Joe Rogan is a comedian, actor, comedian, and heart transplant survivor. He talks about his journey to recovery from a near-death experience and how it changed his life. He also talks about what it was like to be on the other side of the transplant process and how he was able to walk again after a year and a half of being in a coma. Joe also shares some of his favorite memories of being on the transplant program and talks about some of the challenges he had to overcome to get back on the road to recovery. Joe and his family are a loving, hard-working, loving family and they are always willing to do whatever it takes to make sure their family and friends are able to have the best possible day. Joe is an inspiration to so many people and this is a must-listen for anyone who has ever had a heart transplant or is going through something similar to one or is in the process of getting one. I hope this episode inspires you to keep fighting the good fight and keep going! Thank you Joe for being a rock star and being the rock star you deserve to be the best you that you can be. You are an inspiration and you are not alone in this life! I love you, I appreciate you, thank you, and thank you for being you, Thank you for your strength and resilience! XOXO. - Joe Rogan - P.S. - Thank you so much for coming back from your long journey. I appreciate all the support and love you. I am so grateful for all the love and support you are so much more than you know you deserve it. I can t wait to come back from this journey. Thank you, so much love you are amazing. I love ya, I m coming back, I will see you back, bye, bye! - MRS. XO - Joe and we re back. P.A. xo xoxo - Joe, P.E. - J. and P. , P.M. ( ) ( & P.O. ( ) - SONGS . (S. ( ) (A. (P. ) ( ) (PODCASTING) , J. (SORCHES) (J. (M. (R. (AUGMENT) ) - JOSEPH)
00:00:58.000You know, it's such a fall from where I was.
00:01:02.000I really appreciate that, though, but I look at myself now and it's just a fragment of what I used to be, but I'm still here.
00:01:12.000That's what's so important to me, man.
00:01:13.000Well, the ridiculous thing you were doing, you're making videos of your working out, like getting ready, and after your heart operation, you have a heart transplant, and you're running in a parking lot, and you trip and fall.
00:04:22.000You know, you absolutely know that this is it, and it's not, you know, this is irreversible, and you know that this is death, and you're not just dozing off.
00:13:31.000When I go back this month, back up to Palo Alto where they did the transplant, they're going to take off about four or five different medications.
00:13:40.000So I'm a year out now, take less, and then the further you get out, the less medication.
00:13:45.000I think it eventually will get down to two or three.
00:13:47.000But you'll always have to take something.
00:14:45.000And I have so much faith to nothing can't faze me.
00:14:48.000You know, I went into the operation and Hey, I'll see you guys on the other side of this because, you know, I know I'm going to be all right.
00:14:55.000I got so much faith that, you know, I'm going to get through this.
00:15:57.000And I really would like to know if what I'm feeling is right.
00:16:03.000I really want to meet the family and let them know that I'm out here doing everything I can to raise donor awareness.
00:16:12.000And that their mother or their wife or their sister or their aunt didn't die in vain.
00:16:17.000And that I'm doing my absolute best to carry on and let people know that she was a donor and that it's so utterly important for people to donate, to give the gift of life.
00:16:29.000What are these feelings that you have?
00:16:30.000I have feelings that, for some reason, I can see that I feel like she was the oriental lady.
00:16:39.000I don't know why, but I really have feelings like that.
00:16:45.000And I feel like I can see this woman telling her husband, you know, I'll see you when you get home from work and making plans with her kids for the weekend.
00:16:54.000And I have no idea if this is right or not.
00:18:09.000Superman from Compton has a lady's heart.
00:18:12.000Now, when you say that it's not, the results aren't good for lady hearts and male bodies, did you say that to the doctor?
00:18:21.000Yeah, I mean, the doctor, it's so funny.
00:18:25.000I don't even know if the doctor's supposed to, because it was this one doctor, he would come in, a young guy, and he would come in every day.
00:22:19.000Like I said, I questioned God and my answer that I got back was simple.
00:22:26.000He said, if I gave you an 18-year-old Olympic athlete's heart CT and you recovered and was doing well, then people are going to say that that's why.
00:22:38.000We got an 18-year-old Olympic gold medalist heart and you're able to recover and stuff because of this.
