all remote and in different places or do you guys have a headquarters here?

[Andy] We are completely decentralized.

[Luke] Wow, cool.

[Andy] There's not two people in one place. We Really?... eight employees in I think 15 or 18 different states, something like that, and they are all working from home. And I trust them that they're getting their job done and, Yeah... they do. and so we were started during COVID, so we had to like disperse anyway. Right. And for me it was like, as just a business owner, I'm like, man, if I can find a really great person in Kansas that doesn't have to be in Austin Great. Like, you Yeah... some of our best people are in Kansas and Indiana and Florida and all these places, so we're completely decentralized.

[1:47:43]

[Luke] That's epic. Which is, it's been great. I mean, that's gonna make for a happier team, too. Like, who wants to go drive to some corporate office building every day Yeah... with terrible lighting?

[Andy] Yeah. I think they're more productive. I'm more productive. Yeah. and so it works out, works out great.

[Luke] Yeah, I mean, I have worked from home for I guess almost 11 years now. I mean, I can't imagine having to show up somewhere every day, even if it was cool. Just like, I don't know. Yeah. I don't feel like it. I'm gonna do this other thing this morning, and then I'll pack more work in at the end of the day or whatever, right? Yeah. Just being able to create one's own schedule definitely lends to a higher quality of life, and higher quality of life means your people are able to serve better because they're happier.

[Andy] Yeah.

[Luke] Yeah.

[Andy] We have a little concentration in Austin, a little concentration in Nashville, but it's just because those are where our networks are, and Yeah... anytime you have a network, you just tend to find people there. But other than that, like yeah, we have people all over the place.

[Luke] Awesome, man.

[Andy] Yeah.

[Luke] Well, dude, thank you. This has been amazing. I Thank you for having me... I got... Yeah, my pleasure. I'm honored. and it's funny that, you know, when you walked in, it's, "Oh, where'd you fly in from?" You're like, "I live down the road." Yeah. So yeah, it's cool. so I do have one last question for you. Yeah, sure. It's a real zinger.

[Andy] Okay.

[Luke] Who have been three teachers or teachings in general throughout your life that have informed who you are today?

[Andy] Man, my grandpa on my dad's side who my dad was actually adopted by him. and, you know, he-- funny enough, he always had this saying, "Teach those willing to learn and learn from those willing to teach." And so I've always kind of taken that approach where it's like, I think I can interact with you, and man, I can, I can learn a ton from you, and I'm sure you can learn a ton from me. As long as we Yeah... that reciprocity of being humble and saying, "I don't know everything," I think that's just a, you know, a beautiful, a beautiful thing. That's a

[Luke] Great principle.

[Andy] Yeah. Yeah. and so I think my grandpa is probably, you know, the number one on that list. Can they be like historical figures that I've learned from? Yeah,

[Luke] Anything.

[Andy] You know, look, I think that I don't, you know, I'm pretty forward with this, but I don't know about your podcast. You know, I believe that we have a higher being. and so I think you've probably heard me say love your neighbor a bunch of times. That's a teaching from Jesus. So Yeah... I love the fact of like forgiveness and the kind of the principles of what he was talking about are just like so incredible to me. They make sense to me. I will tell you that the... I'm, I had three daughters, only two of them are still around. We lost one right after she was born, and I can tell you that one of the... my wife and I came home from the hospital, and we had this crazy thought of like, "Did we tell her that we loved her enough?" You know, it's like one of those crazy things where we only had 10 and a half hours with her. My-- I had a dream that night where I was my daughter looking up at me and my wife and just filled with like the most incredible feeling of love that I ever have felt. Wow. And so I feel like there is a higher being that there is there that comfort us and protect us and walk us through, like, those really, you know, hard periods of life. And so that would be Yeah... probably my number one. number two is grandpa. Yeah. And number three, man, I had this guy who right out of college just, like, was such an incredible mentor to me and took me in when, under his wing, and he was the CEO of this big, huge Fortune 500 company forever. Whatever reason, he saw me and was like, "Man, I'm gonna take you under my wing, and I'm gonna teach you, and I'm gonna, you know, be a mentor to you." And I don't think I would be here today, and I wouldn't be married to my wife, and all the things that kinda dominoes that had to fall throughout life for me to be here today wouldn't be here today without his willingness to really lean into our relationship. And here I am let's see. That was tw- 2001. So here I am 25 years later, and I'm gonna go and meet him at his home, you know, in a couple of weeks when I'm in his city, and he's still there be like, "Man, I love it." He's an investor in CrowdHealth. Oh, cool. And so it was just one of those relationships that was kind of like, I feel like God put me in that situation, and it Yeah A pretty amazing thing where he's been willing to mentor me along the way. So, um-

[1:52:00]

[Luke] Beautiful...

[Andy] Pretty neat.