00:22:45.000But if I take an old lady's heart that's too small and that you're not supposed to be able to come back and do these things with this heart, Then they're going to have to give me a little credit.
00:23:00.000He said, I have a habit of taking the least of the least, the lowest of the low, and making something out of it.
00:23:08.000And I said, you know, let me shut the fuck up.
00:27:17.000The really important things are, of course, my family and spreading donor awareness is so important because so many people die just waiting to get a heart, you know,
00:28:17.000I've heard people say, I'm worried about doing that because what if they don't resuscitate me because they need someone to get a heart or a liver or something?
00:35:18.000People talk to me about, you're yelling, you're yelling, CT, but I can't have C. So I make it all caps so I can read what I'm talking about.
00:35:42.000I've noticed, like, from when I was, like, 42, I started to notice it, and by the time I was 46, I was like, God damn it, I think I need glasses.
00:35:50.000Because I would just try to read the computer and I'd be doing this with my eyes, bulging my eyes and squinting and trying to look at it sideways and trying to see what the fuck I was reading.
00:37:39.000If you're right and it's an Asian woman, I think that would be fantastic that you could feel that, that you would know that and you could feel it.
00:38:30.000I mean, when I was a kid, it would be like Dr. Frankenstein.
00:38:35.000They didn't start doing it until 68, and I was born in 59. Wow, they did heart transplants in 68?
00:38:42.000In 68, yeah, that was the first one, yeah, 1968. They've been doing it a long time, but when I was a kid, it would have been like Dr. Frankenstein.
00:38:50.000He told me something like that was possible.
00:41:58.000It was so many, I got so many people, and it was overwhelming support, but I got quite a few, well, too many for me, messages or DMs, and I hope you don't make it, I hope you die, and I wish we're dead already, you know,
00:43:20.000People live their lives in just very counterproductive ways, and they feel like as long as they've got something they're excited about, that they're doing something.
00:43:27.000Even if it's excited about hating you for no reason.
00:45:03.000Their body developed like a solar panel for vitamin D. They're like, we gotta figure out how to get fucking vitamin D. This black skin ain't cutting it.
00:45:26.000This gentleman here, Graham Hancock, was on my podcast last week and he's a brilliant, brilliant guy but he studies ancient civilizations and people and one of the things that they're studying now is The various civilizations that we didn't even know existed,
00:45:42.000that existed in South America, like huge, multi-million size population civilizations in the Amazon.
00:45:52.000Like 20 million people living in the Amazon at one point in time.
00:45:54.000They think they were wiped out by Spanish explorers and European explorers that came over and gave them smallpox.
00:46:00.000The way they wiped out 90% of the Native Americans, they think the same thing happened down there in the Amazon.
00:46:06.000They had huge cities down there that European settlers had reported on.
00:46:20.000And the funny thing about white people that are racist is that, especially, like, I have Neanderthal DNA that's more primitive than Homo sapien DNA. And it's only in white people.
00:48:44.000Well, I think the feeling that you got from the second chance on life, this beautiful feeling of appreciation and celebration of this existence.
00:48:53.000That's what we need to try to foster in people.
00:48:56.000We need to try to let people know this is a temporary thing, man.
00:49:01.000If you're lucky, like we were talking about 100 years.
00:49:04.000If you're lucky, you get to 100 years.
00:49:18.000Yeah, I do because I'm a science nerd.
00:49:22.000I'm fascinated by all these 3D printed hearts and all this shit.
00:49:25.000I want to see what the fuck they can do.
00:49:27.000I really think, and talking to guys like David Sinclair and all these anti-aging specialists, I think they're on the verge of being able to reverse aging.
00:49:36.000They're treating aging like it's a disease, like it's a disease at the cellular level.
00:49:41.000Instead of accepting it and that like, well...
00:49:44.000You get older, hey, you're going to have to accept you can't do as much, your body's not going to work as well.
00:49:51.000Maybe if they can correct certain things about the human body, maybe they can correct that.
00:49:56.000I think it's very likely that in the future, I don't think that's an insurmountable situation.
00:50:01.000I think they're going to be able to correct what happens to your body when it ages.
00:50:04.000The deterioration that's caused by the aging process, your body produces less hormones, your body starts to slow down, Alzheimer's, all these different things.
00:50:14.000I think they're going to be able to correct those things.
00:53:54.000Well, I think with a guy like you that's so physical and you've been so physical your whole life, the big fear is to not be able to take care of yourself or move.
00:54:03.000Like, that's what we were talking about when you get to talk about being 100. Like, having someone wipe your ass and take care of you.
00:56:26.000We are strange little monkey people living on this fucking planet, making things that alter our environment, moving around, driving, flying, talking to each other, talking shit.
00:56:38.000But at the end of the day, You're only aware of what you've experienced.
00:57:09.000I think a lot of people that have come that close to dying, a lot of them are going to say the same thing, that they have no fear of death anymore.
00:58:37.000But faith and religion are two different things.
00:58:39.000A lot of people confuse them, and they talk about them as being the same, but they are definitely not.
00:58:46.000Religion is man-made, and a set of rules, and man says, okay, we're going to be this, and if you want to be this religion, then you're going to have to go by these rules.
00:58:55.000And it's all man-made, but faith is not man-made.
00:58:59.000And so I'm a tremendous man of faith, but not religion.
00:59:03.000Yeah, some would say that you're a spiritual person.
00:59:05.000That's a thing that gets thrown around today.
00:59:27.000And maybe it's just something more for us.
00:59:30.000But the beauty of friendship and love and family, those things are intense.
00:59:38.000Beautiful, emotional experiences that I don't know.
00:59:43.000They seem to transcend just regular life itself.
00:59:47.000There's a higher power to them, a higher beauty to them.
00:59:50.000I think that's one of the things that we like when we see people doing something really great.
00:59:55.000We love seeing people accomplish things because we like seeing people succeed.
01:00:00.000We like seeing people that have doubts and something almost insurmountable and incredibly difficult in front of them, and then they overcome.
01:00:56.000Like, when you know someone's, like, there for you, and you know you're there for them, like that camaraderie, that intense camaraderie, it's like that expression, the windows to the soul, that the eyes are the windows to the soul, it really does seem like that, right?
01:01:42.000And I told you the first time I had the open-heart surgery and flatlined three times, During that surgery, I also had an experience that also strengthens my belief in there being something after the body dies.
01:02:04.000A vision or whatever you want to call it.
01:02:09.000I was able to see my mother, who had passed away the year before.
01:05:11.000So he was super dedicated, you know, to, you know, part of him was super dedicated to what he believed.
01:05:19.000And then, you know, you go over to Sister Sally's house to give her a consultation, and I'm looking, and her bedroom door is open, and there's my dad with his fucking t-shirt on.
01:05:46.000I'm like, fuck, what kind of consultation is he doing?
01:05:51.000I think right now we're experiencing some of the most insidious aspects of religion in the people attacking people while they're worshiping.
01:06:01.000Muslims attacking Christians, Christians attacking Muslims, and it's like In synagogues and Christians attacking Jews.
01:08:10.000Yeah, I mean, there's so many issues, right?
01:08:15.000There's so many issues with poverty, with crime, with all these different things in this world today.
01:08:21.000But the religion issue and the hatred of other people's religions has got to be one of the strangest aspects of our community or our cultures.
01:09:26.000I mean, marathon runners have that sort of camaraderie, that feeling like if someone can actually complete marathons and then ultra marathons, do you have the goods?
01:09:36.000No one gives a fuck if you're Chinese or Nope.
01:09:54.000I've always said that one of the best ways to stop bullying, and it sounds counterproductive and counterintuitive, but to stop bullying, teach kids how to fight.
01:10:06.000And the ones who are the strongest, they won't have this need to impose on people.
01:10:12.000That doesn't exist in jujitsu the way it exists in kids.
01:10:18.000Because kids are insecure and they have this weapon being bigger or being meaner or being more aggressive and scaring kids and they see someone intimidated and they can't help themselves because they don't have any guidance.
01:10:29.000No one's taught them the proper way to behave and think.
01:10:33.000And no one's taught them the consequences of that shitty behavior and thinking.
01:10:37.000They just get away with it, they do it, and they don't think that it's hurting anybody.
01:15:15.000There's a guy named John Donoher, who's a jiu-jitsu genius, and he came to me once, and it turned out he actually knew, but he was playing it off like he didn't know.