[Luke] Beautiful. Yeah. we're no stranger to God around here. Yeah. We talk about God in whatever you wanna call it all the time. When you were saying that, I thought, man, if there isn't a higher power, we're screwed.

[Andy] That's what I'm saying.

[Luke] I mean, I know I am. We were just praying in the bedroom before, you know, you got here. My wife's like, "Hey, man, we need to, like, really step up the prayers and make sure God is first in life." And thank God I

[Andy] That's amazing...

[Luke] I have that reminder

[Andy] Now. I'll tell you just one more quick story. Do we have time for one more quick story? Yeah, go for it. Yeah. Okay.

[Luke] Got all the time in the world.

[Andy] After we lost our daughter, her name is Grace we came home, and we had a very silly pastor tell us that it... We don't have any kind of, like, biblical reference for babies being in heaven Which is probably the absolute worst possible thing you can say to somebody- Wow When they've just lost their daughter. And so my wife went to bed that night, and she had a dream that there was a two-way mirror. Grace was on the reflective side, totally healed, in the most beautiful prairie of flowers that you'd ever seen. And sorry, and my wife was on the non-reflective side. And for us, that was like God's way of being like, "Hey, I know it's painful that you don't have her anymore, but she's in the most beautiful place that she can be." And like, those are the ways that, like, God has touched us, like, in a very... And I think he can talk to us in dreams, you know? Yeah. Like, even biblically. Like, we see this over and over. Joseph was told that Mary was pregnant in a dream. And so, like, that was the kind of two moments where I felt like God was so present with us. And if you can imagine losing your first daughter, watching her take her last breath, incredibly difficult time in our life. We almost got divorced in the first two years of our life because it was such, like, a hard thing to deal with, and he just kept being like, "I'm here. I'm here. I'm here." I don't understand why he took Grace. I won't understand until I get to meet the higher being, but he was so comforting in those moments. And it was a just a huge, powerful impact. Wow. And I think ultimately, those getting through that, having empathy for people who are really going through hard things, does in many ways form the way that I currently live my life, form the way that I run my company with just this like, I want people to feel loved during the most difficult times of their lives. Like, that's why I say legit love your, our members, right? It's a, from the biblical passage, love your neighbor. You know, we just kinda made it a little more fun, but that's kinda the driver behind why I do what I do.

[Luke] That's beautiful, man. Thank you for sharing that. Yeah. I appreciate that. Yeah, I mean, sometimes things happen in life, and it really requires a lot of blind faith and trust, you know? Yeah. I mean, we had a miscarriage, and then weren't able to have a kid, and it's, I mean, we're constantly kind of looking at each other like, "Well, what are we doing here then?" You know? It's like more will be revealed- Yeah... you know, in terms of purpose- Yeah... and legacy and things like that, right? Yeah. Amen. So it's just like, oh my God, I would not be here if I didn't have faith that there is a a benevolent force that's taking care of me whether I know it or not, you know? Amen. So I appreciate you sharing that.

[1:55:14]

[Andy] Yeah. Thanks for letting me share.

[Luke] All right, Lifestylist Nation, big ups to each and every one of you for joining this conversation. Wherever you're listening or watching, hit those buttons. You know what I'm talking about. Like, follow, subscribe, 'cause I know you don't wanna miss what's coming. And if you enjoyed this episode, please drop a rating and quick review. This podcast has always been and will always be free and unfiltered, and dropping a quick rating and review is a powerful way for you to give back without spending a penny. 'Cause here's what's up. With tens of thousands of new podcasts constantly hitting the airwaves, it's tough for us to reach new people. The reason is because the podcast platforms are ruled by algorithms, and the only lever I have to pull is your ratings and reviews. So pretty please with organic cane sugar on top, take 60 seconds out of your life and tap that review button. It not only keeps the show from disappearing, it's also the only way I can know what topics and guests you want more of. Our new episodes drop every Tuesday, and on the last Friday of the month, I release an AMA where I answer your very own questions. And I put those calls for questions out on all my social media accounts, so you gotta make sure we're connected. You'll find over 600 podcast videos and long-form product reviews on my YouTube. That's youtube.com/lukestory. I'm on X @MrLukeStory, and my brand-new TikTok handle, fresh from being banned for the third time by the CCP, is LukeStoryOfficial. And of course, I'm still active on Instagram, @LukeStory, and on Facebook @MrLukeStory. But you'll need to follow to see me, thanks to four years of heavy shadow banning. And I know that was a lot, so I'm gonna let you know you can find all of those links at the bottom of my homepage at lukestory.com, which is the mothership for everything I do. Oh, and if you enjoy your content raw-dogged and uncensored, you're gonna wanna join my Telegram channel at lukestory.com/telegram. But be forewarned that my Telegram feed is for adults with open minds only. Things can get pretty racy in there. Okay. That's it, and that's all, folks. Thank you for your attention to what matters. I'll close by sending blessings to you and yours and to your journey. See you next time.

‍