01:15:24.000He was telling me that he wanted George St. Pierre, who was the interweight champion at the time.
01:15:28.000You know I know who George St. Pierre is.
01:15:57.000I mean, but when I was a kid, man, it's hard for me to even talk about it now because it seems like a different life, like a different person.
01:16:06.000From the time I was 15 till I was 21, I was obsessed.
01:17:25.000You can't just go run off and decide you're going to be a professional this or a professional that because that's what my brain wants to do.
01:17:32.000My brain wants to find something and go, what's this thing?
01:18:28.000Yeah, I hated it whenever I had a job.
01:18:29.000Whatever job I had, I fucking hated it.
01:18:31.000And I had a bunch of part-time bullshit jobs because I wouldn't take a real job on because I was so scared that if I had like a real nine-to-five and then started getting a career and then have a family, got married, I'd be trapped.
01:18:53.000And there's a lot of people that live that life.
01:18:55.000What I've always told people is before you have all those other things, a mortgage and family and all that other stuff, damn, dude, funnel that energy into you, into what you like.
01:19:38.000There's some people that they don't have that obsessed mind.
01:19:42.000Their mind is like they're better off running a country store somewhere, just being real friendly to people that come in, being a baker, making good food for folks.
01:19:54.000There's some people that that's their thing.
01:20:30.000Reinforcement of positive goals and reinforcement of positive experiences.
01:20:36.000I think there's some people that just, they never got any of that and everything was just work and just drudgery and they'd rather just lay around because that is the alternative to work and drudgery.
01:26:36.000Psychiatrists are just dealing with crazy fucks all day long.
01:26:39.000That's their chosen thing to deal with next.
01:26:43.000When I was briefly in college, one of the things that I was concentrating on was psychology.
01:26:48.000Because I was trying to find out what, like I knew there was times when I fought and I was very confident and I knew there was times that I fought that I was a nervous wreck.
01:26:56.000And I was like why, what is that, that feeling of nerves where you're scared is very compromising.
01:27:15.000And so I was reading a lot of psychology books and philosophy books, a lot of samurai books.
01:27:21.000But one thing I realized in talking to people that were like psychologists or psychology majors, like You're dealing with fucked up people.
01:30:07.000For folks who don't know, one of the reasons I brought up Raymond Daniels is Raymond Daniels is a Bellator kickboxing champion now.
01:30:14.000He lost in devastating fashion to Nicky Holtzkin, who's another world champion, and also to Joseph Valtellini, who's another world champion.
01:30:23.000So when he was making the transition from karate champion to kickboxing champion, he had some stumbling.
01:32:13.000I love watching those guys and guys like Michael Venom Page, who's another one, who has those karate skills, but then they're learning all the skills of MMA. Yeah.
01:32:22.000And then you see, man, if you don't know that karate style and he knows MMA, you're kind of fucked because they do shit that's outlandish.
01:38:27.000Judging by his fights with Derrick Lewis, who's a fucking huge guy, and knocking out Stipe Miocic, who nobody's ever been able to do it like that before, the way DC did it.
01:38:37.000DC says that heavyweight is just way more powerful, hits harder, takes a punch better.
01:39:11.000My opinion is that Mighty Mouse Johnson is the greatest of all time, but the caveat is that Mighty Mouse never really fought the caliber of competition that John Jones did.
01:39:22.000Jon Jones' first fight in the UFC for a title, he's fighting Mauricio Shogun Hua, who is a legend.
01:40:15.000You know, I mean, he hasn't had a near-death experience, but I think he's had so many, like, near-career-death experiences that he appreciates it now.
01:40:23.000And I also think, to be that good, you gotta be fucking crazy, and I think Jon Jones is fucking crazy, and he's just getting his crazy online.
01:42:06.000I'm glad you brought up soldiers because I'm a veteran, I'm a veteran myself, and I, you know, have a lot of PTSD. I was hoping that during the conversation we could get PTSD in there some kind of way because my dad suffered from PTSD big time.
01:42:28.000He went in the Korean War at age 16. He had a guy signed for him and said he was his dad and he was able to get in for a while like that.
01:42:47.000I give him a pass on a lot of the crazy shit he did.
01:44:33.000I want to ask your opinion about something, Joe.
01:44:36.000Do you think a police chief, or if a guy can be, do you think a guy can possibly rise to police chief without ever having been an officer himself?
01:45:46.000I think that if you are going to be able to tell people where they go and that they have to risk their life on a campaign that many people might think is fruitless, or even worse, many people might think is financially motivated and not necessary,
01:46:01.000and you're asking someone's son to go over there and die for that, you should have some understanding about what you're saying.
01:49:50.000Because by doing that, you're saying, and when I sign this piece of paper, I don't know if there's going to be a conflict, there's going to be a war or not, but I'm signing up.
01:51:06.000Not just please everybody, but the idea that one person is going to oversee every branch of government, the military, the economy, social issues, censorship, big tech, problems with the environment.
01:54:39.000But overtraining, no, if you get enough rest and enough recuperation, I think overtraining is bullshit.
01:54:45.000Right, but if you have to work out hard, and then you have to work out again the next day, and you work out hard the next day, that's rhabdomyelosis piss.
01:54:52.000When you get rhabdo, your piss comes out looking like iced tea.
01:55:20.000And I train every, I work fucking eight hours a day, eight, ten, twelve hours a day at the post office, went to the gym, put in another four to six hours for fucking 25 years and my piss never looked like that.
01:55:36.000Yeah, I think that's more endurance athletes, and particularly CrossFit.
01:55:40.000A lot of CrossFit people get wrapped up.
01:56:48.000That's where, and I'm not qualified to judge, but there's a lot of people that are professional strength and conditioning coaches that frown upon it.
01:56:57.000Because they think that those kind of movements, like power lifting movements, like clean press, that kind of shit, that should not be done for the maximum amount of repetitions.
01:57:05.000They think that should be done for power.
01:57:07.000You should hoist up your maximum or 85% of your maximum for X amount of times, and that's it.
01:57:13.000But what they're trying to do is just, you know, if Mike does 10, I want to do 12. Mike does 12, I want to do 15. Steve Maxwell, who's a pretty famous strength and conditioning coach, he frowns upon it and he just thinks those movements are not designed for endurance.
01:57:29.000Those movements are designed for power.
01:57:32.000He thinks ultimately it's detrimental for your body.
01:57:35.000And that if you want to have a long career in fitness and constantly be able to work out deep into your 50s and 60s, he just thinks it's very detrimental for your body.
01:58:35.000All the people that give all the advice, the weightlifting advice online, I always go and look at their page and see how the fuck they look.
01:58:43.000And the overwhelming majority of Instagram coaches are fat fucks.
02:03:59.000I think that people tell me, Joe, people tell me I get letters and DMs and stuff from people from all over the planet and so many different races, Russian, Ethiopian,
02:04:53.000If I had a choice, I'd have been perfectly fucking healthy.
02:04:56.000But going through it, if it could help that guy in Sri Lanka, that guy in Russia, the guy in Prague, the guy in Ireland, if it could help them, then it was so worth it.
02:09:08.000But it changed their life for them to tell me something like that.
02:09:11.000I'm like, fuck, I'll do this shit all over again tomorrow.
02:09:15.000Well, you know, it's like what we were saying earlier about people that don't have anything that they're inspired by.
02:09:22.000And I was saying, maybe I wish I saw them when they were young.
02:09:26.000Like, maybe if you got a hold of them when they were young, you could teach them the value of expressing themselves and competing or doing something where you get positive feedback from your effort.
02:09:37.000And I think that some people, they just...
02:10:24.000Everybody's Searching for a Hero song.
02:10:27.000It was like on the Muhammad Ali life story.
02:10:32.000The original version of that song was like a docudrama on Muhammad Ali's life.
02:10:42.000But that sometimes you don't find someone for a long time, and then when you do, it changes your whole life.
02:10:52.000You find someone, maybe it's just a YouTube video, and it's you saying it's still your motherfucking set, and it's you just pushing people and telling people to go get after it.
02:11:02.000And people see that, and all of a sudden it's like they get goosebumps, their heart starts racing.
02:11:07.000It's like you gave them a drug, like you gave them fuel.
02:11:11.000And then they want to change their life.
02:11:37.000When someone like you does something that's exceptional and says something that's exceptional and has these inspirational words, it can change a person's whole life, change their whole path, change who they are.
02:11:48.000I've gotten so many messages from people that say, I lost 130 pounds.
02:13:06.000And if you accomplish everything you ever want to accomplish, but nobody's there with you, nobody cares, nobody likes you, that don't mean shit.
02:13:41.000It's just, like I told you, Joe, I never expected even, you know, live past 40. People tell me, I always think about, I'm the little kid that used to...
02:13:56.000Hide in the closet when I would hear my dad's keys rattling the door or this car pull up in the door.
02:14:04.000I would hide in the closet or try to hide me.
02:17:23.000And if you find a thing, particularly martial arts, because you get belts and ranks, and then you can see how you're doing with opponents, especially jujitsu.
02:17:32.000I like that one the most, because you're not getting hit.
02:17:34.000I think there's so many people that, especially if you go to a bad gym, in the early days, people are going to tune you up.
02:17:43.000You can get some real damage from that.
02:17:45.000Yeah, that would discourage a lot of people.
02:17:46.000Yeah, but if you could just find a thing and work hard at that thing, you'll realize through that thing that you can get good at anything with time and effort.
02:18:19.000You know how bleak it may seem, but if you have the will, the desire to change it, there's your starting point.
02:18:25.000Since you started doing these videos on YouTube to now, how much of a difference has it made in the types of people that come to your gym and the numbers of people that come in?
02:24:12.000That's more closer to being around long enough.
02:24:16.000Well, you're also, like, people, because of the fact that you've been around, you've done so much, the people will turn to you and say, hey, this is a person with real-life experience.
02:24:29.000When you start talking about pushing, when you start talking about pushing yourself, people understand this is coming from life experience.
02:25:52.000You know, because where I'm at now, I tell you, I could make a lot more money, but first responders, firemen, policemen, all vets, paramedics, they train at the gym for free.
02:28:47.000The way you let first responders and firefighters and veterans work out for free and the Wednesday night working out for free and all that.
02:29:02.000So, like, the environment around the gym, how much did it change once you started putting up those videos?
02:29:12.000It's the type of gym, my gym is the type of gym that if you don't, you know, I gotta say this, we got number two behind Gold's Gym as the favorite hardcore gym in America, Iron Attic Gym.
02:36:14.000You know, more than I, you know, I'm still shocked.
02:36:18.000But, you know, I go to the store, I was walking down the street the other day, and it got, hey, CT! You know, I was yelling and screaming from the car, and I'm like, man, how do you even know who the fuck I am?
02:36:30.000Because I figure if you're not a weightlifter and you don't look at YouTube, then, and I know that's a lot of people, how would anybody, you know, wouldn't even know who the fuck I was, you know.
02:36:42.000So I'm still shocked by it, but I get recognized more than I, you know, more than I thought I would.
02:36:48.000This C.T. Fletcher 2.0, this life that you're living right now.
02:38:37.000I started a Nonprofit organization in the name of my mom.
02:38:43.000And it's to people, because a transplant is a very, I mean, a lot of people, if it wasn't for the Army, if it wasn't for me being a veteran, there's no way I could afford a transplant.
02:39:18.000I started the Osprey Futter Heart Foundation to help people, uh, With that, to help the mom who's still at home, who still has to pay the bills and stuff, because insurance doesn't cover everything.
02:39:31.000To help the people that don't, you know, I haven't even had my first event or anything like that.
02:39:37.000I just paid the lawyer to get the name and stuff.
02:39:46.000I'm going to do something for my mom so her memory will go on, you know, even after I'm I want to do something to honor her because that woman, you know, everything I am is because of her.
02:39:59.000So I want to do something to honor her.
02:40:01.000I just got all these things I want to do to help my veterans with PTSD. I got so many goals and stuff to live for, Joe.
02:41:43.000Listen brother, it's my pleasure and for people that are listening that have never heard you before or watching You got to go watch his videos.
02:41:49.000This is the reason why you got on the first place I got so inspired by your shit and seeing you online with these these videos and Just shows your passion and your motivation and now to see you this new person on top of that still have the passion But now you there's like this you like this New enlightened C.T. Fletcher.